I was raised Catholic. During the first year of my marriage, though, I realized that I was finding myself drawn in a somewhat different spiritual direction, and left the Church. At no time did I expect the force of law to be applied against me – nor did I need to live in fear that I would be murdered for following my conscience.

Unfortunately, that is not the case for these folks.

A group of young Muslim apostates launches a campaign today, the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks on America, to make it easier to renounce Islam.

The provocative move reflects a growing rift between traditionalists and a younger generation raised on a diet of Dutch tolerance.

The Committee for Ex-Muslims promises to campaign for freedom of religion but has already upset the Islamic and political Establishments for stirring tensions among the million-strong Muslim community in the Netherlands.

Ehsan Jami, the committee’s founder, who rejected Islam after the attack on the twin towers in 2001, has become the most talked-about public figure in the Netherlands. He has been forced into hiding after a series of death threats and a recent attack.

The threats are taken seriously after the murder in 2002 of Pim Fortuyn, an antiimmigration politician, and in 2004 of Theo Van Gogh, an antiIslam film-maker.

Speaking to The Times at a secret location before the committee’s launch today, the Labour Party councillor said that the movement would declare war on radical Islam. Similar organisations campaigning for reform of the religion have sprung up across Europe and representatives from Britain and Germany will join the launch in The Hague today.

“Sharia schools say that they will kill the ones who leave Islam. In the West people get threatened, thrown out of their family, beaten up,” Mr Jami said. “In Islam you are born Muslim. You do not even choose to be Muslim. We want that to change, so that people are free to choose who they want to be and what they want to believe in.”

Indeed, that threat of death is quite real, given the murders that have taken place in the Netherlands. The courageous Ayaan Hirsi Ali was forced to flee the country because of the threats against her. And around the world, individuals like Abdul Rahman and Lina Joy have faced death and imprisonment for exercising their right to follow the call of Christ, while forced conversions have become a hallmark of jihadi terrorists.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is clear on that such oppression is a violation of a fundamental right of every human being.

Article 18.

Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.

Notice, please, that there is no exception for Islam – EVERYONE had the right to change one’s religion or beliefs.

So unless we are to conclude that Muslims – including those born and raised as Muslims without their consent – are not human, then it is obligatory for every government to not only permit individual Muslims to freely change their religion, but also protect such ex-Muslims from violent reprisal by their former co-religionists.

Of course, given the violations of the rest of the rights in Article 18 in Saudi Arabia and other Muslim countries, I somehow doubt that the governments of those countries will suddenly embrace the right to renounce Islam and become an apostate. It is up to the rest of the world to apply pressure until that right is universally accepted.

Unfortunately, this does not help us to deal with the greater philosophical question – how much tolerance should we grant to a religion that not only rejects tolerance, but does so in a murderous fashion?

H/T Malkin

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