Religious-Liberty-Annual-Report

II – What Is Religious Liberty and Why Does It Matter? 11

in men’s faithfulness to God and to his holy will. (6)

political community. This means that the government does not force its citizens to conform to one particu lar religion, but neither does it treat religion as a pri vate matter or religious institutions as mere voluntary associations. As Pope Francis teaches: A healthy pluralism, one which genuinely re spects differences and values them as such, does not entail privatizing religions in an at tempt to reduce them to the quiet obscurity of the individual’s conscience or to relegate them to the enclosed precincts of churches, synagogues, or mosques. This would repre sent, in effect, a new form of discrimination and authoritarianism. ( Evangelii Gaudium , 255) This committee strives to promote this kind of healthy pluralism in the United States today.

A government that promotes the common good will recognize that religious individuals, communities, and institutions need space to flourish, and such flourish ing ultimately redounds to the benefit of the broader

CNS photo/Lola Gomez