A/68/290 religious scriptures, normative rules, rituals and ceremonies, organizations and hierarchies, come into the focus of human rights. 24. For a discussion of the complex relationship between freedom of religion or belief and equality between men and women it is important to bear in mind the indirectness that characterizes the relationship between human rights and religions and beliefs. In the framework of human rights, legal recognition cannot be accorded to the particular contents of religions or beliefs, namely, their doctrines, truth claims, practices and value systems, among other aspects, but is due to human beings as the responsible actors who hold, profess, cherish and develop their various religious or belief orientations, as individuals and in community with others. 25. The consistent focus on the human person as rights holder does not mean to adopt an anthropocentric worldview in which the human being figures as “the measure of all things”. For many (not all) people, religious convictions, spiritual values and norms that claim a transcendent origin constitute a most important part of their daily lives and possibly the backbone of their personal and communitarian identities. The Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Intolerance and of Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief states that “religion or belief, for anyone who professes either, is one of the fundamental elements in his conception of life”. Thus, freedom of religion or belief serves the purpose of respecting and protecting this reality in the specific mode of universal human rights guarantees. 26. However, to take religions and beliefs in all their dimensions seriously also implies taking pluralism seriously, including sometimes irreconcilable differences in world views and practices. If the State protects the doctrinal and normative contents of one particular religion as such, this will almost inevitably lead to discrimination against adherents of other religions or beliefs, which would be unacceptable from a human rights perspective. It is not least for this reason that human rights epitomize a shift of focus from beliefs to believers, in order to appreciate existing religious or belief diversity on the basis of non-discrimination and equality. Accordingly, the human right to freedom of religion or belief does not protect religious traditions per se, but instead facilitates the free search and development of faith-related identities of human beings, as individuals and in community with others. 2. Synergies and conflicts 27. On the phenomenological level, the question of how freedom of religion or belief relates to gender issues does not find one general answer, but largely depends on how people actually make use of their human rights. Obviously, the ways in which individuals resort to their right to freedom of religion or belief differ widely. Freedom of religion or belief is a norm to which liberals and conservatives, feminists and traditionalists, and others, can refer in order to promote their various and often conflicting religious or belief-related concerns, including conflicting interests and views in the field of religious traditions and gender issues. 28. Freedom of religion or belief, in conjunction with freedom of expression, helps open up religious traditions to systematic questions and debates. In discourses on religious issues everyone should have a voice and a chance to be heard, from adherents of conservative or traditional interpretations to liberal critics or reform theologians. However, by also empowering groups who traditionally experience discrimination, including women and girls, freedom of religion or belief can serve as a normative reference point for questioning patriarchal tendencies as they exist in 13-42191 7/22