• Introduction

     

                                                                                                                                    Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; ​this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief ​in teaching, practice, worship, and observance. Violations of freedom of religion or belief have a devastating impact on individuals, communities, and societies.

    SMC and the FORB Learning Platform offer free courses, learning resources, and training materials for individuals, communities, organizations, and decision-makers. These resources cater to personal study, staff training, and can be used by educators and facilitators for both young people and adults.

    The FORB learning platform aims to foster a culture of freedom of religion or belief at all levels—from grassroots to the top. It emphasizes the importance of human rights in achieving peace, stability, and development, promoting acceptance of rights for all despite differences. The resources are available in multiple languages and are developed in collaboration with specialists and individuals from various religious and belief backgrounds.







    • FORB Capacity development and coaching


           Capacity development on FORB for SMC members and partners

        Kristina Patring

        kristina.patring@smc.global

      Reach out to Kristina Patring, the FORB advisor at the SMC office!

      She is more than happy to give your organisation training on FORB or just be a bouncing board on how you can integrate FORB into your projects or programmes and fulfil the SMC’s requirement of FORB as an integrated perspective in planning, applications, report and follow up.

      The SMC office offers either distance advice and digital in person trainings on FORB related to other perspectives OR opportunities for IRL capacity development learning weeks. At the moment the next learning week on FORB related to issues such as democracy and civic space is planned to 2025, but these trainings often take their time to plan so if you are interested – do get in touch already now!

      • courses

        We offer three courses including our facilitated FORB training of the trainers course and two self-study courses on Freedom of religion or belief (FORB), and the Relationship between women's rights and FORB, that you can take at your own pace, at any time. 

        Click on the images to access the courses!


      • NEWS

        Course to be launched during 2024:

        Christian theological motivational grounds 

        for FORB work for all

        In this new module Kristina Patring, SMC’s advisor for FORB, invites you to reflect with us on some of the theological reasons for why we as Christians need to work with FORB as a human right for all. For persecuted Christians, but also for others whose human right to FORB is violated. The SMC is a broad ecumenical platform of churches and Christian organisations with members from all church families. 

        Therefore, the theological reflection in this course will be based on theological thought from several church traditions. Our hope and prayer is that regardless of your church background the course will equip you in your practical work and inspire you in your prayers for those persecuted for their faith.

         

        Kristina Patring is in charge of 
        developing the course.

        • Resources - The Local Changemakers Course

          Do you want to raise awareness and transform attitudes at the community level?

          The Local Changemakers Course is a series of nine face-to-face workshops, designed to enable groups of adults and young people to learn about, value and promote freedom of religion or belief (FORB) for all in their communities. A complete curriculum of course materials is available to download and use in any you find helpful. 

          Click on the image to navigate to the course, facilitator's manual, and resources! 


             Watch this film to discover the course!

             

          • learn with films

               Click on the images to access the films!





            • FORB Learning platform

              Click on the image to learn about Freedom of Religion or Belief (FORB)!


              • Exercise bank & reports