Religious Moderation
In the book Khitthah Nahdliyyah (2005, 62), KH Ahmad Siddiq states that moderate (al-tawassuth) must be juxtaposed with al-i\'tidal (being fair) and al-tawazun (balanced).
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Two Christian students (not wearing a headscarf) interact with their Muslim friends in one of the classes at SMK 2 Padang, West Sumatra, Tuesday (26/1/2021).
The headscarf case at state vocational school SMKN 2 Padang, West Sumatra, some time ago, indicates that there are still parts of our religious community that want to impose their religious beliefs on those who are different. Tragically, they even see such coercion as a religious virtue and not as a violation, either against religion or the constitution.
The cases related to freedom of religion and belief as mentioned above are a challenge in itself for the religious moderation program that the Religious Affairs Ministry continues to work on, in addition to issues of radicalism and terrorism. For the last two problems, of course we have a lot of hope for the professionalism of Densus 88 (National Police’s counterterrorism squad) and the National Counterterrorism Agency (BNPT). Meanwhile, with regard to religious culture, religious moderation requires continuous education and implantation of awareness in order to become a new habitus in society.