Religious Pluralism in Indonesia: Helpful and Hindering Aspects

Indonesia today is not only a country with diverse religions, ethnicities, and races, but also a country with several challenges related to issues of religious pluralism. This report tries to describe how tolerance, pluralism (religious), and dialogue among members of religious communities in Indonesia have been promoted and improved. It also attempts to map the hindrances to religious pluralism in Indonesia.Firstly, this report will explore the helpful aspects of emerging issues of religious pluralism in Indonesia, including the roles of government, individuals, and non-governmental organizations that work to enhance public awareness and understanding about how to engage with other members of other religious communities. Secondly, it will explore those aspects that hinder the efforts in promoting inter-religious harmony in Indonesia, such as the fatwas (Islamic decrees) of MUI (Islamic Ulama' Council), and the rise of the Islamic fundamentalist movement

"God Is Infinite, and the Paths to God Are Infinite": A Reconstruction and Defense of Sri Ramakrishna's Vijñana-Based Model of Religious Pluralism

This article argues that contemporary philosophers have unduly ignored Sri Ramakrishna’s pioneering views on religious pluralism. The Bengali mystic Sri Ramakrishna (1836-1886) taught the harmony of all religions on the basis of his own spiritual experiences and his diverse religious practices, both Hindu and non-Hindu. Part I reconstructs the main tenets of Sri Ramakrishna’s model of religious pluralism. Part II explores how Sri Ramakrishna addresses the problem of conflicting religious truth-claims. Part III addresses some of the major criticisms leveled against Sri Ramakrishna’s views on religious pluralism

Religious Pluralism, Religious Market Shares and the Demand for Religious Schooling

We develop a model of school choice in which the demand for religious schooling is driven partly by the desire of parents to limit their children’s exposure to the influences of competing religions. This framework links the literature on the effects of religious market shares on the within-denomination intensity of religious activity with a separate literature relating religious pluralism to the overall level of religious participation. The model predicts that when a religious group’s share of the local population grows, the fraction of that group’s members whose children attend religious schools decreases. In addition, it implies that the overall demand for religious schooling is a positive function of both the local religiosity level and the level of religious pluralism, as measured by a Herfindahl Index. Using both U.S. county-level data and individual data from ECLS-K and NELS:88, we find evidence strongly consistent with the model’s predictions. Our findings also illustrate that failing to control for the local religiosity level in estimating the effect of religious pluralism on religious participation, as is common in previous studies, may lead a researcher to erroneously conclude that pluralism has a negative effect on participation.Religious participation, school choice, religious pluralism

Malaysia, Truly Asia? Religious Pluralism in Malaysia

The spectacular economic growth of Malaysia in recent years has greatly impacted the state of religious pluralism in Malaysia. However, this growth has also created an attitude of indifference, if not silence, when it comes to matters pertaining to religion in Malaysia. Many Malaysians are not prone to discuss religious matters publicly due to the sensitive nature of such discussion as well as a fear that such discussion might trigger racial unrest. The role of the government in promoting a policy of silence rather than active discussion regarding issues of religion further exacerbates this attitude of indifference. As a result, many Malaysians suffer from a paradox; they remain a sophisticated society in terms of their material growth but are constrained when it comes to understanding their multi-religiosity.The purpose of this report is to provide an overview of the state of religious pluralism in Malaysia by first looking at Malaysia's historical setting, followed by an analysis of the impact of colonial rule on religious and ethnic pluralism and finally, a description of the current state of religious pluralism in Malaysia

Islam and pluralism : does Quran approve religious pluralism?

As for the relation between Islam and pluralism, it seems a little bit complicated. There are some verses in The Koran for pluralism and at the same time we have some verses against. Among the sayings of Prophet Muhammad like the some Koranic verses, we came across with something good and bad for non-Muslims in special contexts. By another saying, we find both positive and negative statements for Jews and Christians in different circumstances. Muslim scholars the complexity still exists. We find both positive and negative stances. So it is difficult to see a standard or official view on this issue. However, we should point out that Islam recognizes all the sacred (Semitic) books and their messages. It accepts all prophets of that traditions. It defines itself as the last and perfect religion of Semitic tradition and states that no other religion will be accepted from anybody else other then itself. It criticizes both the Jews and Christians especially about their failure to uphold the Oneness of God, tawhid, and to preserve the authenticity of their scripture from interventions. This exclusivist aspect of Islam as many conservative scholars formed with putting together some evidences from the Koran is generally accepted by Muslims

Religious Pluralism and inter-religious dialogue iosr

Religious exclusivism is the biggest threat for multi-religious society at the same time, ambivalent thoughts among religion in religious pluralism due to religious diversity often yields religious violence. In both of the extreme, (religious exclusivism and religious pluralism) there is the possibility of religious violence, i.e., religious riots, terrorism, mob lynching, and communalism. The objective of this paper is to discuss the significance of inter-religious dialogue (IRD), its basic principle, how IRD will help us for addressing the problems of humanity (i.e., Religious diversity and contradictory thoughts in major religions, Religious Dogma, superstition, and terrorism). If there is any biggest challenge for religion in the 21st century, is this one that how religion can deal with these problems and became a good tool for establishing peace and prosperity in the region

Introduction: Religious plurality, interreligious pluralism, and spatialities of religious difference

The introduction to this special section foregrounds the key distinction between ‘religious plurality’ and ‘interreligious pluralism’. Building from the example of a recent controversy over an exhibition on shared religious sites in Thessaloniki, Greece, we analyze the ways in which advocates and adversaries of pluralism alternately place minority religions at the center or attempt to relegate them to the margins of visual, spatial, and political fields. To establish the conceptual scaffolding that supports this special section, we engage the complex relations that govern the operations of state and civil society, sacrality and secularity, as well as spectacular acts of disavowal that simultaneously coincide with everyday multiplicities in the shared use of space. We conclude with brief summaries of the four articles that site religious plurality and interreligious pluralism in the diverse contexts of Brazil, Russia, Sri Lanka, and the Balkans

Religious pluralism and referential realism

Religious plurality is a fact of our time. It cannot be avoided. Neither can it be factually acknowledged then cognitively shunned, except by enacting a most obtuse denial. Religious plurality demands a cognitive response. The pressing question is how to comprehend both other religions in themselves and, of course, reflect on what they mean in respect of comprehending one’s own. If other religions are not to be denied, are they to be treated as equal? Do religions aspire to the same goal? Are they just varying paths with the same end? What is the nature of the reality embedded in the notion of religious plurality? It is in response to issues such as these that the paradigm of pluralism has emerged to challenge not only any narrow exclusivism, but also the more subtle inclusivism where one religion is perceived to function as the dominant paradigm to which all others, in some sense, are subsumed. In this paper I shall briefly review, and critically discuss, the paradigm of religious pluralism with particular reference to the work of Peter Byrne with respect to referential realism

Religious exclusivism unlimited: JEROEN DE RIDDER

Like David Silver before them, Erik Baldwin and Michael Thune argue that the facts of religious pluralism present an insurmountable challenge to the rationality of basic exclusive religious belief as construed by Reformed Epistemology. I will show that their argument is unsuccessful. First, their claim that the facts of religious pluralism make it necessary for the religious exclusivist to support her exclusive beliefs with significant reasons is one that the reformed epistemologist has the resources to reject. Secondly, they fail to demonstrate that it is impossible for basic religious beliefs to return to their properly basic state after defeaters against them have been defeated. Finally, I consider whether there is perhaps a similar but better argument in the neighbourhood and conclude in the negative. Reformed Epistemology's defence of exclusivism thus remains undefeated