American Christians calling for censorship based on religious beliefs should look to Saudi Arabia for an indication of what faith-based government means. There, government recently sentenced “prominent Saudi blogger [Raif Badawi] to 10 years in prison and 1,000 lashes for insulting Islam,” Fox News reports.
Badawi’s wife, Ensaf Haidar, “who fled the nation two years ago and now lives near Montreal,” said,
I am very shocked by the news, but the Saudi government is radical Muslim. [Badawi] is the leader of the Saudi liberal movement, and the government wants to make a symbol out of him.
Philip Luther of Amnesty International said of Badawi:
He is a prisoner of conscience who is guilty of nothing more than daring to create a public forum for discussion and peacefully exercising the right to freedom of expression.
Let us hope the Saudi government overturns this vicious, rights-violating sentence. And let us hope Americans come to see that when religion is mixed with government, rights-violations inexorably ensue.
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