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发帖数: 29846 | 1 By Patrick Goodenough
November 30, 2011
(CNSNews.com) – A religious freedom advocacy group is challenging all 2012
presidential contenders to sign a pledge committing themselves to promote
religious freedom at home and to make it a foreign policy priority.
As of late Tuesday, Republican former Sen. Rick Santorum had signed the Open
Doors USA pledge and the other candidates – including the Democratic
incumbent – were “considering” doing so, the organization said.
Signatories to the “pledge for religious freedom” commit themselves to
uphold religious freedom for Americans of all faiths; to nominate federal
judges who are committed to upholding religious freedom (including the right
to employ religious arguments in contending for or against laws and
policies such as those “designed to protect the unborn and traditional
marriage”); and to prioritize religious freedom in U.S. foreign policy.
Several dozen institutions, organizations and individuals in the religious
freedom field have endorsed the pledge, and Open Doors is also inviting
Americans to sign a petition urging candidates to sign.
“Open Doors will approach candidates, informing them how many Americans
have signed the petition,” the ministry said in a statement. “This will
help them understand that the public cares about religious freedom and wants
our president to protect and promote it.”
“Religious freedom is foundational to American society, and a key indicator
of prosperity in most societies worldwide,” said the group’s advocacy
director, Lindsay Vessey. “Candidates need to hear from American voters
that this is an important issue.”
Promoting religious freedom as a U.S. foreign policy priority moved onto
Washington’s agenda 13 years ago, with the passage of the International
Religious Freedom Act (IRFA).
The legislation established an office in the State Department led by an
ambassador-at-large to oversee the issue and produce an annual report. It
also set up an independent advisory commission, and provided tools and
incentives including the “countries of particular concern” designation for
regimes that perpetrate or condone religious persecution.
‘Anti-Christian spring’
International religious freedom has not featured strongly as a stand-alone
issue in the 2012 GOP presidential primary race, although the issue has made
brief appearances in platforms, debates and interviews.
One of the most direct references to the issue came during a Nov. 12 foreign
policy debate in South Carolina, when former House Speaker Newt Gingrich
responded to a question about Egypt.
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“Candidly, the degree to which the Arab spring may become an anti-Christian
spring is something which bothers me a great deal,” he replied. “And I
would certainly have the State Department intervening on behalf of the
Coptic Christians, who are being persecuted under the new system, having
their churches burned, having people killed. And I’d be pretty insistent
that we are not going to be supportive of a regime which is explicitly
hostile to religions other than Islam.”
Gingrich, who converted from Protestantism to Catholicism two years ago,
identifies “Protecting life and religious liberty” as one of eight “
solutions” in his campaign platform.
His 13-strong “national security advisory team” announced a week ago
includes an international religious freedom expert – Tina Ramirez, director
of international and government relations for the Becket Fund for Religious
Liberty.
Santorum, a conservative Catholic, has long championed the issue, and while
a senator founded and led the Congressional Working Group on Religious
Freedom, a group of lawmakers meeting regularly to discuss international and
domestic religious freedom concerns.
In a video message last June, Rep. Michele Bachmann (Minn.), an evangelical,
voiced concern about developments in Egypt and Libya, noting that those
rising up to replace Arab tyrants were not “necessarily peaceful lovers of
liberty.”
“Upholding American values doesn’t require us to support the rise to power
of those who reject the bedrock notions of liberty, of individual rights
and freedom of religion that are the foundations of the American creed –
just because they manage to convince a majority of voters to support their
intolerant message,” she said.
In his 44-page foreign policy strategy released last month, former
Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, a Mormon, said that as president he
would “vigorously support and engage civil society groups within China that
are promoting democratic reform, anti-corruption efforts, religious freedom
, and women’s and minority rights.”
Romney also pledged that as part of his response to the upheavals in the
Middle East he would “convene a summit that brings together world leaders,
donor organizations, and young leaders of groups that espouse the principles
of representative government, religious pluralism, economic opportunity,
women’s and minority rights, and freedom of expression and conscience in
the Arab world.”
‘Freedom to worship is a basic human right’
In a newly-released “vision for foreign policy and national security” –
essentially his assessment of 20 key bilateral relationships – former
corporate executive Herman Cain, a Baptist, cautioned that in supporting
Syria’s anti-Assad opposition the U.S. must keep “a keen eye toward
protecting Syria’s significant Christian minority.”
Cain also warned that a “nightmare” may be unfolding in Egypt, pointing
among other things to what he called “open season on Coptic Christians,
with churches being burned and mobs on killing sprees.”
Texas Rep. Ron Paul, a Protestant, declares on his campaign site, “I have
accepted Jesus Christ as my personal Savior, and I endeavor every day to
follow Him in all I do and in every position I advocate.”
The libertarian and fiscal conservative opposes policies that he regards as
interference in other countries’ affairs, including attempts to promote
religious freedom abroad. He was one of 14 Republicans to vote against the
IRFA in 1998. (The bill passed in the House by 375-41, and in the Senate by
98-0.)
Texas Gov. Rick Perry, a Methodist who is outspoken about his faith,
recently condemned the authorities in Iran for sentencing to death an
Iranian pastor convicted of apostasy.
“There is no shade of gray or room for equivocation here,” Perry said in a
statement. “Freedom to worship is a basic human right, and the charges
against Pastor [Youcef] Nadarkhani are an affront to the essential
principles of the civilized world.”
Former Utah governor Jon Huntsman, a Mormon, referred to religious freedom
as an American value during a foreign policy speech in New Hampshire last
month
Describing his meetings with Chinese dissidents while serving as U.S.
ambassador in Beijing, he recalled, “What was always clear to me was that
those seeking reform and change drew strength from our nation’s values –
the openness, the freedoms of speech, assembly, religion and press.”
“Half a world away they could see this country’s light. Dissidents around
the world can see it,” Huntsman said. “That is America’s value in the
world today. When we shine our light abroad magnified by a strong core at
home, we are invincible.” |
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