Hasyim Widhiarto, Jakarta – The authorities need to pay more attention to the safety of Christian worshipers living on the outskirts of Jakarta, a religious expert says.
"Attacks directed at churches are frequent in parts of West Java," Theophilus Bela, secretary-general of the Indonesian Committee of Religions for Peace, told The Jakarta Post recently.
Several areas in Greater Jakarta, such as Depok, Bekasi and Tangerang, are included in this category.
In an almost prophetic response, the Christmas morning mass at a church in Tambun Utara, Bekasi, was marred by hundreds of demonstrators demanding the service be stopped. At one point, the crowd threw objects at the church.
Last week, a mob attacked a church construction site in Harapan Indah, Bekasi, and demolished a security post as well as damaged the contractor's office and a container filled with building material.
"The churches and cathedrals in the center of the city might be safe, but those on the capital's outskirts often face opposition," Theophilus said.
The Yohanes Baptista parish in Parung, West Java, for instance, has been working to build a church on their property since 1999. However, they have met with many obstacles, such as the withdrawal of their building permit in 2005.
This Christmas, parishioners were forced to move their mass to a government building instead of holding it on their own property, adding to a protest in March that also forced them to cancel Easter celebrations.
For around 1,000 members of the Depok Huria Kristen Batak Protestan (HKBP) congregation, however, this year's Christmas was more cheerful than previous years, which were marred by conflicts.
In August, the Bandung State Administrative Court overturned a decision by the Depok mayor to withdraw the church's building permit.
"For the last 10 years, we had to borrow a church in Pangkalan Jati (in South Jakarta) for our activities, including Christmas services," Betty Sitorus, head of the HKBP church construction committee, told the Post.
The conflict between the HKBP congregation and Depok Mayor Nurmahmudi Ismail began in March, when the latter issued a municipal ordinance to scrap the building permit for the church in the Bukit Cinere Indah residential complex, following complaints from a local Muslim group.
Theophilus said such frictions were often the consequences of urbanization. "The building of intercity toll roads during the Soeharto era attracted mass urbanization from areas such as (Catholic-majority) Flores, with these new arrivals living among the local residents," he said.
Thus areas that became the target of urbanization, namely the outskirts of the capital, should be given attention, Theophilus said.
Muslim scholar Azyumardi Azra said the government should take a firm stance on sectarian violence. "The country has a decent level of tolerance, but there are still those who take up extreme positions, and they're the ones who have to be dealt with firmly," he said.
He added religious minorities in the country often faced obstacles in building their places of worship. "Muslims also face difficulty if they want to build a mosque in an area where they're the minority, such as in Papua, for instance," Azyumardi said.
Local authorities should also be responsible for providing a temporary place of worship for minorities, he went on, in the face of objections from the community in which they lived. (dis)