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Religious Affairs Minister Resolute on Controversial Decrees
March 26, 2011

Religious Minister Suryadharma Ali has said decrees on Ahmadiyah and places of worship are enough to maintain religious tolerance in Indonesia. (Antara Photo) Religious Minister Suryadharma Ali has said decrees on Ahmadiyah and places of worship are enough to maintain religious tolerance in Indonesia. (Antara Photo)
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RafiqMahmood
12:20pm Mar 28, 2011

It is horrible that children learn everything together until it comes to religion and then they are separated. That is precisely what religion does. It separates people. If we all learnt about each others crazy myths then we might be able to see how crazy our own myths were. Actually I hope that eventually religion as a subject will die out naturally. What should definitely be banned are religious schools. They are nothing but organised child abuse.

BrahmaPutra
10:19am Mar 28, 2011

@Rafiq that is an interesting solution, but does not seem to be a very workable one ??

I like the quote from Steven Weinberg, that certainly has a lot of truth to it !

BrahmaPutra
10:15am Mar 28, 2011

@wegieboy It is indeed a shame that religion often seems to make ordinary people go a bit loopy and people that are susceptible to it can become completely brain washed by their religious leaders be they Christian, Muslim, Scientologist etc. As you point out a lot of it comes from whoever has taught them from a young age, be it parents, teachers or religious figures. That is why i find the pondok pesantrens here so scary, seems the only curriculum they have is rote learning of the Koran. No critical thinking , math, science different ways to look at the world, the ability to put yourself in other peoples shoes, and see things from other perspectives.

I believe that not many people are actually rationally thinking human beings. Most people just follow the crowd wherever it is led and do not question anything. Most people have enough with their daily goings on and do not question the society they live in. Even when things get as extreme as they have here in Indonesia where the government actively pursue and discriminate against religious minorities instead of protecting them. Normal people just follow the popular opinion and do not see the grievous danger this road is leading towards.

RafiqMahmood
9:58am Mar 28, 2011

Yes, WeegieBoy, you are right that our prejudices are inherited.

As Steven Weinberg said, "Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion."

The problem is that as soon as you ban something it becomes attractive. So don't ban religion, teach it. All of them to everybody. Bore people with religion until they realise what a futile and dangerous waste of thought and time it is.

WeegieBoy
9:50am Mar 28, 2011

@BrahmaPutra. I was borning to a religion like most people but I chose to not follow it and now have no interest in it. I have no hatred for those who are religious except for the radicals who I think should be locked up out of harms way. I have a partner who is religious and she practices her religion almost daily. I do not stop her and accept tha this is her way to deal with life. Religious or not, we should all have respect for each other as long as the other does not wish to harm us, then at that point we must defend ourselves which is a very different matter.

Religious Minister Suryadharma Ali reiterated once again that two controversial decrees governing religious issues would not be revised or revoked despite increasing protests against them.

“The joint decrees will not be revised and the regulation on Ahmadiyah will remain,” Suryadharma said during an event held by his  United Development Party (PPP) in Manado, North Sulawesi on Friday.

He was referring to the 2008 joint ministerial decree on the Ahmadiyah and the 2006 joint ministerial decree on houses of worship — two decrees the minister says are enough to regulate religious differences in Indonesia, but which pluralism advocates say foment intolerance instead.

“The decrees are still very relevant, it's so obvious,” Suryadharma said. 

The decree on houses of worship, issued by the ministries of religious affairs and home affairs, requires a religious group to obtain the approval of at least 60 households in the immediate vicinity before building a house of worship. It has been criticized for making it almost impossible for minority faiths to build churches in Indonesia, the world’s largest Muslim-majority nation. 

Calls to amend the decree resurfaced following the attack on two leaders of the Batak Christian Protestant Church’s (HKBP) Pondok Timur Indah congregation in Bekasi on Sept. 12. One leader was stabbed and another beaten. The church has been at odds with Islamic hard-liners, who have objected to the presence of a church in the area. 
 
The decree on Ahmadiyah, on the other hand, requires the Ahmadiyah community to “stop spreading interpretations and activities that deviate from the principal teachings of Islam.”

Date from the Setara Institute for Peace and Democracy shows that violence against Ahmadiyah followers increased following the 2008 national decree — with the number of attacks rising from three in 2006 to 50 in 2010.
 
Human Rights Watch has said the decree and the actions of top government officials facilitated discrimination against the group and unofficially condoned recent attacks on Ahmadis. The US-based NGO has also called for the removal of Suryadharma for repeatedly urging the cabinet to issue a total ban on Ahmadiyah.

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has also been sent a letter by 27 US lawmakers urging him to immediately revoke recent provincial decrees and the 2008 national decree banning Ahmadiyah activities.

Antara, JG