Religious Tolerance

Belonging to special groups represents a primal need for human beings as fundamentally gregarious creatures. There is a deeply engrained need to be part of a particular group, since groups by their very nature are 'safer' than being alone in hostile environments; safety in numbers. And since nature has bestowed upon her living creatures a primary need to survive, group-safety represents a survival mode to ensure vulnerable existence is prolonged.

Anyone outside one's own group was suspect, inferior, feared. Animosities between groups; clans, tribes became translated into hostilities and feuding, for territorial advantage; protecting one's camp, hunting grounds and family members from being abducted or killed. We haven't progressed all that far from our primitive roots where emotions and xenophobia are concerned. And a new report from the Pew Center tell us just that.

Rising Restrictions on Religion, published by the Pew Center's forum on Religion and Public Life, a three-year study up to mid-2009, reached the conclusion that restrictions on religious beliefs and practises have risen in 23 of the world's 198 countries, and they fell in 12 countries. Progress in human relationships is not that easily attained; our ancient suspicions and aggressive-denials remain soundly entrenched.

"Because several countries with increasing restrictions on religion are very populous, however, the increases affect a much larger share of people than of states", and the report cites China for a rise in government-instituted restrictions. "In nearly three-quarters of all countries, private citizens or groups committed crimes, malicious acts or violence motivated by religious hatred or bias."

Unsurprisingly the Islamic Middle East and North Africa are cited as the world's most religiously intolerant. Because of their anti-blasphemy laws, Christians and Jewish populations (outside Israel) are frequently harassed. And Muslims themselves suffer as well, as a result of sectarian divides with one off-shoot form of Islamic belief pitted against the other.

Five European countries were cited among the ten countries with a "substantial" increase in social hostilities: Bulgaria, Denmark, Russia, Sweden and the United Kingdom. Restrictions on religion increased in eight countries among the world's 25 most populous countries, accounting for roughly 75% of the world's population.

"In China, Nigeria, Russia, Thailand, the United Kingdom and Vietnam, the increases were due primarily to rising levels of social hostilities involving religion", according to the report. "In Egypt and France, the increases were mainly the result of government restrictions." The remainder of the 25 most-populated countries, including the United States, presented as experiencing little change in social hostilities or institutional governmental restrictions.

Government restrictions declined in Greece, Togo, Nicaragua and the Republic of Macedonia. Conversely countries that demonstrated high or rising government or social harassment of populations on religious grounds included India, Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Malaysia. In all of these countries it is obvious that Islam plays its incorrigible part in displaying intolerance for other religions.

According to the results of the report, Christianity is singled out for harassment in the greatest number of countries: 130, followed closely by Islam, in 117 countries. Proportionately, however, smaller religious groups faced more widespread harassment, with Judaism representing less than 1% of the world's population experiencing social harassment in 75 countries.

Homo Sapiens Sapiens: "Man the Wise".