A new law comes into effect on Friday which improves freedom of religion in Finland. It attempts to guarantee that anyone can practice and be educated in the faith of their choice, as well as making it easier for Finns to quit the Lutheran Church.
The new law makes it possible for adults to quit the church by mail and without waiting through the mandatory "reflection period". Teenagers are given greater freedoms as well; no longer can they be signed up or removed from a church roster without their consent.
Most of the legal reforms concern non-Lutheran faiths. The new law dictates that high school classes in a non-Lutheran faith must be arranged if there are at least three students who require it.
Organizing additional religion classes may be difficult in practice because beyond the capital city there is little money to arrange these classes. Furthermore, it is very difficult to find capable teachers of Islam or Judaism, for example, outside of Helsinki.