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If it were to be confirmed as official policy in Egypt, this would be historic:
Egypt's religious advisor says Muslims can choose own religion
CAIRO: Egypt's official religious advisor has ruled that Muslims are free to change their faith as it is a matter between an individual and God, in a move which could have far-reaching implications for the country's Christians.
"The essential question before us is can a person who is Muslim choose a religion other than Islam? The answer is yes, they can," Grand Mufti Ali Gomaa said in a posting on a Washington Post-Newsweek forum picked up by the Egyptian press on Tuesday.
...In many Muslim societies, those who convert to another religion are considered apostates and can be subject to capital punishment.
..."Even though it is not a criminal offence in Egypt, they get detained under emergency laws or are put on trial for contempt of religion if they wish to convert," said Hossam Bahgat of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights.
"This (ruling) is significant, especially coming from Gomaa," he added. "Between 2004 and now there have been many court cases involving Christian converts to Islam that want to convert back to Christianity who are unable to do so."
To underscore the importance of such an advance, here's a quote from Wafa Sultan, who last year was named by Time magazine as one of the 100 most influential people in the world.
When Muslims say, there are 1.3 billion of them, it makes it sound like they are the whole world. But the rest of the world is 5 billion. Muslims are a minority and they have to act like it. Those Muslims have no choice of religion, they are forced to be Muslim. Give those 1.3 billion Muslims freedom of religion, and then see how many Muslims there are in the world!
