For the past six years the Religious Freedom Project (RFP) at Georgetown University’s Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs has been the global center for cutting edge research into the meaning, value, and impact of religious freedom. It will continue that work into the future.

RFP leaders Thomas Farr, Timothy Shah, and Byron Johnson are proud to announce the creation of a new religious freedom organization—the Religious Freedom Institute (RFI). In leading this new organization they will be joined by Kent Hill, formerly the vice president of international programs at World Vision.

The Religious Freedom Institute will take the learning generated at Georgetown’s RFP and “put it on the ground” in order to advance religious freedom around the world, and to help people who are being persecuted because of their religious beliefs.

The mission of the RFI is to achieve broad acceptance of religious liberty as a fundamental human right, the cornerstone of a successful society, and a source of national and international security.

This work will be carried out initially through four RFI action teams. Regional action teams will seek the cultural and political advance of religious freedom in parts of the world currently resistant to religious freedom, or where religious freedom is in retreat. Our initial key geographic areas are the Middle East, South and Southeast Asia, and the United States. A fourth action team will focus on international religious freedom as an aspect of foreign policy.

Research and teaching around religious liberty will continue at the Berkley Center under the auspices of the Religious Freedom Research Project (RFRP). The RFRP will continue the scholarly work of the RFP and extend its successful efforts to establish religious freedom as a field of interdisciplinary inquiry.

More information at: Religious Freedom Institute (RFI)