While religion and human rights often seem to clash, in this lecture and discussion Professor John Witte Jr. will argue that religion and human rights ultimately need each other.
On the one hand, human rights norms need religions to bolster them. While there is value in declaring human rights ideals of “liberty, equality, and fraternity” or “life, liberty, and property,” these abstract ideals of a good life and a good society depend on the visions and values of religious communities to give them content, coherence, and concrete manifestation. Religions may also provide some of the essential meanings and measures of shame and regret, restraint and respect, responsibility and restitution that a human rights regime presupposes. Religions must thus be seen as indispensable allies in the modern struggle for human rights.
On the other hand, religion needs human rights for its own protection. While religious believers and groups might quietly accept the current protections of a modern human rights regime—the guarantees of liberty of conscience, freedom of exercise, religious non-discrimination and self-determination, and more—a passive acquiescence in a secular scheme of human rights ultimately will not prove effective. And failure to press unique religious rights claims will eventually leave many religious beliefs, practices, and communities too vulnerable to political dynamics of liberalism and anti-liberalism. Religious communities must reclaim their own voices within the human rights discourse, and reclaim the resources internal to their traditions to engage and affirm human rights.
Professor John Witte Jr. will deliver this lecture virtually. The event will be moderated by Dr Marietta van der Tol and followed by a panel discussion with Dr John Adenitire and Dr Emanuelle Degli Esposti.
Speakers
John Witte, Jr., J.D. (Harvard); Dr. Theol. h.c. (Heidelberg), is Woodruff University Professor, McDonald Distinguished Professor, and Director of the Law and Religion Center at Emory University.
Marietta van der Tol is a postdoctoral fellow at the Blavatnik School of Government. Her research interests include the relationship between religion, politics and society, and the role that political imaginaries play in the formation of law and public policy with regard to religious minorities in Europe.