Oct 23, 2012
Dr. Brian Grim, lead researcher and author of a new Pew Forum Report, will discuss the “Rising Tide of Religious Restrictions around the World”. Even before the recent turmoil in the Middle East and North Africa – including attacks on U.S. embassies and the killing of an American ambassador – the region was experiencing increasing hostilities and tensions involving religion. A new report by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life finds that as of mid-2010 – six months before the outbreak of events that would become known as the Arab Spring – the Middle East-North Africa had by far the world’s highest levels of social hostilities involving religion as well as government restrictions on religious beliefs and practices.