Easter Wishes
Father Thadeus remains imprisoned by the government of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. As Amnesty International reports:
Father Thadeus Nguyen Van Ly prepared to celebrate Mass on the morning of May 17, 2001, hundreds of police officers appeared at his church and arrested him... A long-time, outspoken advocate for religious freedom in Vietnam, Father Ly was sentenced to 15 years in prison for peacefully exercising his right to freedom of expression and religion.To urge Congress to pass a resolution urging the Vietnamese government to release of Father Thadeus, please click here.
"A long-time, outspoken advocate for religious freedom in Vietnam, Father Ly was sentenced to 15 years in prison for peacefully exercising his right to freedom of expression and religion."
The sentence appears to contradict itself. If he was exercising his right to freedom of expression and religion, then that means such rights exist in Vietnam. If such rights exist, then a) why the need for him to be an outspoken advocate for them, and b) why was he arrested for exercising them? Perhaps the writer means that those rights exist universally, at least philosophically, regardless of any nation's laws?
Rights are quite independent of legalities, the sooner we all grasp this, the better. The best a law can do is secure a right.