Typically, questioning religious community’s right to fully practice their religious freedoms is preceded by (and resulted in) widespread disinformation and stereotyping: religious community may be widely known yet misunderstood, which calls for empirical clarification. Maintaining a constructive dialogue between religious communities and officials, and the legislative, is more challenging if the religious context is not properly understood in a secular society.
This paper gives a summary why emphasis in strengthening religious literacy is needed in order to secure religious freedoms. The paper analyses recent court cases involving Jehovah's Witnesses in Norway and Belgium. The goal of these case studies is to show what specific religious concepts are seen as problematic and what approach the courts have taken in their judgments.