Ecumenical & Interfaith
Network - PCUSA

Religious Conversion

Ecumenical efforts toward an interreligious issue:
from controversy to a shared code of conduct on religious conversion

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Ecumenical prayers requested amidst violence in India

Following the killing in Orissa state, India of a Hindu swami who had prominently accused Christians of unethically seeking the conversion of Hindus, Christians are being targeted and indiscriminate violence has led to deaths of vulnerable persons, church burnings, and destruction of institutions -- in spite of the fact that Maoists have claimed responsibility for the original death. The World Council of Churches general secretary has said, "Religious fanaticism has once again broken the lives of the poor."  Prayers on Sunday, September 7, are especially requested, as are letters of support written to Orissa Christians.

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Ecumenical efforts of the World Council of Churches and others |

| Religious conversion as related to: | Europe | Asia and the Middle East | the United States |

| Evangelism and conversion of Jews to Christianity |

At the World Council of Churches

The study

The Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue and the WCC's Office on Interreligious  Relations and Dialogue initiated a three-year study on the controversial issue of religious conversion in 2006. Their goals were (1) to address religious conversion and changes of religious affiliation from a Christian perspective and (2) to establish, in cooperation with people of other faiths, a code of conduct on religious conversion. In August 2007, as participants in an intra-Christian consultation, the World Evangelical Alliance (WEA) became a part of the process.

"It is of particular urgency that mission be understood and practiced in a way which does not lead to an increase of hatred and violence," WCC general secretary Samuel Kobia said in April 2007. "That's one of the reasons we are involved with the Roman Catholic, Evangelical, and Pentecostal churches in searching for a code of conduct on conversion."

A code of conduct on conversion is not expected to have formal authority in any of the Christian communities who are participating. Nonetheless, planners hope that it can provide guidance and a kind of "peer pressure" which advances the cause of religious freedom. They would like a "code" that can be used in conversations with governments considering anti-conversion laws, address other religions’ concerns about Christian proselytism, and inspire other religious communities to consider their own codes of conduct. The same code may also help ease tensions within the Christian community itself where, for example, the issue is a tense one between the Roman Catholic Church and the Pentecostal movement in Latin America.

Stage One: Interfaith consultation

A May 2006 meeting meeting of a multireligious group of 27 persons affirmed freedom of religion as a "non-negotiable" human right valid for everyone everywhere and at the same time called attention to an "obsession of converting others." See testimonies from the meeting's hearing. Its reflections and recommendations include:

• Freedom of religion is a fundamental, non-negotiable right that includes freedom to practice one’s faith, to propagate the teachings of a faith, and to embrace another faith by free choice.
• The right to invite others to one's faith should not violate others’ rights or religious sensibilities. There should be transparency in the practice.
• Humanitarian work should be carried out with no ulterior motives and without taking advantage of the vulnerable. In time of need, “what we can do together, we should not do separately.”
• Members of each faith should listen to how people of other faiths perceive them.

Stage Two: intra-Christian consultation

An August 2007 intra-Christian consultation looked toward an end-product, an ethical code of conduct for religious conversions. The keynote presentation provides an idea of where the project needs to go to respond to the voices of the many Christian participants -- evangelicals, Pentecostals, Protestants, Anglicans, Orthodox, and Catholics. The WCC press report on the meeting lists some of the issues:

• understandings of conversion, witness, mission and evangelism, and concern for human dignity
• distinction between aggressive proselytizing and evangelism
• balance between the mandate to evangelize and the right to choose one’s religion

Next stage: preparing a document draft

A meeting in 2008 will draft a code of conduct document, building on the findings of the earlier consultations.

The WCC stance on proselytism

A document, “Towards Common Witness: A call to adopt responsible relationships and to renounce proselytism” adopted by the central committee of the World Council of Churches Central Committee in 1997, addresses the issue of proselytism among the churches. Interfaith discussions have pointed to this document as a good basis to begin thinking about the ethics of relationships with those outside the community of the Christian Church. (See especially section III.)

For a look at the Christian-Muslim discussions convened by the WCC that have examined the question of proselytism, see the chapter by Margaret O. Thomas in Christianity and Human Rights.

Hans Ucko, then in the WCC office on Inter-Religious Affairs and Dialogue, spoke to an Indian newspaper, the Deccan Herald, in the fall of 2006, saying "any targeting of others [is] a disrespectful act. It objectifies the other, reducing him or her to be only a receiver of what I have to say or communicate." But Ucko did not endorse use of legislation to ban "proselytism."

Looking ahead to a final document

The World Evangelical Alliance (WEA) has said, through a representative, that it is ready, in principle, to support a code of conduct on conversion. It will review the code thoroughly once it has been drafted and will decide then whether it will be appropriate to recommend it. The WEA says that churches in other traditions acknowledge evangelicals as taking the brunt of persecution and that they are grateful others "are standing with us to assert our God-ordained right to evangelize a needy world . . ." See the web page of WEA's religious liberty commission.

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In Asia and the Middle East

Ferment in India

A group of Indian Christians, members of the Bangalore Initiative for Religious Dialogue (BIRD), proposed an amendment to Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that would add the words, "no individual or organization may seek to convert an individual or group of individuals, including minors or individuals of limited cognitive abilities, formally or informally, from one religion to another by offering financial or other material incentives, through physical, mental, or emotional coercion, or through threats or intimidation of any kind." At the same time, the BIRD members affirm the Great Commission that "unequivocally calls us to witness to Christ in a pluralistic setting."

The conflict concerning conversion was highlighted recently by the killing, in the tribal area of Orissa state, of an anti-conversion swami, Lakshmanananda Saraswati. Christians were among those accused of the deed and continuing violent attacks against them led to a decision to close some 30,000 church educational institutions around the country for a day on August 29. (ENI #08-0683) Minorities now constitute some 18 1/2% of India's population. Among India's population are also numbers who come from communities that have mixed Hindu-Muslim backgrounds, who become targets for mass conversion attempts to rectify their religious identity. In the Indian state of Gujarat, a Freedom of Religion Act was passed in 2003 but rules for its implementation were only framed in 2008. The law is intended to curb conversions made by force, fraud, or allurement and to punish forced conversions by jail terms. Anyone now wishing to convert must inform the government, and clergy "seeking to convert someone" must obtain prior permission. Hence the legislation is known as an "anti-conversion law."

Islamic scholars statements on freedom of religion in Islam

Ali Gomaa, the Grand Mufti of Egypt, wrote that there is no compulsion in religion (Qur'an 2:256) in this world, and it is between the individual and God "unless it is combined with an attempt to undermine the stability of the society, in which case it is the society that holds them to account, not Islam" and "preservation of the society takes precedence over personal freedoms." Likewise, according to Muhammad Hussein Fadlallah, a leading Lebanese Shi'a intellectual, "Embracing Islam is not only a matter of the heart and faith, but it is a commitment to belonging to the society and to the practice of Islamic law in the Muslim country the Muslim lives in." The BBC reports that Abdal Hakim Murad, a lecturer at Cambridge University, points out that Islamic law is diverse and, "in terms of public law, on most issues there is no consensus." Some scholars favor a death penalty for apostasy -- the abandonment of one's faith -- and others say the punishment should be left to God on the day of judgment.

Potential legislation in Iran

The Iranian parliament is considering legislation that would make the death penalty mandatory in cases of apostasy, i.e., when a person leaves Islam. The World Evangelical Alliance (WEA) religious liberties commission is the source of an article that says, "The draft Internet Crime Bill which is presently being debated in the parliament will, if passed, make apostasy and promoting apostasy (even through Internet articles and weblogs) a mandatory capital offence on the grounds that it harms the 'mental security' of society."

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In Europe

Joint agreement by Muslims and Christians on religious conversion signed in Norway

A joint declaration on the freedom of religion and the right to conversion was signed on August 22, 2007 by the general secretaries of the Islamic Council of Norway and the [Lutheran] Church of Norway council on ecumenical and international relations, the majority religious group. The church council leader says, "As far as we know, this is the first time that a church and representative national Muslim organization have jointly acknowledged the right to convert."

In the United States

Interfaith organization's statement on proselytism

Since 1987, the InterFaith Conference of Metropolitan Washington has had a statement on proselytism. Presbyterian minister Clark Lobenstine is executive director of the conference.

The special case of Christian evangelization of Jews

Evangelical views

The World Evangelical Alliance (WEA) sponsored a one-page statement urging Christian evangelization of Jews in Christian magazines and secular newspapers during April and May 2008, including a March 28 New York Times ad. The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) countered that Jewish converts to Christianity are " using their religious and cultural Jewish experience as tools to proselytize Jews" and a blogger wrote that "the ad pretends it is directed as a friendly communique to Jews. I actually took it as a declaration of war."  See Christianity Today's (CT) March 26 posting and its links, as well as the Willowbank Declaration mentioned by CT. Refer also to the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) study document on a Theological Understanding of the Relationship Between Christians and Jews.

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