A congenital religion?

The 40-day prayer and fasting programme had just started this Sunday. The launching of the programme was held at my church on Saturday. During the launching, some video clips were shown, regarding the 'freedom of religion' in our country. There was a woman who was held by the religious authority for not complying to certain rules of the religion and another video showed a woman who had converted to another religion being prevented to change the status of her religion in her identification card.

As Malaysia is celebrating her Golden Jubilee this year, there are a lot of things we Malaysian can truly thank God for: the peace we are enjoying, being spared from severe natural disasters, and above all, the freedom to profess and practise our religion and the freedom to gather in the name of Jesus. All these, of all things, I choose to attribute to the fact that god has not been taken out of the political scene. We still have an official religion, Islam, which still plays a crucial role in the government of the country. It is still, to a certain extent, the core of our government and our society.

For a country to have an official religion is a good thing, whatever the religion may be. I believe that all religions preach love, kindness, goodness, and all the positive qualities that come to mind. No religion ever preaches cruelty and hatred. Having religion as the core of the government and the society helps to uphold moral standards in the country. I am glad that abortion has not been made legal because the Islam religion condemns the practice. However, there is a certain limit to the role of a religion in a country.

As all good things, when taken excessively, become a bad thing, so is the role of religion. When it is fine for a country to have an official religion, I do not believe that the religion of any individual should be regulated by law or defined by the constitution. As in many cases, a religion has been so ingrained into the lifestyle of a certain group of people that the practices of the religion are adopted as part of the culture of the race. Often a race is equated to the religion, so much so that one is said to be born into the religion.

Religion is not something to be enforced by law: it is a matter of the heart. Just as love for a person cannot be enforced by the law, so is one's religion. Practising one's faith should originate from the faith and love one has for the beliefs he dearly holds on to, instead of out of fear for the law. I have met a friend of mine of a certain faith who gives excuses to escape practising the rituals her religion imposed on her. She professes to be of a certain religion, merely because she was 'born into it' and hence, she was left with no other choices. Failure to comply to the rules of the religion will cause her to come under fire of the religious authorities.

It brings us, then, to ask ourselves this question: Is this true faith? If profession of a faith does not originate from true belief, but merely because one was perceived to be born into it, so what if your identity card says Islam/ Christianity/ Buddhism/ Hinduism? Just as being born in a garage does not make you a car, so there is no such thing as a congenital religion. Whatever the law may say, true profession of a faith comes from deep within and nothing can change that fact.