Bolivia recently imposed severe restrictions on Religious liberty according to a report from Christianity Today, and this ought to illustrate the horror of what can happen when the government begins to infringe on this fundamental human right to conscience and religious liberty.
According to the nation’s penal code, “whoever recruits, transports, deprives of freedom, or hosts people with the aim of recruiting them to take part in armed conflicts or religious or worship organizations will be penalized 5 to 12 years of imprisonment.”
There are many things wrong with this code, but let’s begin with some of the obvious ones.
The wording is incredibly vague and highly problematic. Any church service is theoretically hosting someone with the aim to have them participate in a particular religious practice. We welcome people into our church even if they come uninvited. We are still hosting them, so the first question I have regards children. What if parents bring their child to church? That child theoretically does not have any religious beliefs when they are born, but they typically acquire the belief system of the parents at least at first. Any church is going to be hosting these children when the parents bring their children, and this could easily be seen as recruiting them to join a Religious Organization. The wording makes all parents ought to be criminals.
Second, this equates any religious organization with organizations that create armed conflicts. This perpetuates the stereotype, reinforced by everyone’s favorite John Lennon, that if we can only imagine a world without Religion, they will be no more problems in the world. Never mind all of the evil that has been committed in the name of atheistic regimes like the Soviet Union, China or North Korea, but this is a highly problematic characterization of religion by grouping it together with essentially gangs.
Another problem with this legislation is that it causes freedom of speech to be restricted. Even if we go beyond freedom of religion, another fundamental right of freedom of speech is being trampled on by this legislation. Why should anyone not be able to discuss difficult ideas and try to convince people to see the world in a different way? At least for me, I know that I am probably wrong about a lot of things, so I would think it would be a good thing if someone came along and demonstrated the error of my thinking. Rather than being something evil that must be stopped through government intervention, rigorous debate and the discussion of ideas is important and ought to be protected by the government rather than suppressed.
Clearly, this legislation in Bolivia has severe problems. However, it is not particularly surprising. When people believe that religion causes all the problems in the world, it does make sense that they would want to prohibit things like proselytizing. However, the fundamental assumption that religion causes problems is where this falls apart.
