ROME (CNS) — Religious freedom shouldn’t be solely a elementary and important human proper, “it’s also a pathway to fact and deeper communion with God and neighbor,” mentioned Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Vatican secretary of state.
Nonetheless, non secular freedom is severely restricted in 62 of the world’s 196 nations, affecting round 5.4 billion individuals; “in different phrases, nearly two-thirds of the world’s inhabitants lives in nations the place critical violations of non secular freedom happen,” the cardinal mentioned.
Cardinal Parolin was citing info contained within the 2025 Religious Freedom Report compiled by the papal basis Support to the Church in Want and launched Oct. 21 throughout a convention at Rome’s Augustinianum Patristic Institute.
The truth that the 2025 report runs 1,248 pages, the most important in its 25-year historical past, “signifies that violations of non secular freedom are growing 12 months on 12 months,” the cardinal mentioned.
The report, masking the interval of Jan. 1, 2023, to Dec. 31, 2024, discovered that “grave and systemic violations, together with violence, arrest and repression, have an effect on greater than 4.1 billion individuals in nations equivalent to China, India, Nigeria and North Korea.”
Talking to reporters after the occasion, Cardinal Parolin cautioned towards contemplating all assaults on Christians in Nigeria as indicators of non secular persecution.
Citing native church sources, the cardinal mentioned a lot of the violence in Nigeria “shouldn’t be a non secular battle, it’s extra of a social battle, for instance between herders and farmers.”
And the place Muslim extremists are attacking Christians, he mentioned, additionally they assault Muslims who disagree with them. “These are extremist teams that make no distinctions in pursuing their objectives. They use violence towards anybody they take into account an opponent.”
Support to the Church in Want listed one other 38 nations — together with Egypt, Ethiopia, Mexico, Turkey and Vietnam — as nations the place “non secular discrimination” is widespread. The muse mentioned that in these nations “non secular teams face systematic restrictions on worship, expression and authorized equality. Whereas not topic to violent repression, discrimination usually ends in marginalization and authorized inequality.”
In Mexico, in addition to in Haiti, the report mentioned, “organized crime is a key driver of persecution or discrimination” with clergymen and different church staff being kidnapped or murdered and home of worship and sacred objects being desecrated in “an environment of blatant impunity” as the federal government fails to cease the drug cartels and prison gangs.
Talking on the presentation of the report, Cardinal Parolin targeted on the Catholic Church’s help for the non secular freedom of all individuals, regardless of their religion, and on the upcoming sixtieth anniversary of the Second Vatican Council’s Declaration on Religious Freedom.
The council’s help for non secular liberty was “a name to motion primarily based on the council’s perception that God himself has made recognized to mankind the best way by which males are to serve him and thus be saved in Christ,” the cardinal mentioned.
And whereas all individuals have a “ethical obligation” to hunt the reality, Cardinal Parolin mentioned, nobody could be compelled to take action.
“One should and may solely reply in a technique: freely, that’s to say, out of affection, with love, not by pressure, as a result of Christianity is love,” the cardinal mentioned.
On a private degree, he mentioned, non secular freedom “protects the inside sanctuary of the conscience, the God-given compass that guides moral and non secular selections.”
And, he mentioned, on a collective degree “it fosters vibrant communities the place individuals of various faiths can reside collectively, contribute to society and interact in constructive dialogue with out concern of persecution.”
The 2025 Religious Freedom report discovered that “non secular nationalism is on the rise, fueling exclusion and repression of minorities. Nationwide identification is more and more formed by ethno-religious nationalism, eroding minority rights.”
“In India and Myanmar,” for instance, it mentioned, non secular nationalism “drives persecution; in Palestine, Israel, Sri Lanka and Nepal, it fuels discrimination.”
The report additionally discovered that “non secular persecution more and more fuels pressured migration and displacement,” with victims around the globe fleeing “violence, discrimination and the absence of state safety.”
Support to the Church in Want credited the Vatican’s 2018 provisional settlement with China’s communist authorities for “indicators of enchancment” for the nation’s Christians however famous that enchancment utilized solely to Christians belonging to government-recognized Christian organizations.
Catholic clergymen and bishops continued to be arrested or detained for not becoming a member of the Catholic Patriotic Affiliation, and in lots of components of China anybody beneath the age of 18 is prevented from attending church or a church-sponsored occasion, the report mentioned.
With the arrest and exile of bishops and clergymen, the confiscation of church property and the banning of non secular processions and different public celebrations, the state of affairs in Nicaragua is also highlighted within the e book.
“In the course of the interval beneath overview, hostility towards church buildings intensified, severely violating the basic proper to non secular freedom,” it mentioned.
Support to the Church in Want additionally known as consideration within the report: to “a pointy rise in antisemitic and anti-Muslim hate crimes,” together with in Europe and North America; arson assaults on church buildings in Canada; and vandalism or desecration of church buildings in the US.
