Tolerance is getting more costly

Tolerance is getting more costly

There is this irksome joke which goes like, Indonesians differ from Westerners in that when the latter get up in the morning, they think of what they have to do, while the former think of what they have to destroy.

The joke is absolutely untrue. However, if we turn our eyes to the destructions committed by our people, we realize there is a grain of truth in the joke.

Social conflicts, ethnic violence, corruption which has become even more deeply ingrained in every layer of society, destruction of public facilities, and legal abuse are examples of how low our tolerance is, as a nation.

That is why President Megawati's call for Indonesian Muslims to uphold tolerance among the values should not be interpreted as an empty rhetoric.

Megawati's call when opening the National Koran Reading Contest (MTQ) in Palanka Raya, Central Kalimantan on Wednesday was indeed addressed not only to Muslims, but to all the people of Indonesia.

Since the core of democracy is tolerance and a democrat should respect people from other groups, intolerance would be a big problem for our nation.

In fact, our democracy appears to be attractive in its rules, but terrible in implementation because culturally, we learn democracy through books rather than through practice in our daily lives.

Thus, to be tolerant, we have to ask our centers of education, whether our schools, society and families have taught us the importance of tolerance.

Have the school teachers, religious teachers and priests ever sat at one table to say that all religions have similarities, at least in developing the morality and spirituality of their followers?

Because we hear mosques, as well as churches, frequently reverberate with the sounds of sermons on the importance of tolerance and living in perfect harmony, we realize that all religions teach their followers to love their neighbors as they love themselves. -- Media Indonesia, Jakarta