Raiders playing with fire
The action of JAIS is not only despicable but also inimical to the interests of society.
But we are not living in the dark age of religious intolerance where Christians and Muslims fell by the sword in their bloody pursuit of supremacy of the cross or the crescent. This is the age of goodwill, of mutual respect, of compromise, of reason, of sanity. Although remnants of suspicion, hate, and animosity still run deep, the march of progressive ideas and thoughts calls for new thinking and behaviour.
Free Malaysia Today
The spectre of religious strife is casting a long shadow as Christians continue to be the punching bag in the country whose prime minister recently shooks hands with the spiritual leader of over one billion Christians worldwide. While the Muslim-dominated government, be it at state or federal level, professes to advocate religious tolerance, the reality is that it has little respect for people of other faiths. The gun is always trained on the Christians who seem to have a hand in every plot, imagined or real, to destablise the country. The resentment felt towards the Christians is so great that churches had become target of attacks or raids. The recent detestable action of the “religious policemen” from the Selangor Islamic Religious Department (JAIS) is one of the many examples of the shabby treatment meted out to the Christian minority.
JAIS is the religious arm of the state government whose job, among others, is to protect Muslims from the evil influences of outsiders. So when its officers barged in a church and rudely disrupted a thanksgiving-cum-HIV/AIDS fundraising dinner organised by an NGO, they accused Christians of attempting to convert some Muslim guests. They had no proof that the church was engaged in a “subversive” activity to undermine Islam. They behaved boorishly simply because there were some Muslims present at the event. The implication is clear: if there are Muslims in any function organised by Christians, then the latter is guilty of proselytising which is a serious crime, given that Islam is the official religion. Such parochial thinking is dangerous because it will breed hatred in the Muslim and Christian communities and pave the way to sectarian violence.
JAIS is so absurd and irrational in its thinking that it may not surprise anyone if it raids the homes of Christians on Christmas day because Muslims are celebrating with Christians the birth of a Christian prophet. The Christians are using the Yuletide festival as a cover to convert the unsuspecting Muslims, JAIS may reason foolishly. In this theatre of the absurd, JAIS may even issue a decree: Muslims are not allowed to visit the homes of Christians. And bigoted politicians may follow up with a law banning Christmas and crosses. Then events may spin out of control and soon a slew of farcical legislation will pop up: Muslims cannot the shake the unclean hands of Christians, churches must conduct their services behind high walls, and to round it up in a final outburst of fervour, all Christians must abandon their faith on pain of death.
But we are not living in the dark age of religious intolerance where Christians and Muslims fell by the sword in their bloody pursuit of supremacy of the cross or the crescent. This is the age of goodwill, of mutual respect, of compromise, of reason, of sanity. Although remnants of suspicion, hate, and animosity still run deep, the march of progressive ideas and thoughts calls for new thinking and behaviour. Muslims cannot forever cling to the threadbare argument that a crackdown on Christians is justified because they threaten the preeminent position of Islam. Since the Federal Constitution unambiguously states that Islam is the religion of the federation, no one can and will dispute it. At the same time the sacred constitution also guarantees the right of “every person to profess and practise his own religion”. For the country to progress and prosper, the fire of religious fanaticism must be doused for good. Muslims cannot hark back to days of yore where blood and gore followed the swords of Islam. Let all religions flourish in peace and amity.
