Gus Dur warns of politicization of religion

KARANGASEM, Bali (JP): Abdurrahman Wahid, chairman of Indonesia's largest Moslem organization, Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), warned against the "politicization" of religions.

The scholar, better-known as Gus Dur, told a conference of the World Conference on Religion and Peace -- an international organization which he chairs -- that once religions are used for political interests, social conflicts are bound to occur.

The gathering was held at the Ashram Santi Dasa temple in Karangasem regency on Thursday evening.

He cited a number of examples of the politicization of religions. Islam, he said, has laws and requires power in order to implement them.

"Power, in this case, is the power of a state, and it's formal ... this means that the political forces should be 'Islamized' as well," he said. "There are demands to turn Islam into something formal, which -- like it or not -- would give birth to a relationship between Islam and politics."

The new entity -- Islam and politics -- he said, would then stand in confrontation with other forces.

"This ideological approach is the reason why Islam has been for centuries the enemy of the West," he said. "Added to this are a number of misperceptions. We then have confrontations."

He said that some people see the West -- especially the United States -- as the hotbed of anti-religious, free-sex activities and of a materialistic way of life.

"There are religions there," he said. However, those who politicize religions view religions that are active in the United States as only "organized in order to fight Islam".

Abdurrahman cited the longstanding feud between countries such as Pakistan and India.

"Religion would only bring peace to the people if it could accept plurality," he said. "Moslems, who happen to make up the majority of Indonesian population, should never ask for special treatment from the government."

"Moslems should be able to protect the followers of minority religions," he said. "However, not many people understand this. They are only thinking that because they are the majority, then they should be given privileges."

Such a stance, he said, could aggravate conflicts in pluralistic Indonesia.

The scholar then named a number of incidents arising from religious tension, which stem from some people's insistence that they be given special treatment.

The attacks on 10 churches in Surabaya, East Java, last month was one of the incidents. He said it was triggered by economic, educational and sociocultural disparities.

The attacks on June 9 have sparked concern about diminishing religious tolerance in Indonesia. The government has attempted to play down the incident by saying that it was purely a criminal act.

"Economic disparities cannot be addressed by only one religion (followers)," he said. "All religions should help each other in fighting injustices." (23/imn)