Dossiê: Laicidade, Estado e Religião - Artigo original

This article presents an analysis based on bibliogr aphic and documentary research and aims to show the relationship between secularit y and freedom of conscience, differentiating it from religious freedom. The text shows an overview of national and foreign thinkers who have reflected on the issu e of secularism and the events that have led do the separation of church and state in France (considered as the country of the secularism) and in Brazil. It also c larifies some basic concepts, including the concept of secularism, often wrongly taken as anticlericalism in the Country. This text presents the genesis of seculari sm and concludes by relating the defense of secularism by the state with in defense of individual rights to freedom of conscience, always taking into account the required legislation. Finally, the present text started from the following statement of Lacord aire ‐ “Between the strong and the week (…), is the freedom which oppresses and th e law that liberates” ‐ it used other quotes by the same author, it analyzed some c ollected documents, and then it returned to the statement of Lacordaire.