Keynote Address: After Twenty-five Years

Twenty-five years have passed since the passage of the 1981 Declaration, and it is important to celebrate the event. But what are we celebrating? Is it something more than simply the continuation of the paper trail in human rights from the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights1 to the 1966 Covenant on Civil and Political Rights2 to the 1981 Declaration on Religious Intolerance and Discrimination?3 Perhaps more importantly, why should we celebrate? One of the keys to a happy life is to go where you're celebrated, not simply tolerated. And moreover, it is the optimists who celebrate-pessimists commemorate. Do you know the difference between an optimist and a pessimist? A pessimist has more facts. That has always been true. It was true twenty years ago and twenty generations ago and will be true in the future. Here is my definition of an optimist: An optimist is the guy who falls off a ten-story building and is exclaiming as he passes the fifth floor on his way down, "So far so good!" Pessimists are steeped in reality; optimists are hopeful they can change that reality. Let me introduce what some might suggest is a very narrow distinction: the difference between tolerance and respect. Tolerance is commemorated. On the other hand, respect is celebrated. I am unapologetically tough on the concept of tolerance. Tolerance is an act of the intellect, while respect is a movement of the heart. Tolerance suggests forbearance, not equality. Tolerance starts with the premise, "I don't really have to like you. I simply have to tolerate you." Its implementation takes us to a lower common denominator. It allows me to accommodate your presence without celebrating your person. Tolerance freely uses the language of political correctness and shallow superficiality, and it diminishes the "other" while elevating the "self." In practice, it is a cheap form of grace delivered to those folks I don't especially care for. Respect, on the other hand, is a much stronger concept. Respect celebrates what we have in common, and at least one thing that we have in common is the fact that each of us has been created in the image of God. This is cause for celebration, as is the universal appeal of choice. Whether you get to the concept of choice as a rational person, thinking post-enlightenment thoughts, or as someone embracing the theological construct of free will, choice creates respect for one another, and respect honors differences while it celebrates a common humanity. The world that I see today is a world that is absolutely desperate for the celebration both of choice and of a common humanity. Let me tell you a story about a Lebanese woman by the name of Mary. Mary taught me everything I know about religious freedom. I met Mary in the early '90s, after the end of a civil war-a horrific civil war tliat was fought along religious lines and that cost 140,000 lives.4 I went into Lebanon as soon as I could after the war and that is when I met Mary. Mary told me her story. There was a day in her life when the civil war spilled over into her community and into her village. A wave of militiamen came first. They came into the village and opened fire on the town. Everybody began to run. People fell here, there, everywhere. Mary ran. Mary tripped, and before she could get up, a young militiaman with a revolver approached her. Knowing that she was a Christian, he put the revolver to her head and said, "Denounce the cross or die." Mary was merely eighteen years old. She looked up at the militiaman and said, "I was born a Christian. I'm a Christian. I will die a Christian." The revolver exploded in her face. The bullet went in just to the left of the chin and came out at the base of her head. It went right through her spine and instantly and irreparably she became a quadriplegic. Then the militiaman bent over her body and with his bayonet carved a cross on her chest and left her for dead. The next day, however, the militia had a problem. …