Morocco: The limits of Islamic religious tolerance

It took Christendom centuries, but religious tolerance eventually replaced persecution.  Today it’s hard to find a Christian society that genuinely persecutes.

In contrast, it is rare to find a Muslim nation that does not persecute.  There are the few good, which allow other faiths to exist and publicly worship.  More common are the bad and the ugly.  In the latter, Christians, Jews, Baha’is, and other religious minorities face prison and even death.  For instance, Somali Islamists recently publicly executed a Christian convert.

If you asked most evangelicals today where Morocco fits on the spectrum they’d probably say bad or ugly.  The North African state has been denounced by missionaries, human rights activists, religious leaders, and members of Congress.  One legislator even compared the Moroccans to Nazis.

It is a shocking turn for a nation that long has been among the good.  A few years ago evangelical leaders proclaimed the country “open to evangelical Christian outreach.”

Even Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va.) acknowledged that Rabat has been “a model of tolerance and modernity in the Arab world.”  But Morocco is now charged with religious persecution.

Morocco officially protects the liberty to convert. There have been complaints of social pressure and official harassment of converts, which reflects the limits of tolerance in most Islamic lands.  But Moroccan converts to Christianity do not risk forfeiting their lives—in contrast to converts in countries as diverse as Somalia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and even Malaysia.

Morocco does, however, ban proselytism.  Prohibiting the practice fits comfortably with Islam, Judaism, and even some established Christian sects that feel threatened by evangelizing Christian churches.

But restricting evangelism is a serious limitation for those who take seriously Christ’s injunction to “go and make disciples of all nations.”  (Matthew 28:19)  Nevertheless, even when affected churches do not proselytize officially and openly, church members often do so unofficially and privately.  An evangelical church in Kuwait, where the practice is similarly banned, posted the Great Commission over the door leading out of the church and the minister told me there were no restrictions on talking with Muslims who asked about the Christian faith.

Anyway, enforcement by Morocco appeared to be lax in recent years.  Rabat allowed American and other Western Christians to reside in Morocco, some for many years.  Several Americans ran the Village of Hope orphanage.

Then in March a number of foreign Christians were summarily deported; others, out of the country, were denied the right to return.  Deportations continued in later months, though apparently Morocco dropped several names from the latter list.

Some Christian groups put the total number of expulsions at 105.  Congressional sources believe the number to be closer to half of that and most of the expelled are Americans.  The Moroccan government says the larger numbers may include people who were interrogated, but claims that only five Americans were deported and another 25 were barred reentry, along with about ten other foreigners.  There is similar disagreement over the numbers involved in a second round of deportations in May.