Securing religious freedom in South Asia poses a challenge. Religious minorities are specifically targeted for their beliefs, which greatly compromises their religious freedom. The discrimination against religious minorities within each of these countries fosters a culture of impunity toward human rights violations.
While there are a lot of differences among countries in this subregion, generally speaking, Christians and other religious minorities face many consequences based on their beliefs including:
- Discrimination: Religious minorities can face discrimination in public life, such as in education, employment, and access to justice.
- Violence: Religious minorities can be targeted for their beliefs and face violence, including attacks, hate speech, destruction of churches and religious sites, and land-grabbing.
- Cultural impunity: Discrimination can create a culture that tolerates human rights abuses including false blasphemy charges.
- Majoritarian trends: Governments in South Asia have passed laws to prohibit religious conversions from the dominant religious group, which can be motivated by a fear of minority groups.
- Religious conflicts: In some countries, national identity is conflated with one religion, which can lead to political animosity towards minority groups.
Building on partnerships and past projects in South Asia, the 21Wilberforce team is currently working with local partners towards the establishment of indigenous and sustainable partner programs. As a first step in this endeavor, 21Wilberforce recently organized an advocacy and peacemaking workshop that equipped a core group of Christian leaders with advocacy and peacebuilding training. This group of leaders will help 21Wilberforce form action teams to support peacemaking efforts in the region.
Through training and close collaboration with the leadership of faith networks in the region that participated in the workshop, 21Wilberforce welcomed church and ministry leaders who represented a broad array of networks. The training and consultations were led by 21Wilberforce facilitators and one invited peacebuilding trainer from an international non-governmental organization.
The workshop started by training the leaders on the Biblical foundation and theoretical frameworks for peacebuilding. This training draws heavily on Biblical narratives and uses experiential education methods to explore topics of conflict dynamics, conflict resolution, personal conflict styles, mediation, dealing with diversity, power dynamics, and developing movement for constructive change.
The workshop quickly transitioned to working with the participants to provide hands-on exploration of peacemaking possibilities in their contexts. The participants were divided into regional and topical groups to map the landscape of challenges to peace and religious freedom they face in their regions.
Leaders in other states throughout the region shared that they fear the violence might spread to their states and that the broader Christian community is already being targeted through laws that allow for the arrest of anyone sharing the gospel or simply doing activities, such as prayers for the healing of the sick or feeding the poor, that could be construed as influencing people towards conversion. The leaders noted that while they and others in the region have launched initiatives to start to address some of these issues, there is not a united strategy to face these challenges. Many shared how their conventions and pastors do not feel equipped with the knowledge of how to face persecution or be peacemakers.
21Wilberforce provided the participant leaders with a toolbox of strategies and worked with them to develop action ideas for them to implement. In the future, the 21Wilberforce team will work alongside them to support several of their ideas.
Participants later shared that they had gained a deeper understanding of Christ-centered approaches to peacebuilding. They also shared that they were challenged to think more deeply about how to use ‘peacemaking as missions’ and came away with a new perspective on involving church leaders in the ministry of peacebuilding.
January 10, 2025