Alfian Sa'at, Our Columnists - Written on Wednesday, September 23, 2009 20:54 - 106 Comments
On tolerance, sedition and forgiveness
Alfian Sa’at
To many Muslims, Hari Raya Aidilfitri, a day of celebration after a month of fasting, represents a moment of renewal. When I was a child, I had always assumed that it falls on the first day of the Muslim New Year, when in fact it is the first day of Syawal, the tenth month. In the morning, prayers are performed at the mosques, where God’s clemency is sought for the sins of the past year. Continuing in this vein, families conduct a ritual where the young will kneel and kiss the hands of their elders, seeking forgiveness
The spiritual purification one experiences during fasting finds its zenith during this annual re-setting of accounts, where moral debts are cleared. What bogs down the soul are the grudges that people hold against us. As such, I have always associated Hari Raya with lightness, a certain freedom of the spirit—never mind that the physical body itself is stuffed full with specially made delicacies like ketupat and rendang.
On 19 October 2007, Irwan Bin Ariffin was checking his letterbox, having just returned from his Aidlifitri prayers. He found an envelope with his name and address written on it. It could have been a Hari Raya card for all he knew, if not for the bulk of its contents. Opening the envelope, Irwan found a little book with the title ‘Who is Allah?’
Fresh from his prayers, this seemed to be a serendipitous find. When Irwan flipped the pages, however, he was shocked to discover that he was holding on to a tract, illustrated like a comic, which denigrated Islam. It was filled with drawings of sinister-looking Arabs, and alleged that Allah was a pagan moon god. The tract was published by Chick Publications, a company based in America.
Irwan made a police report, as he believed that a publication of such nature might ‘incite religious tension between Muslims and Christians’. Investigations eventually led to the arrest of Ong Kian Cheong and Dorothy Chan, a Protestant Christian couple who had been sending evangelical tracts for the past 20 years.
In June this year, both of them were charged under the Sedition Act, as well as the Undesirable Publications Act, and sentenced to 8 weeks in jail. In passing a custodial sentence, District Judge Roy Granville Neighbour noted that the couple’s actions were deemed “to promote feelings of ill-will and hostility between different races or classes of the population of Singapore.” He also remarked that “the offences upon which they are found guilty and convicted are serious ones in that they have the capacity to undermine and erode the delicate fabric of racial and religious harmony in Singapore”. (See Straits Times report.)
It disturbed me that Judge Neighbour had described this ‘fabric’ as ‘delicate’. What this suggests is that the bonds between the different ethnic and religious communities in Singapore are still fragile. That mutual respect exists outwardly, but slips back into mutual suspicion behind closed doors. That ‘tolerance’ as a governing principle of dealing with the ethnic other has failed us.
On the surface, ‘tolerance’ seems like an alluring formula for maintaining ‘multiracial harmony’. We ‘endure’ the calls of prayer from Sultan Mosque in the vicinity of Arab Street, or flecks of charred paper flitting in through our windows during the Hungry Ghost month. We grin and bear it as we pick up an evangelical flyer slotted under our door, or crawl along a traffic snarl caused by a Thaipusam procession. In justifying our forbearance, many of us will tend to cite the virtues of diversity, but often in facile and clichéd ways. Having such plurality in our society means having a variety of food at hawker centres, more public holidays, more ‘local colour’.
But any discussion of tolerance must also take into account its limits. What happens when we have reached the end of our patience, when we feel as if another person, out of mischief or malice, has caused us unacceptable offence? Then, a desire for justice—retaliatory, retributive—rises to the surface. In some extreme cases, this might even take the form of violence.
This is where the state is often expected to intervene. Positioning itself as a secular, impartial entity, the state exercises its powers in deciding who it should punish and who it should protect. In other words, it is the umpire presiding over an arena of constant low-intensity warfare, of perpetual irreconcilable differences.
But is this desire for justice the only response when the limit of tolerance is breached? It might very well be our first instinct. But there is another response available to us, though often a belated one—forgiveness. In Singapore, the Sedition Act has been used on three occasions. In each case (PP vs Benjamin Koh & Another, PP vs Gan Huai Shi, PP vs Ong Kian Cheong & Another), it involved speech that denigrated Malays and Islam.
On one hand, we can say that these are sobering examples of how certain members of a majority can be so blind to the sensitivities of minorities. On the other, the image of the local Muslim community is also affected. Some might form the impression that Muslims are especially quick to take offence, would not hesitate to seek redress through legalistic means (by filing police reports), and are generally unforgiving and implacable.
But what if we were to introduce an ethics of forgiveness into our concept of inter-ethnic relations? What if we temper our natural demands for justice with the possibility that even those who have hurt us the most still deserve our pardon?
In my view, instead of prison sentences, the offenders should instead be allowed to perform community work and undergo counselling. This already has a precedent in the case of 17-year-old Guan Hai Shi (Picture, left, CNA), who had created a blog called ‘The Second Holocaust’, advocating the genocide of Malays. In 2005, on account of his age, he was sentenced to 24 months of supervised probation. (See report here.)
I consider a supervised probation to be a more effective means of rehabilitation than an 8-week prison stay. This is because the offenders—especially if they are prone to overzealous delusion—might perceive their prison sentence as unfair persecution by one of their enemies: a secular, godless state. Instead of reflecting on how they might have erred, they might find themselves resentfully nurturing a martyrdom complex.
Civil society groups such as the Inter-Religious Organisation of Singapore (IRO) should be consulted on the exact nature of the ‘community work’ to be performed by the offenders. This is a delicate matter, because simply coercing the offenders to conduct visits to mosques, or to participate in activities organized by Muslim organisations, might prove counter-productive. The presence of Christian representatives on the IRO might mollify the offenders’ unease that they are being forced to ‘deal with the devil’.
As for counselling, a useful model would be the Religious Rehabilitation Group, a body of volunteer Islamic scholars set up under the aegis of the Islamic Religious Council of Singapore (MUIS) to deal with the detained members of Jemaah Islamiyah (JI). Christian clergy could be tapped to advise offenders on the mainstream practice of Christianity in a multi-religious society.
The participation of the Christian community is also an important dimension that has been missing from the picture. To the best of my knowledge, there has been no public statement from Christian religious authorities condemning the actions of Ong and Chan. Contrast this with the response by MUIS in the aftermath of both the September 11 attacks and the JI arrests, where press releases were circulated to restore an image of Islam distorted by extremists.
One assumes that non-Christians are rational enough to note that both Ong and Chan are not representative of the majority of Christians in Singapore. Nevertheless, I do think that the Christian community and leadership should take ownership of the issue. If Ong and Chan had defended their actions as a Christian duty to spread the Gospel, then surely some housekeeping is in order. Taking ownership, however, is not equivalent to taking blame.
It would have been a gesture of reassurance if the Christian community had issued its own internal guidelines on the practice of proselytisation. For starters, I would like to suggest the following: firstly, proselytisation should not involve any form of insult to other religions. Secondly, it has to be a dialogic, instead of a monologic, process—the person you are trying to convert is entitled to a right of reply, which includes saying ‘no, thanks’. Thirdly, one should not target vulnerable parties, such as children, or those on their deathbeds. Ong’s and Chan’s methods—the unidirectional mail-bombing of offensive tracts that appeal to the young due to their pictorial nature—violates all three points.
A common greeting you might hear on Hari Raya is ‘maaf zahir dan batin’. The phrase means ‘I seek your forgiveness for wrongs both obvious and concealed’. Incidentally, Az-Zahir (the Manifest) is one of the 99 revealed names of God, as is Al-Batin (the Hidden). There is something quite absolute about this request—to be forgiven even of the unconscious wrongdoings—which serves as a reminder of how our actions may affect others in ways we might not fully appreciate.
On Hari Raya, I asked my mother, ‘If someone asks for our forgiveness, what happens if we don’t give it to them?’ She frowned at me disapprovingly, and said, ‘What right do we have to withhold forgiveness from those who are sincere in asking for it, and who have acknowledged their wrongs? If God can forgive them, why not us mere humans?’
The Sedition Act, ostensibly, aims to protect those of certain races and religions (especially minorities) from hate speech. In exercising such a paternalistic function, however, it robs the aggrieved party of the power to forgive, and the right to decide the ways in which one can heal a damaged relationship.
The Muslim community also has to take ownership of this issue of sedition: should we continually seek protection from the courts, thus legitimising a national security nanny-state? Instead of casting ourselves as passive victims, can we exercise forgiveness, seeking creative and flexible ways to deal with those who have wronged us, and thus finding a position as active moral agents?
To the question of ‘Who is Allah?’, it would be prudent to remember that one of His 99 names is Al-Ghaffar—the Ever Forgiving. To my Muslim readers, Selamat Hari Raya. And also, maaf zahir dan batin—to both Muslim and non-Muslim readers alike.
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Headline picture from Malaysia Trekker.
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106 Comments
You said, “To my Muslim readers, Selamat Hari Raya.”
Why to only Muslim readers?? We are all Singaporeans and all Singaporeans should be greated Selamat Hari Raya, Deepavali, Lunar New Year and Marry X’mas.
I wish you and all readers of TOC Selamat Hari Raya.
That was a vastly confusing comment. Okay all I want to say is that we have moved beyond the ‘fragility’ issue of racial harmony, but I still think that in law, we still need the protection to prevent crazy extremists from spreading untruths. Humans are susceptible to doing outrageous scapegoating, proven by WWII in Germany.
I am a non-practising Buddhist, and if I had received hate propaganda about other religions, I’d still have reported it. It’s not because I fear for the fabric of our nation, it’s out of respect to said religion. How hurt would they be to know that there is so much hatred against them by any particular group?
@jy,
I do agree with you to a certain extent, but at the same time I think Muslims Hari Raya quite differently from other communities (who tend to see it as simply a public holiday). It might be something else if the concept of the Hari Raya open house means that non-Muslims take the opportunity to visit their Muslim friends, and this happens on a widespread basis.
But this is not the Singapore that I am living in, at the present moment. : )
@Ryvyan
Interesting how the discourse on lax immigration and influx of new citizens might give rise to new feelings of nationhood and ‘Singaporean-ness’. But let me put it this way: if non-Malay immigrants to this part of the world never saw the need to learn Malay, is it fair for us to insist that new immigrants to Singapore learn English so they can integrate into their English-speaking ‘host’ society? Hmmm…
@Ryvyan 3):
Maybe the issue here is what are the avenues available where we can seek redress? I’m all for empowering civil society instead of letting the state–with its powers of ‘legitimate violence’–handle the racial and religious frictions in society.
As an example, perhaps upon noticing hate speech, we could contact a hotline number, provided by the IRO. In this way, I hope that more dialogue could occur among leaders of various faiths on issues of boundaries and the comfort level of each community.
Personally, I think Islam is a great religion but suffered from “image problem”. I studied a bit of history of the middle age and Islam was the most enlightened religion of that time and very tolerant to many other people, including the so called “infidels” like us.
Nowadays, some people has fear, misunderstanding and even hostility to Islam because of the following reasons.
1.) It is unfortunate that majority of the terrorists that operates nowadays in the world are all claiming to be fighting for Islam, although in my eyes, they have already failed the tenets of Islamic teachings, which is a teaching of peace.
2.) That majority of Muslims do not condemn such acts and some even welcomed it. E.g. Palestinians cheering when hearing news of 911 tragedy. (contrast this with the anger and indignation of Christians against fellow Christians who commit atrocities in Yugoslavia, in WW2 Nazis against Jews)
3.) The historical baggage of religious animosity between Christians (actually Catholics) and Muslims and the current conflict between Jews (which has backing of many Christians) and Muslims.
4.) The general reaction of Muslims when they are slighted. When Prophet Muhammed was caricatured or slighted, Imams called for the death of those slighting him and many Muslim supporters openly rioted. Contrast this with Jesus Christ being slighted and even blasphemed in books like Da Vinci code, Christians generally acted quite maturely (they call for boycotts but otherwise did not call for death to Dan Brown or riot and burn things). When the statue of Buddha was desecrated by Muslims, Buddhist around the world expressed sadness and disappointment but do not riot or call for the death of those who desecrate the statue of Buddha.
5.) There are Islamic laws that non-Muslims still do not understand. Like the ability for men to have four wives, which goes against the modern concept of one-man-one-woman, although this has not been practiced by many Muslim couples as well.
6.) There is a sense of “unfairness”. While people are welcomed to convert to Islam, in some countries, they are not allowed to convert to other religion, sometimes on pain of death or punishment. This violated the freedom of religion set by United Nation.
7.) Islam in the middle ages was a very enlightened religion, giving us many scientific breakthrough. Algebra, Algorithm, modern numbers, all has roots in Islam. However, modern Islam is perceived to be incongruent with modern science. Granted a religion should focus on spirituality and not scientific knowledge.
8.) The emphasis on traditional clothings also confuses people. What has wearing of 15th century style clothing got to do with 21st century religion? Why some Muslim women covers their hair and others don’t. Yet when not allowed to cover their hair, many are unhappy? If it is compulsory, why is not every Muslim women doing it? If it is non-compulsory, why the hoo-ha?
I hope one day, religion can be discussed openly without one getting too thin skin about it. Even people who do not believe in God should also be respected. When we can “agree to disagree” is the day we don’t need to care about forgiveness or other things.
I also disagree criticising a certain religion as “hate speech”. At best, it is the ignorant talking. That said, I also understand religion is such a personal thing, there will also be no end to this discussion.
Know that if there is really a one true God, he won’t want us to fight or kill one another in His name. He will probably shake his head up in heaven.
‘As-Salāmu `Alaykum’ to everyone. If you look this traditional Muslim greeting, you will see what you call the heart of Islam, which is the desire to promote peace. In the Islamic World there is no word called hello, except at the most casual – the standard greeting is ‘As-Salāmu `Alaykum’ or ‘Peace Be Upon You.’ Which if you look at it, is the correct thing to do when you meet people.
Allot of people find me very strange when I, as a Singaporean Chinese make the point that I have Muslim friends and go to the extent of not eating or drinking in their presence during the month of Ramadan. But why should this be the case? We in Singapore, have grown up with a peace loving Muslim community and our experiences with our Muslim neighbours is quite different from that the West, which has had a history of cultural conflict with the Islamic World (Crusades). In Asia, Islam was spreed by trade rather than the sword and our history in Asia should show us by now that Islam is a force of good.
I think we need judge Islam by our own experiences of the religion than from what we read in Western influenced newspapers. Why do the Muslims react so differently in the West than they do in Asia. Let’s look at some instances:
a – 9/11 and the celebrations on the streets of some Islamic Countries. I cannot condone the killing of 3,000 people and I personally find it sad when people celebrate death and destruction. However, let’s understand that blind American support of Israeli policy in the Middle East has caused allot of anger against America to build up. People in the Middle East believe that the conflict in inherently unfair and that unfairness comes because the USA supports Israel regardless of what it does. Last December, the Israeli army illegally invaded the Gaza strip, killing women and children. It’s internationally recognised that Israeli settlements in the West Bank and Gaza are blatantly illegal and provoke “terrorist” reactions, yet nobody can be even critical of Israel because the USA will support them. So, as far as the average Joe in the Arab streets are concerned, the US of A got its just deserts. – I don’t condone but I can understand where the feelings come from. I think Singapore needs to be ‘prepared,’ for terrorism but I don’t believe we should take Washington or Tel Aviv’s view on the Islamic world as the ONLY one.
b – Which leads me to my second point. Arabs and Muslims are in general NOT anti-Jewish. I have had Arabs from the Middle East tell me, “You must remember that there is a difference between Jews and Israel. ” For the record, the Saudi Embassy made it a point to deliver Ramadan Dates to the Jewish Synagogue here. If you look at conventional teachings of Islam, you will realise that Islam does not see itself as a new religion but a fulfillment of a religious tradition started in the Jewish Torah.
So, let’s not take everything coming out of Washington and Tel Aviv as gospel truth when it comes to Islam. Look at our own experiences in tinny little Singapore. Muslims have lived amongst us and plenty of cultural exchanges have taken place. Yes, we should be careful against terrorism but let’s not jump to conclusions about Islam just because a few Arabs don’t like having their land stolen from them in the Middle East.
For the record, I am a Buddhist who studied Christian Theology and does business with Muslims and Hindus and I have Jewish relatives.
Nice article Al fian…and happy holidays man…
Did not read it all the way….but while reading my toughts were…what are you getting at…but along the way…i realised you are an …or perhaps a well enlighten person….with a nice utopian Singaporeaness in you….
If only most of the power players see it and get into it..then we will be looking at a great Singapore not too far away….but somehow today while in my shower I was thinking what these guys were doing….they do the delibrate divide and conquer thingy…which is sad… I see it in their actions….really sad….
Coming back to the case… It would have been far greater, if any Muslim on their own accord had presented themselves in court to forgive the 2 persons who did what they did…would have lifted all the world….forgiveness…
leesjuanpat (patrick leesjuan)
The fact that religious conflicts escalated to gigantic scale in the Middle East, is due to the shallow understanding of human sentiments.
We pride ourselves for the advancement of science and technology. But sad to
our human pride, we failed in our moral understanding of each others practice of our faith. We are not talking about the terrorists, some may not even embrace Islam but propagated Muslims to commit atrocities to the world.
Racial harmony and religious integrity take great effort to bond the little suspicion we may have for each others practice. As long as the practice do not encroah into
the paradigm of another’s rights, we are safe.
We respect the traditional practice of one another, be it burning of incense paper, joss sticks, etc. A nation can only co-exist, as in Singapore with its multi-religious
background, with greater understanding and tolerance and acceptance of each other’s religion, be it Islam, Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism and others.
The sad protracted wars of the Middle East, is a case of religion in conflict with the human factor unable to reconcile each other’s differences. The egoistic nature of human pride exacerbated the process.
Live and let’s live. We are all homo sapiens of the same species. Harmony and cohesion can be achieved in tolerance of each other’s religion.
All religions practise in good faith. There should be no encroahment.
Who are you trying to kid? Where is the tolerance in the many anti-Christian articles carried by TOC? Sedition: Aplenty. Forgiveness: None.
Is this article using Islam as the model to educate other religions, particularly, Christianity?
Law and order is interpreted as ‘tolerance’. Singaporeans have been compelled to observe a strict set of rules to ensure that the races live alongside each other peacefully. There is no need for tolerance, but plenty of need for lawful abidance.
‘Sedition’ is directed and reserved for the over-zealous Christian.
The writer now uses both tolerance and sedition to glorify Islam by exclaiming that ‘forgiveness’ is the Islamic way and a virtuous model to uphold, forgetting that ‘forgiveness’ is what makes a true follower of Christ and Christianity too.
Perhaps the writer is proposing forgiveness as an alternative to punishment. If this is the case, then the manner in which he argues his point is less than desirable, especially when using ‘Ramadan’ as the backdrop.
I believe the intention is to keep the fabric “delicate”. The prison sentence is to reinforce the idea that we need laws to keep the peace, otherwise all hell will break loose. Well, we all know that political stability or should I say one party rule thus becomes critical. When you are crying wolf all the time, you need to have the wolf or at least his footprints appear once in a while and you fire some shots in the air and produce a dead wolf, otherwise people will no longer believe you.
Hi Gemami #10,
What about this alternative piece on the Ramadan?
Hi @12) Oxford Dude,
Thanks for the link. It helps to reinforce my point that such views be best kept to religious platforms like the one you have linked to.
I would not have commented if Alfian Sa’at had expressed his views in a religious platform. Unfortunately, placing his views here in a public platform – proclaiming the goodness of Islam; by slamming the badness of other religions – is very unfortunate for one so talented.
Hi Gemami #13,
I am sure TOC will have a Christian message for Easter Sunday or Christmas. TOC is not anti-religious. It so happens recently some high-profile overzealous religious people of a particular religious affiliation got into bad the book of so many people despite their well-meaning intention. If they aren’t high profile figures, nobody will cover their news too.
The Singapore Daily » Blog Archive » Daily SG: 24 Sep 2009
[...] Religion – TOC: On tolerance, sedition and forgiveness [...]
@Tang Li
There is no justification whatsoever to celebrate the death of 3000 plus people, some of them their fellow Muslims.
The Chinese did a lot of attrocities in Tibet, you don’t see the Tibettans celebrating in the streets during the Sze Chuan earthquake.
Like I said, Islam suffered from image problems. And it does not help the very people Arab struggle against are not traditional imperialist. The Israelis are a persecuted people as well. Two persecuted people naturally will have feelings of insecurity and injustice.
The Palestinians need to follow the message of peace preached by Islam and adopt Gandi’s method of non-violent civil disobedience for their struggle against Israel. Throwing rockets or bombing a bus full of school boys is not going to win any cause or improve the image of your religion.
In a conflict where both sides have their hands in blood, you just need one side to say : no, enough is enough, no more blood need to be shed from now on.
Hi Oxford Dude,
Agree to a certain extent. I am sure an Easter or Christmas article will not be one that proclaims holiness at the expense of another religion.
And if one particular group from a particular religion chooses to opine, exercise and practice extreme fundamentalism, that does not mean that another religion should follow in the same vein.
If it does, then does it not follow that the same level of disdain and protest directed at the former be made against the latter?
Excellent read Alfiaan. Well done, and do try to get them published in ST as your previous article was.
Good article and well argued.
Keep up the good writing Alfian.
You are a rare Singaporean gem! Muslim or not…we are all Singaporeans first.
The couple was charged under the Sedition Act, as well as the Undesirable Publications Act. http://lwb.lawnet.com.sg/legal/lgl/rss/subcourts/62212.html
I note that the MDA has blocked the website for Chick Publications.
It is unfortunate for the couple, as they seem to be left alone in their time of difficulty. http://www.nccs.org.sg/NCCS/Common_Issues_Evangelism.html
Maybe the government can also spend $10 million on religious holidays to promote inter-religious harmony. Eg. free food on Hari Raya etc.
#10 “Who are you trying to kid? Where is the tolerance in the many anti-Christian articles carried by TOC? Sedition: Aplenty. Forgiveness: None.’
Erm gem, I think the ‘advice’ given to you by TOC in a previous article with regards to ranting about its anti-Christian stance still stands. I know you are a very balanced person, but harping on one thing without proof is starting to make you look like a certain Thio…
I wonder what people would think when I tell them, “We should be allowed to worship whoever we want as long as others are not being harmed by our actions.”
This means I could be a Christian, a Muslim, a Hindu or a fan of Festivus (for the Rest of us) and nobody should be telling me that I’m worse off or that I won’t go to heaven. I believe this is the way for me…so why are there still enough people out there who spend more time telling me I should follow their religion in order to reach God instead of just accepting that God is infinite – meaning He (or She) can be everything to everyone.
The problem is religion. My take on religion is that of a social organization used to organize society. To what end? Initially, it always starts out with a good aim – help your fellow man, etc. This ultimately gets corrupted when the organization grows to the extent where we lose contact with those we’re meant to help – it becomes a numbers game. “How many converts today? How many pagans/heretics/infidels/non-believers did we kill/maim/threaten/slander today?”
Just like a government that is bulging with red tape and bureaucracy, religion keeps growing and appears to have lost its way. Some, like Hinduism, is just so vast because everyone has his own idea of God and this translates to different representations of God (in its simplest form, it is creation, preservation, destruction). Some, like Islam & Christianity, appear to have a better direction because of the single focus on a book. However, the problem with this is that these books were ultimately written by many men (ever heard of versioning? :) )
The ‘religions’ I really like are more a way of life than a set of dogmas. In this regard, Buddhism and Sikhism come across nicely because it’s about what you have to do to be a better person than what you have to pray to or how much rapture you want to share.
In the end, where my kids are concerned, I’ll be teaching them about my religion (according to my NRIC) but I’ll leave it to them to practice what they want. I may challenge them, as I would challenge a bad theory or a lousy experiment, and it’ll be up to them to convince me with sound arguments.
More power to reasoned and logical discussions. Less time for frenzied monologues and non-acceptance of alternative views.
Zefly, you have just provided proof, thank you.
My dear Gem,
The only proof I provide is your tendency to link criticism of relligo-centrism to attack on the entire faith itself. You do know that God can defend himself very well without you having to come to his defense at every imagined attack, yes?
Hi gemami,
I’ll try to respond to the points you’ve raised the best that I can…
“Is this article using Islam as the model to educate other religions, particularly, Christianity?”
I looked through the article again, trying to see in which way I might have implied that Christianity is not as forgiving a religion as Islam. I found nothing of the sort. If you have indeed located this somewhere, I would ask of you to highlight it to me.
“The writer now uses both tolerance and sedition to glorify Islam by exclaiming that ‘forgiveness’ is the Islamic way and a virtuous model to uphold, forgetting that ‘forgiveness’ is what makes a true follower of Christ and Christianity too.”
Again, I don’t think the article is about comparing the respective virtues of Islam and Christianity. As a matter of fact, the Christian injunction to ‘turn the other cheek’ is about one of most radical statements on forgiveness one could find in ANY religion. For the benefit of those not familiar with this, let me quote the lines from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount from the Gospel of Matthew:
“You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if someone wants to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles. Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you.”
Similar sentiments were expressed in the Sermon on the Plain as well, in the Gospel of Luke:
“But I tell you who hear me: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If someone strikes you on one cheek, turn to him the other also. If someone takes your cloak, do not stop him from taking your tunic. Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back. Do to others as you would have them do to you.”
Hi Alfian,
I think I have already made it quite clear, but never mind, let me repeat myself.
The heading of the article reads: On tolerance, sedition and forgiveness. Let us break them into the self-named three parts.
Your comments on tolerance centered on the community as a whole and the role that the government plays to ensure there is ample tolerance to upkeep the peace and harmony of our society. This became the root point as you gradually led readers to your call for forgiveness in place of punishment.
You then used the Christian couple as your example for what constituted the crossing-over of boundaries and then uses it to extol the virtue of forgiveness, implying along the way that the Islamic way of forgiveness is the role-model one should adopt.
Yet in your own words, you highlighted the fact that there were three other occasions when forgiveness was exercised over punishment under the sedition act. Your point was not lost when you clearly stated that all three occasions involved Muslim and Islamic forgiveness, since the seditious acts were against Muslims and Islam.
Your next two paragraphs went on to defend this position, implying along the way that you have considered adequately the repercussive sentiments that might arise, lending further weight to your argument on the virtue of Islamic forgiveness, as if the Muslims are the only ones capable of forgiveness, since most of the crimes were committed against at them.
You would have done well to have delved deeper and question why is it always (seemingly) only the Muslims? Are there no blasphemous encounters for the Christian or Buddhist to report? For this reason, it is clear that you failed to expand on your own point that others might view the Muslim as “uick to take offense… Could this be already true? You side-stepped it very well.
It does not help your argument when you pressed further that the Christian religious authority did not condemn the couple guilty of the seditious act mentioned. You also called for proper-housekeeping of the Christian church.
You then concluded by asking only the Malay community whether it should be more forgiving, conveniently forgetting to mention the other religious communities.
How then does one draw his own conclusion to such a narration, or; did I understood the whole article incorrectly?
I am re-posting this portion.
You would have done well to have delved deeper and question why is it always (seemingly) only the Muslims? Are there no blasphemous encounters for the Christian or Buddhist to report? For this reason, it is clear that you failed to expand on your own point that others might view the Muslim as “…quick to take offense… ” Could this be already true? You side-stepped it very well.
It does not help your argument when you pressed further that the Christian religious authority did not condemn the couple guilty of the seditious act mentioned. You also called for proper-housekeeping of the Christian church.
You then concluded by asking only the Malay community whether it should be more forgiving, conveniently forgetting to mention the other religious communities.
How then does one draw his own conclusion to such a narration, or; did I understood the whole article incorrectly?
To many Muslims, Hari Raya Aidilfitri, a day of celebration after a month of fasting, represents a moment of renewal……..by: Alfian Sa’at
The author should also touch on WHY during fasting month (year after year), Muslims are still eating (including non-halah), drinking (including alcoholic), smoking, buying 4D, TOTO etc, especially those in s’pore?
Next year, these group of muslims will join the Casino queues.
Some muslims even put on songkok or tudung and walk into the 4D shop, high abortion rate and divorce cases.
When a non-muslims marry a muslims, he or she must convert.
But a muslims cannot be otherwise.
Everyone knows (including govt) and it’s not a secret.
Maybe the writer should write on how to improve on muslims character & reputation.
Alfian@25, Jesus did NO sermon on the mount nor on the plain. Those are just religious titles added later to the manuscripts of Matthew and Luke.
Gemami,
Pls keep your comments to the issue/s raised in the article and not on the author himself.
Otherwise, your comments will be disallowed – as one of them already is.
Dear Gemami,
Your frank and thorough comments are refreshing as always. I have been following them, and have appreciated them for their insights. So thank you. : )
Personally, I read Alfian’s article as an appeal to us all, regardless of religion, to draw upon forgiveness, rather than relying on punitive actions. As you rightly pointed out, the call to forgive comes from Christianity too. It is also a secular moral value. In a way, this article in your words, ’softens our impression’ on the very notion of religion. You would agree with me that religion has been unfairly criticized in recent times.
His instances of the Christian couple and the response of their religious authority can be put as an empirical example. Perhaps it comes down to a matter of our readings and sensitivities. Alfian is a dear friend, and dare I say he would be the last to harbour any ulterior motives.
Sincerely
KJ
Gemani
What you have failed to notice was the only incidents where the sedition act was activated with regards to religion was when Christian extremists iniated the said ‘harmful’ actions. This is unlike Muslims who were arrested under ISA for their terrorist plans did not target any particular religious group – theirs was more politically motivated
I have also come across profiles and testimonials of a christian youth pastor that condemned the Taoist religion as one of devils and demons, claiming that he was once possessed and christianity has relived him of this. This is certainly seditious in my book. And that is not the only posting or testimonial of a similar nature that i have seen and read online. Lord only knows what these pastors preach to their faithful about other religions. Christians tend be very open about their opinions on other religions (as it is their dutynalso to ‘witness’) and point out the faults and flaws in a most judgemental way. perhaps thats what makes them such easy targets for criticism.
So why are u curious that the this feature on religion, sedition and tolerance is focussed only on the actions of these christians extremists? is there any other case study involving tensions between other religious groups u can highlight to us? And is it any wonder that most of the comments here center on the actions of these christian extremists?
I find it strange that you, a christian, have a problem with the advocacy of forgiveness within the context of these incidents. On the other hand, You have not condemned the actions of these christian extremists and for what they did (as their ‘god-give duty).
Alfian is saying that to avoid misunderstanding, perhaps the NCC should make a public stand on the actions of these christain extremists. If not, the tendency is to deduce that if there is no adverse comments or condemnation, then by logical inference (fallacious or not), they must be supporting them
Fyi, the christian post has a nice piece with statements by NCC on postelysing:
http://sg.christianpost.com/dbase.php?cat=editorial&id=538
The stand states the limits on christian postelyzing in our multi-religious socity, understanding and tolerance, but has no mention or reference on the actions of these christain extremists.
Pls do not mistake the comments here to be anti-christian. They are comments against anti- extremist behaviour by any religious groups.
As i have said before, we all have muslim, hindu, buddhist and christian friends. I am sure no one bears them ill will throught their daily interactions. It is only through the extreeme actions of a few that can darken a whole community.
Hi TOC,
Thanks for the reminder.
My moderated comments were in response to posts #21 and #24, which I had initially chosen to ignore but unfortunately found it too tempting to give a reply. Those posts ought to have been moderated first as they do not contribute to the article any more than the reply I gave. Just so you know.
Still, I offer my most sincere apologies for straying.
Hi KJ,
I thank you for taking the trouble to give your assurance on behalf of Alfian. I have nothing against Alfian, the person that he is, but I cannot say the same when views; especially religious ones; expressed by someone cut deeper one way than the other.
Christianity has already taken a lot of brickbats and valid reasons notwithstanding, it is unwise for another religion to ride on its unpopularity to push a cause of its own. I was just attempting to point this out.
I am assured and I will give Alfian the benefit of doubt that I may have been too overly excited with my comments.
My sincere thanks to all for tolerating me.
No hard feelings ;)
Hi Sloo,
I disagree that the Muslim terrorist and his plan of destruction is solely politically motivated. The reason they are politically motivated is because of the religion they profess to, and the teachings of that religion.
We all have, one way or another, our own stories to tell of which religion is pushing the other into submission. We can give numerous examples to support our claims but this is not the issue.
The issue I am highlighting is this: that one should not push one’s cause by deriding or harping on the negatives of another, period.
Take this is a religious context if you must, but it also applies to everyday living and how we behave towards one another.
To #4) Alfian,
The English language is a working language in Singapore. I mentioned in a previous post that I encountered a non-English speaking service guy in KFC, a place where people of all linguistic capabilities go. How disrespectful to the rest of the population when we have gone through a mandatory education based on the common language most of us understand?
Gemami,
you are right about this “The issue I am highlighting is this: that one should not push one’s cause by deriding or harping on the negatives of another, period.”
So can someone spread this words to those people who tries to “share” with me and end up saying this and that about my religion…
A is for Allah by Yusuf Islam (formerly Cat Stevens)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwH_cQufv6o
Lovely song. Mr. Yusuf wrote it to teach his children the Arabic alphabet.
Mao Zedong is said to remark “Religion is poison”.
There is some element of truth if one choose to believe that the words of one’s holy book is the ultimate truth and all others are total untruth.
I think being spiritual is different from being religious. I have read the experiences of mystics from various traditions like Sufi (Islam), Buddhism, Taoism, Hinduism and Christianity and they all point to the UNITY of life.
What does it take to have the experiences of a mystic? Frankly, I don’t know.
To end with a quote:
The perfect way is without difficulty.
Save that it avoids picking and choosing,
Only when you stop liking and disliking
Will all be clearly understood.
A split hairs difference
And heaven and earth are set apart!
If you want to get to the plain truth,
Be not concerned with right and wrong.
The conflict between right and wrong
Is sickness in the mind.
Seng-ts’an
Any polemic attacking the other religion in hateful or contemptuous manner should be banned. However there should be a room for serious discourse among religions and ideas. If proponents of different faiths should have full independence to attack faith of atheists and vice versa, why is it not possible for different religions and their proponents to be engaged in serious debate. While living in Singapore I found that there is an extra caution taken by state not to disturb the status quo when it comes to discussion on faith of Singaporean Muslims/Malays. If government has limited so called “harmful” exposure of Malays to the sermons of other religions, especially, Christianity. Similarly efforts of Muslims to spread their message to other religions in an organised way is channeled exclusively through government/MUIS supervised institution of Darul Arqam. I find this position very difficult because being a Singaporean Muslim but not a Malay, I think that there is nothing which Muslims should be concerned about regarding the message of other faiths. Their book, Quran, gives a challenge to those who oppose the message of Islam to give a counter arguement which is more compelling than the one given in this book. No wonder that according to some estimates out of the total Muslim population in United States around one quarter are converts, while of them being African Americans and they are not the ones belonging to Nation of Islam movement. I personally feel that any active and serious discourse between Muslims and proponents of other faiths will lead towards more informed opinions being formed within the society leading towards conscious decision to respect each others faith and live in greater harmony.
Good evening all,
With due respect to the author. i dont believe he understands what he is proposing – as a theory or even as a formulation, as such you must forgive me if I treat this as a rhetorical piece.
As I understand it the law is the law and religion is religion. These are mutually exclusive bodies of knowledge. Granted they could be treated as one body of knowledge as in the case of Syariah law, but it appears, this is not what the author seems to be proposing.
This prompts us to ask the question: is the answer to be found in jurisprudence (legal ethics) or faith?
If it is the latter, then we would all have to contend with changing the current system. In which case the question is whether what we propose to replace it with would be better than what is currently in place?
Consider this: What if I said to you even if you appoint a committee comprising of equal representations of rabbi’s, monks, imams, pastors and the odd devil worshipper, given time you will still end up with something that is very close if not an exact replica of the current criminal justice system!
Think about it. How did law develop? It was very much an accreation of canon law (religious law) which eventually evolved through centuries into the current adversarial system that we have today. So we are back to square one!
However, if the answer is to be found in the former, then its a jurisprudential moot point , to be precise a matter of legal ethics- in which case you can no more fault a judge for passing judgment on an offender anymore than you can mark down a bus conductor if he decides to punch your ticket – he is merely discharging his duties inaccordance with the remit imposed upon him by his office – granted he may have discreationary powers but whatever decision he reaches has to square off with legal precedents, text and doctrine.
Besides if the goal is redemption; what prevents the aggrieved party from seeking this from the offender intra vires within the criminal justice system? – if memory serves, even former Nazi’s in the Nuremberg trials did atone for their mortal sins when they were in the dock.
Why do we even need to change the current criminal justice system? Why does everything have to go back to race and religion? I dont understand.
Thank you.
SD
Internet Liaison officer of the brotherhood
Gemani
“We all have, one way or another, our own stories to tell of which religion is pushing the other into submission. We can give numerous examples to support our claims but this is not the issue.
The issue I am highlighting is this: that one should not push one’s cause by deriding or harping on the negatives of another, period.”
With reference to my example of the christian pastor deriding his former taoist religion, I would not call that ‘pushing’. I would certainly call it “push(ing) one’s cause by deriding or harping on the negatives of another, period’ as you so aptly put it.
So your comment itself contradictory and ironically condemns the very point that you try to put forth.
The article highlights a reported case that was very much the news of the day when it happen. It brought to light an issue that everyone was unaware of or not concerned about. The fact that these religious extremists developed such antagonism to other religions in our society is indeed a cause for worry. This article provides an alternative solution to dealing with the root problem of this whole issue – instead of criminal jail time and fines, why not community service, why not some other possible more productive, ‘forgiving’ rehabilitaion.
It also deals with the real problem that there are people out there with a very negative view of christians as a whole as a a result of this affair. This is obviously unfair. To improve this ‘perception’ of others, alfian is suggesting that perhaps the Churches make a stand on this issue if they agree with the authorities in the matter. Such an action would certainly make clear the distinction between mainstream christians and the extremists.
I don’t see how this article in any way offends any moral sensibility?
Indeed i find some comments against christians unfair; some even from the christians themselves and i have taken pains to make my stand against categorising the whole due to the action of a few dark sheep.
We need to cultivate an atmosphere of logical, open discussion of issues of the day that will help promote greater harmony. And i find this article contributing to that aim.
Btw, what is your opinion on the actions of those persecuted extremists mentioned in the article?
Salam Alfian,
Notwithstanding how noble your intentions may have been in penning the article, it is unfortunate that your suggestions/alternatives appear pigeonholed so much so that a reasonable reader may miscontrue them as glorifying one one religion at the expense of another.
It is my suggestion that the proposals you made should be framed in generic terms and only then substantiated with the empirical evidence you have highlighted in the article instead of the other way round – ie. providing the examples and carving your recommendations thereafter.
For eg: On the issue involving the Christian community not making an unequivocal stand against Ong and Chan, is it not entirely conceivable that potential/future offenders against Sedition Act may well belong to another faith or even of no faith. In such instances, will you not also suggest that similar steps of reassurance should be taken by the relevant community?
Perhaps the better approach would have been to coin the recommended approach on one hand for the community of the persecuted offenders and another, for the aggrieved community. I believe this will avoid, at least in some form, the contention between Gemami and yourself.
It may be a matter of semantics but framing an issue in an appropriate manner, in my opinion at least, is as important as the substantive argument itself.
Hi Gemami,
I’m sorry, but I think you might have misread the article. You mentioned:
“You then used the Christian couple as your example for what constituted the crossing-over of boundaries and then uses it to extol the virtue of forgiveness, implying along the way that the Islamic way of forgiveness is the role-model one should adopt.”
If I am being prescriptive here, then the prescription is based on a possible range of responses that could have come out from the Muslim community. One possible response could be ‘they deserve it, they were playing with fire, it is good that justice is done’. This could very well be an ‘Islamic’ response as well, especially if one refers to Quranic verses which call for the defence of the religion from its ‘enemies’. But I think I wanted to argue for a more compassionate response instead, still grounded in Islamic teachings, which might run along the lines of ‘they have already apologised to those they sent those tracts too, they have a teenage daughter who will be virtually orphaned for two months, they distributed but did not produce the booklets’ etc. Gemami, I repeat, I am not comparing ‘an Islamic forgiveness’ against other religious models of non-forgiveness. I am comparing forgiveness against notions of retributive justice *within* Islam itself.
gemami, follow up:
“Yet in your own words, you highlighted the fact that there were three other occasions when forgiveness was exercised over punishment under the sedition act. Your point was not lost when you clearly stated that all three occasions involved Muslim and Islamic forgiveness, since the seditious acts were against Muslims and Islam.’
I did not say that ‘forgiveness was exercised over punishment’ in those three cases. I said:
‘In Singapore, the Sedition Act has been used on three occasions. In each case (PP vs Benjamin Koh & Another, PP vs Gan Huai Shi, PP vs Ong Kian Cheong & Another), it involved speech that denigrated Malays and Islam.’
It is clear that when I said ‘the Sedition Act has been used’, then what I mean is that *punishment* was exercised.
You also mentioned:
‘You then concluded by asking only the Malay community whether it should be more forgiving, conveniently forgetting to mention the other religious communities.’
As I was referring to the cases where the Sedition Act was used, and in all the cases the party that seemed to seek ‘legal protection against offence’ *was* undeniably the Muslim community, then I really don’t know in what context I have the right to ask other religious communities to be ‘more forgiving’.
This then brings me to the points raised by Reez. (Hello!) I do agree that I could have made some generic recommendations. Hypothetically, yes, anybody from any religion–or at least those with an evangelical bent–could have done what Ong and Chan did. But this particular incident has happened in our society. It would be irresponsible for me not to engage with the specifics of the case. I think if religions wish to become part of public discourse, then the first thing they should do is take ownership of certain issues that affect the public. You can’t keep on complaining that atheists are imposing their ideas on abortion, contraception etc on the rest of society, and then keep a cautious silence when non-Christians complain that aggressive proselytisation is an imposition into their space. That would be double standards, wouldn’t it? : )
Reez,
With due respect, I disagree. There is such a thing as being overly politically correct. There really isn’t a need to be extra careful simply to placate the hypersensitivities of individuals who had been told time and again that a stance against religo-centrism is not equivalent to anti-religion. It is truly unfortunate that the cases that keep popping up comes from Christianity, and creates the impression that all Christians are like that, which is definitely untrue. But to insist, that we avoid talking about such issues as if they don’t matter to Singaporeans (they do!) and pretend it didn’t happen, or that tensions are not rising… to raise the ‘you are attacking my faith’ red card everytime such issues are raised, how can we even move ahead?
Dear SD,
You brought up a few important points. First of, let me just say that my purpose of writing the piece is not merely rhetorical.
My proposals are quite simple: let’s use the law, as it stands right now, as an instrument of last resort when it comes to dealing with inter-racial friction.
When we keep relying on the court to settle our differences, this simply means that we are surrendering our agency to dialogue with one another. We become overly litigious. I repeat, I do not support the idea of the state trying to manage inter-racial relations, because the underlying assumption is that without a state that is invested with these powers to prosecute, then a ‘natural state’ for society is constant inter-racial/religious strife. Realist at 11) made a very good point about this.
If the law has to ultimately be used, then we need to reconsider whether custodial sentences, even for the sake of deterrence, are the best and only options available. Of course this is up to the judge’s discretion–but you cannot deny that s/he is acting based on his/her understanding of what the ground sentiment of Muslims are–who in such cases are sort of the plaintiffs by default.
If s/he feels that justice should be seen to be done, then it is likely that the punishments will tend to be harsh. However, if there are signals that the Muslim community is able to accept lighter sentences without much protest, then it will likely sway the judgement in another direction.
@39: I suppose the Malay/Muslim community is protected where suicide cases are not reported, conversion into another religion is few and the list goes on. But it must be acknowledged that efforts have been put in place such as the reports of stats of drug abuses, children out of wedlock etc. The problem could also be due to lack of use of the mainstream language which is quite limited e.g. aLive programmes, magazines… One has to bear in mind that most of the Muslims here are of the old generation where understanding of English is limited. It is rather a slow process and I can’t help but feel that Muslims of other races could feel out of place.
With regards to a comment earlier about muslims eating in the public. I think it’s time we learn that just like everywhere else in the world, one’s race do not define one’s religion. & there could be valid reasons as well.
I find it funny that the author compared the non-condemnation of the Christian couple by the local Christian community to MUIS’ condemnation of the Sep 11 attacks on the World Trade Center.
IMO, this is not an apple-to-apple comparison.
The latter is an act of terrorism, while the former is, IMO, a simple case study on how not to evangelize which does not call for an extreme a reaction as the word “condemn” implies.
Alfian (#49),
As a Christian I would like to comment on the last para:
Abortion and Contraception (and Euthanasia) are issues with very clear definitions. They are controversial in that people have different views on what to do with them, but everyone understands what they are.
On the other hand, “aggressive proselytization is an imposition into their space” is a very vague precept. What is “aggressive”? What is “your space”? The New Atheists – for instance Dawkins – considers banners advertising Church programs to be aggressive. What is considered “an imposition”?
If children follow their classmates to Churches voluntarily, is it an “imposition”? Are Deathbed conversions wrong per se? I feel that in many recent discussions here on TOC, Christian Evangelization has become somewhat slighted.
The thing about proselytization is that no matter how “aggressive” it is, you still have a choice to reject conversion. Proselytization is only “intrusion” really if you don’t like your beliefs questioned. Which then reverses the question at you: Why do you like questioning Christianity so much, but not your own religion; isn’t that being hypocritical?
(Interestingly, if you are Alfian, you might want to remember that the Koran is as explicitly against homosexuality as the Bible is.)
In an earlier article or comment, some reader/writer expressed his/her unhappiness at being prayed for by Christians. This person wished to classify such prayers as “proselytization”. Not only is this a misuse of the term, but it conveys the wrong mood. The Christians (in that case) were not praying for the dying person to go to hell, but were most likely interceding for that person out of LOVE. Does one expect Christians to pray Taoist and Buddhist prayers instead?
The Chick Tracts are clearly malicious and inaccurate; but using the Chick Tracts to represent the whole of the Christian Evangelical Effort is also inaccurate.
But I digress. The question to all those parents – usually Taoist or Buddhist – who talk about “imposition into their space” is this: Why is your child’s space necessarily your space? I find it perplexing that these same people would argue that religion is a private affair, and yet wish themselves or the authorities to intrude on their child’s religious privacy. And the manner in which some people – not you – refer to Christianity is as if it is some secret gang society or something, instead of one of the world’s Great Religions. Apart from the atheists – who are increasingly intent on denigrating every religion they come into contact with – there are also Taoists, Buddhists and Hindus who are interested in “protecting their children from the insidious effect of Christians”. I really wonder as to what the “insidious effect” of Christians is.
Another problematic accusation is with regards to Christians asking others to visit their Churches, again construed as proselytization. These same people though, would recommend that Christians visit other places of worship. Is this not a double standard too?
It almost seems as if the only Religion that can or should be criticized – in scholarly or other manner – is Christianity. And I personally find that troubling.
In the end, it is one finger at Christians, fours fingers at you. Blind accusations point to the intolerance of the accuser, rather than the intolerance of the accused.
Bear in mind: Jefferson coined the phrase “separation of Church and State” in 1802 to assure the Church that it would be protected from the State, not to assure the State that it would be protected from the Church.
Dear all,
I’m no expert in religion, nor in politics. But correct me if i’m wrong, i heard the following quote
Mr Obama in Cario ” we are all children of Abraham”,
Pope Benedict – “Jewish Torah, Christianity and Islam are the revealed religions by GOD”
I’m a simple person who think and write simple. Upon reading the comments, i felt disturbed
The revealed religions by God seems like debating over each other’s teachings etc. When i look back at the revealed religions from documentary, books and news, i always find alot of practices, teachings are quite common, it makes me more thinking it could really be ’same’ GOD.
Let’s look what the religions have in common, PEACE, FORGIVING and LOVE, and not the differences, or so whoever is ‘forgiving’ is not important.
Let’s be start from ourself to be forgiving, then our religion will be forgiving. It all humans who can’t agreed to one other and It all humans who start any disharmony. That’s why till today Middle East conflict is still going, it humans again….
Dear Simple Man,
Through a child’s eye, it is really a simple matter. But with all the hardware present, differences are inevitable. Why pray five times a day? Why burn papers? Why light candles? …
Our practices and the long history makes it less forgiving. Why can’t we accept our differences and move on? Because we’ve been taught to stand up for what we believe in.
Simple Man,
I agree with you … mostly.
But the Religions do need to find some “Safe” platform to begin an earnest cooperative introspection of themselves.
Btw, where did you get that statement from Pope Benedict from?
Arixion on September 25th, 2009 1.25 am:
Re: “The question to all those parents – usually Taoist or Buddhist – who talk about “imposition into their space” is this: Why is your child’s space necessarily your space?”
Why is a Christian person’s child’s space in AWARE’s CSE program necessarily YOUR space?
“Ong’s and Chan’s methods—the unidirectional mail-bombing of offensive tracts that appeal to the young due to their pictorial nature—violates all three points.”
Strongly disagree.
Tracting has been practised by churches worldwide for umpteen years without incident. Coming next: SPH sued for accepting advertisements of Australian Pork with the flying pig logo? Admit it, some clowns are just too thin skinned.
Onlinecitizen
Is it just me or Is something wrong with this page? All the comments after #27 (actually happens near the end of #26) is in italics and I can’t rate the posts. For other articles I have no such issues.
Hi Alfian,
Thanks for clarifying some of the points I may have misread. However, I still stand by my opinion that the article you wrote might have been too haphazardly written to convey the message you intended to deliver, but failed.
Citing real case scenarios to argue your case, without due consideration that the case in question was brought about by the mischief of one over-zealous couple as much as one overly-sensitive believer, will no doubt bring about suspicions to the point you attempted to make.
There are countless other over-zealous real cases happening on a daily basis to Christians:Christians; Chrsitians:Others; Buddhists:Taoists; Buddhists:Hindus; Muslims:Others; and so on, but these faithfuls have been true to their faiths by being forgiving. These have the spiritual ability to forgive, or seek other less punitive course of action.
Anyway, now that I understand your point clearer, I must say that your article makes a better rallying call if directed at the Muslim congregation.
This will be all from me. I’m going to be very busy the next three days and can only follow up when I can.
Sandy#54
There is a difference, the intention in the mailbombing was obviously offensive and aimed directly at a certain group, to attack their beliefs.
The Australian pork ads were not meant or intended to offend anyone.
And yes, some clowns will mix up the logic.
#49
*Arix (oops oris it Arixon?)
As I have mentioned before, the childrens’ private space IS the parent’s concern as children are considered minor – thats why we have laws for harm done against minors and thats why MOE has disallowed any form of postelyzing by teachers within the schools. The understanding is that children, as minors, as easily influenced by people of authority, by adults. They should be under the care of their parents until the reach adulthood – then they could make any decision about their live if they choose to. Do not even suggest that children be allowed to make their own decision with regards to matters like religion when they are still minors – you are opening a can of worms that will face great opposition.
With regards to death bed conversions….have u ever been to a wake where such an event has occurred? Obviously not or perhaps as one of the converters. If u have then u will realise how much hurt and harm it has caused the relatives and other family members when such a sneaky action is taken – especially since a person on his/her death bed is not capable of their full mental capabilities. That is the reason why death bed conversions was highlighted by the PM.
My friend’s father was converted when his eldest son took him out of the hospital when he was nearing his end and brought him to church to be baptized. The day he died, the eldest son brought his church friends to the house , took away all the taoist statues, broke them and threw them away even though the mother was still a taoist. Best of all, none of the church friends knew the parents before this. How is that not offensive?
I question these ‘converters’ – what is the value of such a conversion when the person who was been affected hardly understand your religion at all?Its like a quickie one way ticket to your ‘heaven’. Is this the kind of converts you want just to add to your number tally? Not someone who truly understands your faith and appreciates the ’salvation’ of your religion deeply wit his entire mental, spiritual and emotional ability? Death bed conversions are a joke and in any society or religion – they have been a cause of conflict with the wider society and other religions.
“And the manner in which some people – not you – refer to Christianity is as if it is some secret gang society or something, instead of one of the world’s Great Religions.”
The actions of certain groups (who?who?who?) in recent local sagas ARE indeed akin to the actions of a secret society. Can u dispute that especially wit all the facts and media about them? Pls do not accuse us with four fingers when your own four fingers have been greedily digging into the pie of deceit and conceit.
Note that at least where i am concerned, i am making a very CLEAR distinction between most christians and the actions of these few fundies and extremists. My many mainstream christian friends have agreed with me on these points. So pls do not claim to speak for all of christianity when you make accusations against those who speak against the fundies.
As with regards to christians praying for taoists or buddhists, i would call them an imposition of private space especially if these non- christians find it offensive. You can pray out of goodwill privately but to do so in public might cause offence. Would you like a hindu or taoist to pray to their gods for you publicly in front of you? In spite of the good intentions, i am sure there are some christians which would find this offensive. For goodness sake, i have some christians in my gym that find yoga offensive! And they certainly mince no words telling them to all of us practicing it! So is that offensive? To avoid possible offence, take the safe route and offer your prayers for others in private. When i am in need or trouble, my relatives and christian friends always tell me they said a prayer for my well being in their churches. This – their love, concern and care – i truly truly appreciate.
And here we go again, bring the big Gay angle to any argument on religious discourse. What is your Gay hang up?
In the words of the great MJ -look at the man in the Mirror first before making these accusations.
*SAndy
#54
Just because worldwide (prove it and show me; in fact there is a youtube with regards to this on offensive mailing of church tracts) have no problem with the mailing of church tracts, that does not mean it is a problem here in sg.
The authorities have a problem with ‘unidirectional’ mailing of tracts aimed towards non-christians. I personally find it funny when christians leave their tracts and mailers at my door which displays prominent buddhist sign and symbols. Are these people blind? What could they possibly be thinking of? – oh! a non-christian family, target for conversion!!
Its so convenient for some people to blame the West for their eroison of moral values and then use it as a standard bearer of what acceptable behavior is – very selective arguments.
@ USL re: comment 47 It is my personal opinion that any such incidents should not be hidden and pushed under the carpet, neither they should be overblown, which sometimes happen. Why is it that one community should get preferential or discriminatory treatment at the expense or advance of other sections of the population. It goes against the very spirit of equality in the society.
I do not know from where did you get this statistic that most of the Muslims in Singapore are from old generations. If we take anecdotal evidence and look at the attendance for prayers at mosques in Singapore, all the age groups are more evenly represented. Furthermore if just for the sake of argument, we assume that most of Malays are Muslims the birthrate within Malay community is higher than other racial groups. I do not agree with your position that understanding of English is limited within practicing members of Malay community. Looking at the makeup of members of my in-laws family, who are predominantly Malay, I feel that most of them can speak and understand at least functional English. Isn’t it true that now English is the main language of communication in Singapore in everyday life?
I don’t know how this turned into a discussion about proselytization, but since it has, I would like my two cents worth.
Proselytization is about the promotion of YOUR religion; it is NOT about the denigration of anyone else’s. While he has been very strong and articulate, I have a (very) slight disagreement with [sloo] when he says that proselytization shouldn’t be about the denigration of another religion’s NEGATIVES.
Most frequently, the case is is not of the denigration of a “negative”; what is deemed “negative’ by overzealous evangelists is actually a grossly DISTORTED understanding of another religion by people who don’t know the first thing about that religion: they are disqualified from ANY comment on that religion, in my opinion.
Taoists, Buddhists and Hindus come under constant attack for an alleged “polytheism” (Hinduism) and “idol worship” – they aren’t, if you know the meaning of “idol worship” and that the practise in these religions doesn’t conform to the meaning of “idol worship”. And if you know anything about Hindu philosophy, it is essentially a monotheistic faith. It’s interesting that Alfian should raise the point of God’s 99 names in islam in this article because that is exactly analogous to the “polytheism” of Hinduism except thay there are more than 99 names for God in Hinduism; each of those names are given a physical representation in statue form because in Hinduism it is believed that humans learn better by seeing a physical *representation* than trying to imagine it.
But in any case, how do we know that this thing called “idol worship” and “polytheism” is not actually the correct way to worship? Who made the people from other religions God so that they can judge on these matters? Why can’t Hindus disparage other religions for an erroneous belief in one God and declare them to have gone down the wrong path?
But back to proselytization: if you have to, do so. But:
1. Be prepared to take “no” for an answer, and respect it fully; and,
2. Give reasons why your own religion is GOOD; not why you think other people’s are bad.
If you can’t find anything good about your religion to proselytize to others about, then maybe you should do a re-think about whether you are following a legitimate religion in the first place.
Robox
A valid and good point.
And to follow up i this, i wonder why is it that so far its only the christian fundies that deginerate othere religions while promoting theirs as the only true faith, the only true god.
As a non-religious person who was brought up as a taoist, aced my bible studies in school (and almost became a catholic) then went on to study the philosophy of Buddhism in the university, i hope tohave a balanced view of all religion in society. So i simply cannot understand the degineration of religions by others – and i do have to agree with you that most of the time its by people who do not understand what they are criticising. But then that again is what the PM highlighted about religious enclaves. And as long as these elitist religious enclaves exsit, there wont be an understanding of other religions outside thier restricted speheres.
Therein lies the problem when dealing with religion and postelyzation here – there is no middle ground and there never will be as long as people from different ends of the religious spectrum refuse to commit themselves to finding one.
This feature is an attempt to find that space for discussion. But anytime such a issue is brought up, we have the fudies clamouring about christian discrimination and prejudice. We can speak and advocate all we want but sometimes its like speaking to a stone idol.
Good Afternoon Alfian,
We may be making some progress after all, which is rare I might add in the online citizen.
Let’s recap very briefly where we are, so that we may at least have some common terms of reference to draw on to conclude this discussion intelligently.
Firstly, we have managed to disentangle ourselves from the whole idea what you have written here has anything remotely to do with religion; but even you have to agree; your gloss @ 46 September 25th, 2009 12.21 fails to clarify as it leads us yet into another dead end; as what you seem to be forwarding now is a completely new construct i.e as your position now seems to revolve around the concept of maruah in the context of nilai diri sendiri or bangsa vis-à-vis: “However, if there are signals that the Muslim community is able to accept lighter sentences without much protest, then it will likely sway the judgement in another direction.” I stand corrected of course. I may be wrong.
Ok let us assume for argument sake what you have to say can hold water Alfian; let’s even extend it further and run with your idea i.e “When we keep relying on the court to settle our differences, this simply means that we are surrendering our agency to dialogue with one another.”
You know what? I agree with you absolutely. As what you seem to be saying is we should all accept reality rather than buying into happy faced perfidious fairytales regarding human nature. I also agree with you that a narrative that “brackets” discussion on sensitive subjects will at the end of the day only create missing spaces that do little to further understanding.
Having said that I agree with you completely, that doesn’t mean I agree it can work as an idea; neither do I deny the possibility your position may even suffer from a few basic philosophical defects that makes it impossible to past from the realm of theory to reality.
Firstly, what you say would only make sense; if you believe in the idea there’s actually an eclectic audience out there who can be gainfully and productively engaged on an intellectual level to come together and talk shop to make the world a better place. No such audience exist Alfian not in significant numbers at least to effect this sort of social change that you’re proposing; not even in the Western hemisphere. And even less here.
If what you say is true then the UN would have no problem in crafting lasting solutions to reconcile sectarian violence in Africa and possibly even lay to rest the intifada along with perhaps ending the lucrative bootleg trade in plasma canons, space ships and mercenary armies in the gaming world – even we will be out of business.
Consider this Alfian, if the remedy for parochialism and narrowness as you so naively put it is to listen to anyone who is prepared to talk about their world view and its implications, what are we to do with those believe they that they possess a unique, saving truth, and have no intention of discussing anyone else’s? Coming to think of it Alfian, what are we to do with people who may even believe in the whole idea that there is only one right way for humans to live that all differences must be only in the details? To paraphrase, what if they believe, you’re either with me or against me! To put it crudely so that you’re left with no doubt what the sedition may have to deal with, what if they even believe in the scathing German couplet – und willst du nicht mein bruder sein, So schlag ich Dire den Schadel ein.
Now Alfian if you can accept that reality of what is hate speech and racism; that I’ve just shared with you; then you’ve no problem in understanding why the sedition act has to be a blind commitment to zero tolerance – I say blind, because it’s a no brainer and it doesn’t even involve any legal, jurisprudential, ethical or social calculations; as till to date no academic, philosopher or even social scientist has been able to find a happy balance between logic and formulation to support the idea of the state trying to manage inter-racial relations without resort to something higher than window management know-how; and that if you really want to know is where the idea of zero-tolerance emerged from, its actually a piece of work by Prof Kelling whose based in Rutgers – the loose idea if a pane of glass in a building is broken and its not replaced promptly, then within 72 every glass will be broken – by the same token, if one troublemaker goes around spreading hate speech isn’t given the sharp, short and pengsan treatment, then within 72 hours you may well have a mob in your hands! I admit it’s a crude tool, but it may be the only effective tool to protect us from ourselves –as pogo the cartoon character said, “now we know who is the real enemy…its us!”
It’s been a privilege Alfian, Now you must excuse me, I really must return to my conference call. Thank you.
SD Internet liaison officer of the brotherhood
Arix,
“The intent of prayer – whether done in private or public – is the same, so why should you be offended by one and not the other? Please enlighten me.”
When it doubt, ask. And respect the others’ decision if they say no.
If you still think it doesn’t matter whether it’s public or private, consider the scenario when, at your child’s church wedding, a group of buddhist guests suddenly start chanting. Same intent, different results.
@ 60 and 61 I agree with the commentators that you will not old the ground if start converting people by mudslinging acts targeted at other religions if can not hold ground at the strength of your own message.
With regards to 99 names of Allah (God). These are 99 attributes of the only Creator and God mentioned in the scripture. It is like giving different names to someone whom we love. It is different from the position that God has different forms.
Please clarify me if I am wrong, the actual name Hindu is given by foreigners to the inhabitants of India and is derived from the word Sindu (river Indus). The name as it appears in actual scriptures or vedas is Sanatana Dharma.
Dear gemami @ 57:
Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for engaging with some of my views, in spite of–as I gather–your busy schedule. A few points:
“Citing real case scenarios to argue your case, without due consideration that the case in question was brought about by the mischief of one over-zealous couple as much as one overly-sensitive believer, will no doubt bring about suspicions to the point you attempted to make.”
This is purely a technical point, but there were altogether three police reports lodged by three different Muslim individuals regarding the case of Ong and Chan. I think we can appreciate that if these tracts were placed in letterboxes–without the addressees’ names on them, then one can adopt an attitude towards them as ’spam’–indiscriminate mail. But the fact is their names and addresses were handwritten on the envelopes. If I had received an envelope like that, I would feel quite distressed–why me? Had someone entered my name in some mailing list, on a register of ‘Muslims who wish to accept Christ’?
And this in addition to the fact that the contents were malicious–I make a distinction between material which is merely critical and that which spreads falsehoods. One can have doctrinal arguments about what is ‘truth’ among various religions for sure, but I’ll give an example which doesn’t rest on such inter-religious relativism, from the Chick tracts: in one panel, a character claims that one day a crescent flag will fly above the White House. I believe this is the kind of thing that incites anxieties and perhaps even hatred of Muslims–as a supposedly imperialistic religion intent on conquering and subduing others politically.
“There are countless other over-zealous real cases happening on a daily basis to Christians:Christians; Chrsitians:Others; Buddhists:Taoists; Buddhists:Hindus; Muslims:Others; and so on, but these faithfuls have been true to their faiths by being forgiving. These have the spiritual ability to forgive, or seek other less punitive course of action.”
Unfortunately, as in the case of aggressive proselytisation, there persists a general impression that the Christians are the most over-zealous about this. I am not saying this to target Christians unfairly. I accept that the right to propagate one’s religion is a constitutional right. However, it is the means in which this is carried out that requires a lot of fine tuning. The technique of handbill-saturation in the 80’s certainly caused a lot of discomfiture among non-Christians.
Which is why I proposed those particular parameters in the article. However, it seems that Arix is opposed to at least one of them–proselytising to children. Both Robox and Sloo have expressed eloquently why children should not be the targets of proselytisation. I have little more to add, except to say that my concerns also take into account the idea of a ‘dialogic’ mode of conversion. How qualified is the child to argue about the merits of his or her religion (if he or she already belongs to one) as compared to the one being introduced to him or her?
Arix blithely assumes that those who are hostile to proselytisation seem to simply have an aversion to having their faith questioned, or to engage in religious debate. But what kind of debate can you have between, say a Primary 6 Muslim schoolgirl who has yet to finish reading the Quran (and understanding it) and an adult armed with all the arguments he has memorised from a book called ‘Christianity’s Rebuttals to Islam’?
There is nothing wrong, per se, with evangelising. But the devil, as they say, is in the details. : )
60) Robox on September 25th, 2009 11.51 am
I don’t know how this turned into a discussion about proselytization, but since it has, I would like my two cents worth.
And I thought the author was writing about compassion and forgiveness.
I agree with the writer’s view that the NCCS should have issued a public statement regarding this case and to come up with clearer guidelines on communicating the faith.
As the population increases, new incidents of religious values being presented will
be looking for arbitration.
Zef (#64),
Well, there are different types and formats of prayers.
And a Church wedding is well … a different matter. Firstly, it is specified that it is in a Church, and a Church Wedding would be a Church service. Whereas there is no such service going on in a patient’s ward.
Anonymous (#65),
I agree with you.
Alfian (#66),
Why didn’t you respond directly to my post instead of responding to me in a post to genami, as you did?
7) I agree with your idea of the “dialogic” nature of proselytization. But I question what the content of the dialogue should be.
But we must distinguish between the dialogue of proselytization and the “academic” dialogue that takes place at inter-religious dialogue. The latter is for formal sessions between religious leaders and is (necessarily) highly theoretical.
The former is more personal. The target of Proselytization is the heart, not the mind. The Evangelist’s task is not to convince a convert that the Eucharist is superior to Friday Prayers or burning joss-sticks; that is the function of the Theologian. The purpose of the Evangelist is to convince the potential convert that Christianity offers a better experience than the other religions.
8) A child cannot argue the abstract theological merits of his or her religion; but the child can argue for what he or she feels his or her experience of the religion is. As an analogy, a child cannot analyze the components of chocolate or vanilla, but can still tell other people whether chocolate ice cream or vanilla ice cream is preferred.
Because at the end of the day, the importance of a religion is in the example and experiences it sets.
But incidentally, my point wasn’t just about “debate”. It was about religious tolerance in general: the inability to accept a close relative being part of another religion other than your own.
9) I agree. As I also agree that some recent modes of evangelising (e.g. the Chick Tracts) are highly inappropriate. But if the Devil is in the details, then why are you criticizing concepts instead of details?
Arix@71:
“The former is more personal. The target of Proselytization is the heart, not the mind. The Evangelist’s task is not to convince a convert that the Eucharist is superior to Friday Prayers or burning joss-sticks; that is the function of the Theologian. The purpose of the Evangelist is to convince the potential convert that Christianity offers a better experience than the other religions.”
I don’t buy this heart/mind dischotomy. You are doing religion in general a disservice by making it seem that one does not use one’s rational faculties in deciding whether or not to adopt one religion over the other. And like it or not, ‘experience’ is also hardly the only criterion with which one decides to convert–there are so many other factors to consider, including excommunication and stigmatisation from one’s community, strained relations with one’s family, etc.
“A child cannot argue the abstract theological merits of his or her religion; but the child can argue for what he or she feels his or her experience of the religion is. As an analogy, a child cannot analyze the components of chocolate or vanilla, but can still tell other people whether chocolate ice cream or vanilla ice cream is preferred.”
Again, I think when you’re trivialising religion to the level of choosing one ice cream flavour over another. This is conversion to another religion we’re talking about, yes? A very fundamental, very profound change in one’s life. Now that you’ve raised this issue of the ‘experential’, then allow me to restate my discomfort with some proselytisation tactics: ‘come to Church, it’s fun, you’ll make lots of friends, there’s a great show you’ll get to watch, it’s entertaining, we have a live band on stage’ etc. But it’s more than about ‘fun’ or expanding your social circle, isn’t it?
And that’s not taking into account that a lot of people who have tried to evangelise to me have very little EQ. For some reason, they can’t help being patronising, or sanctimonious, or resort to things like emotional blackmail (‘if you consider me a friend then come down to Church with me’).
Let’s just take, for the sake of argument a following scenario. I’m a 12-year-old Muslim boy.
Evangelist: Do you know who Jesus is?
Me: Yes! My parents told me. He’s a prophet.
Evangelist: Well, actually he’s the Son of God.
Me: But my parents told me he’s a prophet, he’s human like all of us, he was sent down to spread God’s message.
Evangelist: Your parents are wrong.
Me: But why would my parents lie to me?
No matter how much you want to try arguing along the lines of ‘let the most convincing religion win in an open marketplace!’, I’m afraid that the idea of proselytising to children will remain a deeply unpopular one among many. Maybe you’d like a survey conducted to bear this fact out?
“It was about religious tolerance in general: the inability to accept a close relative being part of another religion other than your own.”
Would you be able to accept a close relative converting out of Christianity into another religion?
And on the subject of proselytisation, here’s some of my favourite passages:
1)
The preacher Miguel Brun told me that a few years ago he had visited the Indians of the Paraguayan Chaco. He was part of an evangelizing mission. The missionaries visited a chief who was considered very wise. The chief, a quiet, fat man, listened without blinking to the religious propaganda that they read to him in his own language. When they finished, the missionaries awaited a reaction.
The chief took his time, then said:
“That scratches. It scratches hard and it scratches very well.”
And then he added:
“But it scratches where there isn’t any itch.”
from ‘The Book of Embraces’, Eduardo Galeano, 1989
2)
Though the Malay is an Islam by profession, and would suffer cruxifixion sooner than deny his faith, he is not a bigot; indeed his tolerance compares favourably with the profession Christian, and, when he thinks of these matters at all, he believes that the absence of hypocrisy is the beginning of religion. He has a sublime faith in God, the immortality of the soul, a heaven of ecstatic earthly delights, and a hell of punishments, which every individual is confident will not be his own portion that the idea of its existence presents no terrors.
Christian missionaries of all denominations have apparently abandoned the hope of his conversion.
-’from The Real Malay’, Frank Swettenham, 1907
Dear Alfian,
I’m sorry that you have been offended by the actions of some believers. Please forgive us. I found some online testimonies of Muslims who became Christians. This may be a better way of communicating the faith.
http://www.everystudent.com/wires/abdul.html
http://www.answering-islam.org/Testimonies/index.html
Thanks for your articles. Have a good weekend : )
The Muslims are given MUIS. It is argued this is good for the Muslims and it is equally good for Singapore. It promotes religious harmony, tolerance and understanding among the religious communities in Singapore. It also control and curb “excesses” including aggressive proselytisation among and in the community. MUIS has worked well for the Muslims and Singapore for a few decades now, although nothing is perfect.
So if a central authority organised as a stat board, largely financed by the Muslim community itself and with a minister-in-charge appointed by the Cabinet – as with MUIS – is good for Singapore, we should similarly have for the Christians, Buddhists, Taoists, Hindus, their own religious councils.
But if we say it will not be good and/or practical to have similar councils for the Christians, Buddhists, Taoists, Hindus, what then would be the reasons. That such councils would not promote religious harmony, understanding and tolerance and curb excesses and “over-enthusiasms” among the “flock”.
If the argument against such idea is that the Christians, Buddhists, Taoists and Hindus have many denominations and school of thoughts, differences – fundamental or otherwise etc – the Muslims too have Sunnis, Shiites (and their own branches), the 4 known Mazhabs (school of thoughts), regionalisms and others. Furthermore with the respective ministers-in-charge, problem solving and communication at the highest level will be obtained and this will be much better.
Arix@71:
You have brought up a very contentious point which I will arrive at , but it is giving me further opportunity to clarify certain salient points on secularism that hasn’t yet been discussed in Singapore.
The better known aspect of secularism is it designates secular authority to the government and religious authority to the the religious heads of a religion, which can be broken down further to the sects and denominations within any one religion. (I will be using RDS for religion/denomination/sec here.) I don’t want to get into any protracted argument about the actual practice of secularism except as it applies in this discussion.
What the designation of religious authority by the RDS themselves does – and this includes at its very core doctrinal interpretation specific to any one RDS – is to imply that the religious authority in Relgion A does not have ANY religious authority in interpreting the doctrines of Religion B. Similarly, the religious authority of sect/denomination X does have any religious authority over sect/denomination Y even if they are both part of the same larger religion.
Absolutely NO authority!
It makes perfect sense:
1. It draws the lines which once crossed raises the potential for conflict;
but more importantly,
2. The religious authority of any one religion/denomination/sect is NOT QUALIFIED to interpret the doctrine of another religion/denomination/sect because he has not studied that religion/denomination/sect TO THE SAME EXTENT that the religious authority of that RDS has; he is not the religious authority of that RDS.
Thus when you say:
“The Evangelist’s task is not to convince a convert that the Eucharist is superior to Friday Prayers or burning joss-sticks; that is the function of the Theologian.”
I would ask you: Under what authority does the (Christian?) theologian or your pastor – I don’t believe you are a Catholic – interpret the doctrines of Islam or Taoism, and declare them to contain practices inferior to Christianity?
That would be one of the grossest violations of secularism because the relations between individuals and groups falls under the jurisdiction of the State; the State steps in when harm is caused by one individual to another or by one group to another.
You are way off line, I’m afraid.
Dear everyone,
A reminder to keep to the issues raised in the article. How did sex education come into the discussion here? Or church weddings?
We’re trying to give as much leeway in comments as possible but this looks like turning into another thread which is degenerating into senseless arguments, with some making personal challenges to other commenters.
If this carries on, this thread will be closed for comments.
Andrew (#74),
Generally, avoid using items from Answering Christianity or Answering Islam; both love to go back and forth against each other, not using an adequate level of theology.
The Singapore Daily » Blog Archive » Weekly Roundup: Week 39
[...] Religion – TOC: On tolerance, sedition and forgiveness [...]
Arix
Are u a truly a roman catholic?
we must be careful with what we say, if not.. Boomz!
Sloo (#78),
Yes, I am. What do you think Catholics believe in?
Editor (#75),
Sex-Ed was introduced because Sloo made a reference to the AWARE Saga.
I used Church Weddings to analogise with Taoist Funerals.
But I will note your comment, and try and minimize going off-topic.
Test post.
dear TOC
better close the this thread lah…..side track until go to dunno where….any sane person will have difficulty following it. Close it or moderate irrelavant posts.
People,
I apologize if my post numberings are screwed up. My layout seems a bit … fried.
Editor,
What are the new moderation conditions on this thread?
Alfian (#69),
1) Reason is a tool. You need inputs to use tools. Even when choosing a flavour of ice-cream, one uses rational faculties, only that they are used on different premises from that of academicians.
Excommunication, “estrangement” and so on are all part of Experience too. “Experience” is a collective term for a large number of things.
2) Analogies are meant to highlight an aspect, not give a full one-to-one comparison. At some point, all analogies break. So Congratulations, you found the Breaking Point of my Analogy! My analogy is on experience of the child.
Anyway, on proselytization tactics: Yes, I agree with your complaints, and I have to say that promoting Christianity like this is demeaning the religion.
3) Straw Man argument. The lack of EQ in your friends does not constitute an argument against proselytization as an occurrence in itself. The most it qualifies as is a criticism for some forms of proselytization.
4) Ditto as above.
5) I always say, it takes two hands to clap. So there is something in those people that resists proselytization even if their proselytizer was St Francis of Assisi or Matteo Ricci.
It should be borne in mind that the clause on Religious Freedom was one of the most hotly debated clauses in the Commission on the UDHR in between 1945 and 1948; and the reason was because Religious Freedom includes the right to proselytize. No prizes for guessing which countries opposed it the most.
6) I would be dissappointed, but it is not my right to control my relative. If any of my family converts, then I would say that it is because I haven’t lived out my faith properly.
But I admit, I would be atypical in that case.
aft) At the end of the day, Proselytization in Religious Freedom are very contentious issues because all sides have vested interests and – to be brutally honest – are hypocrites with regards to the issue.
@ andrew leung 72)
Thanks for sharing. : )
@ New Renaissance (aka Arix?) 84)
1) “Excommunication, “estrangement” and so on are all part of Experience too. “Experience” is a collective term for a large number of things.”
I agree. I interpreted what you meant by ‘experience’ in rather narrow terms, I admit. This is coloured by my readings of the rise and popularity of certain religions (notably the Charismatic and Pentecostal streams) which promise its followers a more ‘experential’ and ‘personal’ mode of worship, distinct from those which are perhaps more ‘old school’–observance of rites, rigid doctrines etc.
2) “Straw Man argument. The lack of EQ in your friends does not constitute an argument against proselytization as an occurrence in itself. The most it qualifies as is a criticism for some forms of proselytization.”
Agreed. Which is why when I talked about the ‘details’, these are the kinds of details I wanted to discuss. There are certain methods, techniques, etc. And since you’d mentioned the UDHR, I’d just also like to draw attention to one of its counter-documents, the Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam. I do NOT agree with all of its statements (the clauses on women’s rights and capital punishment are woeful), but there’s something that’s stated about religious freedom: “It is prohibited to exercise any form of compulsion on man or to exploit his poverty or ignorance in order to convert him to another religion or to atheism.” Maybe one could argue that proselytising to children amounts to this kind of ‘exploitation of ignorance.’
Now, maybe it’s just me, but sometimes there is great virtue in ‘evangelism by example’. I used to associate Christianity–especially Catholicism–with service to the poor, with care for the vulnerable and needy. Of late, though, the dominant image has been one of megachurches, immense wealth, prosperity gospels, and marketplace recruitment. I was walking around Bugis a few weeks ago, and I saw a Catholic sister, rather elderly, passing through. And I was so struck by her equanimity, her quiet grace, and the sense of devotion that was implied by her dress (is it called a habit? I’m not sure–it consisted of a head-dress). It was, in short, a corrective to the sight of the elder Thio addressing the crowd at the AWARE EGM…
Arix
Pls read up the catholic doctrine
-Roman catholics do not worship idols but they have statues of Christ and the saints which other christians see as ‘idol’ worshipping. Your stance on idol worshipping sounds almost the same.
- Praying wit joss sticks. The catholic religion has no problem with holding the joss sticks and paying respects to their ancestors – just not to the taoist gods. So your stance against joss-sticks? In fact they are no against offering of fruits to tombstones as to them it is an act of honoring their ancestors.
- Tolerance. The catholics believe in tolerance for all religions – in fact the pope himself says all religions is good unless it is used to harm others. So how does that make your catholic religion better than others?
- You have not answered my queries on ACIA. Do catholics actively pursue death bed conversions? It seems not especially when the principles behind ACIA requires potential converts to have a true understanding of the faith before conversion.
It would be an entirely different scenario if someone on his death bed requests to convert with his full mental abilities. The scenario I am describing and the example i quoted is obviously of a different nature. So do u still advocate it actively?
- And there is a reason why the term ‘Evengalists’ is used to describe certain denominations of christians – because these groups evengalise aggressively. Rarely, or if never, do you hear the term used with reference to catholics. The pope and authorities subscribe to the notion of bearing witness – by good deeds, actions – inspiring others to join their faith.
So after reading all you comments – are you truly a catholic at heart or more like a evengalistic christian.
Yay, I am back!
Alfian (#84),
Thanks for your refreshing comment. There tends to be alot of anti-Christian diatribe going on nowadays…
1) Accepted. I forgive you. =)
2) I wouldn’t release my skepticism if I were you. Last I remembered, Egypt still has an apostasy law, like Saudi Arabia. The way it is phrased sounds like a defensive protection for Muslims and Islam, rather than a positive endorsement of Religious Freedom.
You should know better than me – if you are Alfian Sa’at – that what is not said is just as important as what is said.
3) Yes, I agree. All those movements come from Protestantism, not from Catholicism or Orthodox Christianity. (Anglicans are somewhat split because of Henry VIII’s peculiar attitude.)
The Prosperity Gospel certainly isn’t in either the Gospels or the Epistles. The Megachurches have become too social. And some charismatic and pentecostal movements tend to degenerate into personality and religious cults, a deadly combination.
All of a nun’s clothing is called the habit; the head portion is called a wimple.=)
And I agree with you – we need more evangelism by example. That gets done precious little however with the number-crunching protestants and the doctrine-loving traditionalists (Catholics and Orthodox) who spend more time quibbling over infallible dogmatic definitions than dealing with the real world.
I look forward to a Vatican III.
Sloo (#85),
I know my Catholic Doctrine.
1) Yes, I stand by the Catholic Stance. We revere the statues of the saints and Mother Mary (major conflict vis-a-vis Protestantism and Islam) but we do not pray to them as we pray to God. We don’t ask them for favours – or are not doctrinally permitted to anyway. We ask them to pass requests for favours to God for or with us.
We only consider Christ Divine, not the saints or Mother Mary.
It is different with the Taoists – at least – who worship the idols to worship individual divinities.
2) Merely holding the joss sticks is not a problem. Participating in rituals with these joss-sticks is still a problem. I haven’t misinterpreted Catholci Doctrine at all.
3) Once again, you are wrong. The Pope – and the official Catechism of the Catholic Church – says that all of religion has a ray of truth, but only Catholicism has the complete truth in the Revelation through Jesus Christ.
4) Firstly, it is RCIA, not ACIA. RCIA is Rites of Christian Initiation for Adults. It has counterparts RCIY (Youth) and RCIC (Children). I thought that you had made a typo in your previous post. Since you repeated it here, I can only guess that you think “ACIA” is the correct term.
Secondly, yes, Catholics do Deathbed Conversions. My mother used to work with nuns at hospitals who are involved in these. But Catholics do not force dying people to convert against their choice.
In fact, my Parish Priest just did one three months ago. he told us at Sunday Homily.
Deathbed converts do not need RCIA because after all, they are meeting God very soon.
*Sigh*
5) Wrong again. The term is “Evangelical”, not “Evangelists”. In fact, the Pope himself is concerned that Catholic Evangelization is not keeping up with Protestant Evangelization. He mentioned that in a Global Pastoral Conference in June, the start of the Year of Vocations. This Conference is not something reported by the generic press, but it is reported in the Catholic News, if you want to check.
In case you didn’t know, there are missionary efforts by the Catholic Church currently working in Africa and Mongolia.
6) Me? I am a Catholic at heart, and ultimately still a Christian.
Alfian (#84),
One more point: Dr Thio is an Anglican, not a Catholic or Evangelical. Although I expect that COOS is considered a “Low” Church more than a “High” Church. “Low” Churches are closer to Lutheranism and Calvinism, whilst the “High” Church is closer to Catholicism.
Sloo,
I did reply actually, but the Editor deleted my reply.
(con-d from #91)
5) Street Corners, no. But there are Missionary communities preaching in China, Thailand and Mongolia.
Deriding random strangers’ religious affiliations, no. But performing apologetics and polemics in favour of Christianity vis-a-vis other religions, and Catholicism vis-a-vis Protestantism, yes. Talking to potential converts about the deficiencies in other religions, yes.
Inviting non-Christians to Church, yes. But we get them to observe and decide if they wish to attend RCIA or Alpha Course.
Bearing witness and proclaiming the Good News by example, yes
6) I am a Roman Catholic at heart, albeit one of a more ecumenical persuasion.
7) And you think yourself so flawless?
The ‘Colourful’ History of the Church has been found to be more ‘dull’ than is usually portrayed. Apparently, the convenors of the Enlightenment felt the itch to exaggerate the ‘colours’ in the Church’s history and conflate the actions of the Papacy with the actions of secular monarchs who professed their loyalty (formally) to the Church, but were mostly un-Christian in behaviour.
8) The Pope – like all his predecessors – believes in the inerrancy and infallibility of the Catholic Faith, even vis-a-vis Protestant professions. He acknowledges the mistakes in the Practice of the Faith though.
Hi Alfian,
“This is purely a technical point ….. But the fact is their names and addresses were handwritten on the envelopes. If I had received an envelope like that, I would feel quite distressed–why me? ….”
Perhaps it is also technical that the Christian couple acted out of love – a love they believe to be pure enough to share with the Malay in question – unfortunately, without giving due consideration to the contents of what they were delivering and how the contents were being delivered. A case of ‘love is blind’. A stupid argument I admit, but it could be the real reason why they did what they did.
“…in addition to the fact that the contents were malicious…”.
Another technical point of contention. What can be deemed malicious if what you believe in is deemed to be the truth that will bring you eternal salvation beyond the comprehension of this worldly life? The interpretation of ‘malicious’ therefore falls on the receiver and his reaction after that. That’s why I say, an overly sensitive recipient is equally guilty on the equation.
“…there persists a general impression that the Christians are the most over-zealous about this…”.
I agree, and this is what is doing the Christian in, time and time again. To understand the Christian and his zealous actions is to understand Christianity and the reasons of Christianity. Someone once said this in another thread; that to believe in (the Christian) God, is to surrender all you human faculties unto Him.
When the faith of the believer is such, no amount of forgiveness, counseling, reprimand and punishment is going to change him.
Taking action against such staunch believers will only provide them the martyrdom they think they deserve.
Forgiving them publicly will only make them bolder. That’s why we tolerate, using the terms spelt out by the government, in consideration of all religions living in a secular society. How else can we have it any other way?
6) btan on September 23rd, 2009 11.25 pm
2.) That majority of Muslims do not condemn such acts and some even welcomed it. E.g. Palestinians cheering when hearing news of 911 tragedy. (contrast this with the anger and indignation of Christians against fellow Christians who commit atrocities in Yugoslavia, in WW2 Nazis against Jews)
while i agree with your other points, i beg to differ that the “majority” of Muslims to do not condemn 9/11. you cant use the Palestinians as a representation of the majority of Muslims. these people have been fighting with foreign troops(Americas and Israeli soldiers) for years. they are fighting for their own right and freedom not for religion. how many of these people left helpless as the world just watch by? for goodness sake the Palestinians are fighting with sticks and stones against guns and machines!
and as for your comments on what right muslim men has to marry up to 4 times, so you know, the idea was so men who can afford it take women who are suffering in life to have a better life.
as for the convert issues, it’s a personal choice, if a non muslim doesnt want to convert, he or she has to right NOT to convert to islam by choosing NOT to go ahead with the marriage. nobody is forcing anyone to convert, you have a choice. in any religious faith, its always between you and your god whether you want to sin on not. at the end of the day, you are the bearer of your own sin, if you choose not follow or disagree with any teachings of your own faith of choice, it is all on you.
28) tom on September 24th, 2009 3.06 pm
To many Muslims, Hari Raya Aidilfitri, a day of celebration after a month of fasting, represents a moment of renewal……..by: Alfian Sa’at
The author should also touch on WHY during fasting month (year after year), Muslims are still eating (including non-halah), drinking (including alcoholic), smoking, buying 4D, TOTO etc, especially those in s’pore?
Next year, these group of muslims will join the Casino queues.
Some muslims even put on songkok or tudung and walk into the 4D shop, high abortion rate and divorce cases.
When a non-muslims marry a muslims, he or she must convert.
But a muslims cannot be otherwise.
Everyone knows (including govt) and it’s not a secret.
Maybe the writer should write on how to improve on muslims character & reputation.
you my friend, apparently do not have faith in your own faith that you are unconsciously implying that islam should be a perfect religion.
why do non-muslim and human beings other faith commit murder, rape and other crimes or sins, you mean is allowed in their religions?
why issit when a muslim do any wrong-doing which is wrong not only in religious terms but also in humanity as well, people immediately go “hey arent you muslim? do you know that you’re not supposed to do this and that?” are you subconciously trying to imply that muslims are supposed to be angels? we are like you, we are human beings too..
OK, let’s point out what is blatantly obvious here but there are lousy Muslims as much as there are good ones. This is especially true when it comes to following religious commandments. I don’t think there is a religion that can claim that 100 percent of its followers follow the words of it’s Holy Books to the letter.
New Rena ….Arix?
Thanks for the clearification. I hope I got the stand of the Cathooic Chruch right in my postings at least. But what is very enlightening is your statement:
“Apparently, the convenors of the Enlightenment felt the itch to exaggerate the ‘colours’ in the Church’s history and conflate the actions of the Papacy with the actions of secular monarchs who professed their loyalty (formally) to the Church, but were mostly un-Christian in behaviour.”
This sounds so so familiar even in our modern day settings if you were to relace some of the terms and words used. Apparently some leopard never changes its spots, regardless of time, denomination and country.
And to correct your misunderstanding, i never implied that you were flawless; i implied that cathoics, with their fragmented and troubled history, should really be in no position to judge other religion’s ‘deficiencies’ as you put it. Perhaps to contribute their moral stance on society and apply moral standards to their flock, but certainly not to judge or impose other religions. I would love to be flawless but recognise that perfection is impossible on this earth. We can certainly try to minimise our imperfections.
As for pointing out the defiencies of other religions vis-avis your own, that i do not agree. As another posting pointed out earlier, for one who has no understanding of another religious dogma and sees the world through their own religiously tainted glasses, such criticism or discussions would be bias, slanted and ultimately offensive. I agree to the stance of bearing witness, highlighting the good of your own religions and bee the perfect example of what your faith stands for.
**Niagara
“The author should also touch on WHY during fasting month (year after year), Muslims are still eating (including non-halah), drinking (including alcoholic), smoking, buying 4D, TOTO etc, especially those in s’pore? Next year, these group of muslims will join the Casino queues. Some muslims even put on songkok or tudung and walk into the 4D shop, high abortion rate and divorce cases.”
The point you have missed completely that the actions u mentioned do not interfere with the private belief and spaces of any othe rindividuals. This vital fact makes the actions of the christian fundie couple who mailed tracts condeming other religions an offensive one. Their actions impacts the private spehere, spaces and beliefs of others.
As Tang Li puts it, there are good and bad people regardless of their faiths; but what they do with their own lives is of no concerns to anyone else. Only when those actions impacts others negatively, then it becomes is cause of concern
New Renaissance,
Your posts are disallowed as they are way more than a thousand words long. Please keep your comments to within 500 words.
Also, one of your comments is disallowed as it has nothing to do with the article.
Editor,
Fair enough on the length. But which is the comment that has “nothing to do with the article”? I was responding to sloo, and I think that sloo’s comments were relevant to the article.
Editor,
please respond quickly. I do not like being misrepresented because someone thought that I hadn’t responded to them – and this has happened in the past – and I have but they haven’t seen the reply because it is still “under moderation”.
Plus, it mucks up the numbering of posts.
Sloo,
I apologize that my full reply to you isn’t available as the first two-thirds are still under “moderation”. I appear to be having a run-in with Andrew on this point.
Actually, yes, you did get the stance of the Church wrong. I went back to cross-reference the Catechism and official Encyclicals. I would recommend that you read para 22 off Dominus Iesus, the latest Encyclical on Evangelization released in 2000. The document was penned by the current Pope and approved by the previous Pope (may he rest in peace).
“””
22. With the coming of the Saviour Jesus Christ, God has willed that the Church founded by him be the instrument for the salvation of all humanity (cf. Acts 17:30-31).90 This truth of faith does not lessen the sincere respect which the Church has for the religions of the world, but at the same time, it rules out, in a radical way, that mentality of indifferentism “characterized by a religious relativism which leads to the belief that ‘one religion is as good as another’”.91 If it is true that the followers of other religions can receive divine grace, it is also certain that objectively speaking they are in a gravely deficient situation in comparison with those who, in the Church, have the fullness of the means of salvation.92
“””
(to be con-d)
(con-d from MY #101)
1) Hmmm, although I doubt that the terms I would replace it with would be the same to those you would replace it with. I have a sneaky suspicion about your use of ‘leopard’ though. (Why can’t non-believers/Atheists accept their sins too? Talk about hypocrisy!)
2) No, I didn’t intend to imply that I was flawless. I intended to imply that unless you yourself are so flawless, you are not in the position to judge the ‘deficiencies’ of the Church either, of any other religion for the matter.
I notice that Atheists – especially the followers of the New Atheists – like to talk as if they were flawless.
(to be con-d)
(con-d from MY #102)
However, all religions have exclusive truth claims, and where these claims contradict, there are only possibilities: (1) The contradiction is an apparent one which can be resolved through filling in theological gaps; (2) The contradiction is an essential one that can only have one alternative correct. I would concede again that the Church perhaps focuses too much on option (2); but that is why we have liberal theologians like Hans Kung. Though, the number (1) variety of claims do exist.
And where they do, the Church has as much rights as other religions to present its particular case. Because after all, every religion seeks for the Highest Good and Highest Welfare for man, and everyone on earth deserves to have the best methodology for achieving that.
Besides, for the sake of equality too. Christians are not the only one who criticize other religions; Hindus in India do the same for instance.
Dialogue achieves nothing if it only involves the nodding of heads, which is why perhaps IRCCs in Singapore have not achieved as much as they were intended to.
The only way to attain spiritual growth is through self-challenge.
On tolerance, sedition and forgiveness, yes but this afternoon just got one incident at MRT station about going inside a lift. One young Malay couple with toppler. The movement about to enter a lift and no know how got hit with her arm and don’t even know either she hit me first or I hit her arm. Anyway, I presumed that is a small matter. You know what, she standing outside keep on scolding without my notice, When lift door about to close, one Indian guy got in and told me that she was scolding vulgar word again me. But then her husband was innocent stood beside her.
I was short to heard this, a young mother behave so cheap and scolding vulgar words of other with no shame. Anyway, I told that Indian quy it just a small matter and I can’t be bothered to confront her with this small trivial matter. It only reflected how in manner behaviour and shame herself in public.
Through this incident, I strongly believed it is time for our young lady to get involve in Army Liability inorder to discipline them as I even saw a group of young girls fighting inside toilet and smoking at staircase.
Funnily enough, one of the wisest piece of advice I got was from a Malay bus driver who was driving me and a couple of Saudi Journalist who were here for Crown Prince Sultan’s visit back in 2006. We were talking about Islam and the difference between how Islam is practiced here and in the Middle East.
Suddenly, he made the point that, “Too emphasis is placed on the LETTER of the Book and not enough of the SPIRIT.”
If you apply this idea to every religion, you’ll see the “God” within the way they live their lives. It is better to have people who don’t follow every letter of the book but remain decent than to have people who are obsessed with following the letter of their religious books but fail to value humanity.
Alfian
I think your point about the law overriding the capacity of any given community to forgive those who have wronged it is an excellent one, but somewhat overlooked in many of the comments.
We need to be wary, though, of presuming these communities to be coherent in themselves, or of suggesting as much for rhetorical reasons, even where we know it not to be the situation on the ground.
New Renaissance: your comment is under moderation because it is too long. Chop it up and re post.
Tang Li,
I think your bus driver is very wise. It is indeed true that many religious – Christians and Muslims – place too much focus on the letter, and too little on the spirit. Even Jesus Christ himself chatised the Jewish priests of his time for just that. The Bible itself relates an occasion where Jesus is scolded by the Pharisees for healing a sick man on “the day of rest” i.e. violating the 4th Commandment.
On the other hand though, the letter is there to guide people on how to achieve the spirit, although the letter must first be understood fully in the context in which it was communicated, before porting it over to our context, lest we end up in anachronism or fail to see God’s accommodation to fallen nature.
The problem comes when these forms become set in stone. To a degree, that is a problem with all religions.
But people imitate/reflect the Light of God (whatever name they choose to call Him) when they live out the SPIRIT of their religions, which after all all derive from God, regardless of Theology and level of Human Corruption.
Paul (#106),
In the case of religious communities, as per each community there is an underlying coherence that makes them identify with each other, even as they do not fail to emphasize their differences.
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Uncategorized - Jan 15, 2010 10:12 - 126 Comments
It is affordable – Mah Bow Tan
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Uncategorized - Jan 15, 2010 10:12 - 126 Comments
It is affordable – Mah Bow Tan
More In Uncategorized
- Rebutting Law Minister K Shanmugam
- Challenge of communication
- TOC & Talk Politics hold successful Year in Review forum
- “Live” from Post Museum – TOC’s Year End Review
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I don’t think most Singaporean “tolerate” the practices of other religious/racial groups as such. We have moved beyond that to see some practices as as slight annoyance and part of Singaporean life. The lack of complaints would be because it is integrated into our lifestyle to do so, but racial slurs, at least from my pov, are few.
They have done a good job but this tolerance and fragility and racial harmony crap the government forced and is still forcing upon us needs to be updated. We are more united as ever against the lax foreign labour laws probably haha.