A secular society

The move towards a secular society can be a difficult process, and every country faces a unique set of challenges. The challenges include aspects to do with:

• The government (laws)
• The history of the country
• The entrenchment of religion in society
• Interactions with other countries
• The freedom and tolerance and outlook of the people

A secular society doesn’t mean that there isn’t religion in that society. A secular society means that religion does not play a part in the public aspects of that society. In other words, religion becomes a private matter, and little to no aspect of religion is used to affect or influence people in their everyday lives.

Freedom from/of religion

There are also issues to do with freedom-from and freedom-of religion, which means the degree to which people are free to practice their religion without prejudice (e.g. from other religions), and the degree to which people are able to go about their daily lives without being affected by other people practicing their religion.

Freedom from religion can also be more subtle in that there are issues to do with governments using public funds to support religious organisations or endeavors. There are also issues to do with hidden religion, for example the degree to which private companies support religion via their products and services. Issues also arise in the level of protection that is afforded to citizens (including children of course) to avoid religion, should that be their choice.

International organisations

Secular and humanitarian issues vary greatly from country to country and even from time to time within a country. The Internet has broken down some national borders as it is usually possible for citizens in one country to access web sites generated by people and organisations in another country. Unfortunately, that isn’t always the case.

There are international organisations that monitor the humanitarian, religious and secular issues within countries. These include (with links to their web sites):

• Humanists International
• Amnesty International
• Human Rights Watch
• Human Rights Foundation
• Freedom House
• Civil Rights Defenders
• UN Watch
• International Federation for Human Rights
• Humanist Mutal Aid Network

Search those web sites for issues pertaining to particular countries.

Issues in the countries of the world

The world has 195 recognized countries: 193 United Nation member states plus 2 observer states (Vatican City and Palestine). That number is seen as variable due to disputed countries, dependencies and territories. There is also the issue of wars causing country borders to be redefined over time.

About half the countries in the world are officially secular states by law, and therefore the other half are officially based on a state-sanctioned religion. In case you are wondering, there are only two countries in the world with official atheistic societies: China and North Korea.

This page provides links to sub-pages, each of which covers many of the aspects to do with religion and secular issues in the linked country. It isn’t possible to cover all aspects of this topic in every country, so the following pages address the major issues and provide links to resources that allow the reader to do further research.

Currently, almost all countries in the list are unlinked (but, coming soon). This list and the sub-pages to which they link are pretty much always going to be a work in progress and will change often. Please check back from time to time to discover more.

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