LOVE IS A RAINBOW

When I heard that Sekolah Tinggi Teologi Jakarta (Jakarta Theological Seminary - STT Jakarta) was having its annual Lesbian Gay Bi-sexual Trans-sexual Inter-sex Queer (LGBTIQ) Week in November 2012, I immediately contacted Rev Miak Siew, Pastor of Free Community Church. We both without any hesitation decided that we must attend to express our solidarity with the seminary. This is the first Asian seminary that is courageous enough to have such a significant public event.

I recall that when the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC), organized an Asian Conference in Surabaya, Indonesia in March 2010, it was cancelled even when the 150 delegates  representing 100 organizations from 16 Asian countries were scheduled to attend.

Gaya Nusantara, one of the oldest lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) organizations in Indonesia, based in Surabaya was the local sponsor.  The National Human Rights Commission gave their full support.

Seven radical Muslim groups led by Islamic Defenders Front (FPI)  joined forces and protested, demonstrated and even threatened violence against the delegates. The irony is that Surabaya is an open city.  Surabaya’s residents are used to seeing gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transgender people.

Grace Poore from Malaysia, the Regional Co-ordinator for Asia, filed this report:
"Indonesian police ordered the cancellation of the conference in response to pressure from Islamist fundamentalist groups. The conference hotel refused to permit the conference to proceed.  ILGA Asia found alternate venue, but fundamentalists tracked them there.  One of the groups occupied the hotel lobby for several days. After threats of violence and hours of negotiation, Indonesian activists were forced to leave the hotel and foreign attendees forced to disperse until they could leave Indonesia."

Rev Dr Joas Adiprasetya, President of STT Jakarta, warmly welcomed us and in his letter of appreciation when we left wrote: "We started the program with faith and dream and your gift is helping us believe in the future of this initiative. We understand that to initiate such a program in the Indonesian context is very risky; however we realize that we do not walk alone."

STT Jakarta  was founded as early as 1934. It is the oldest seminary and established to train pastors to serve the Christian churches in Indonesia. It is especially significant that an old established seminary had been moving with the times and had the vision to address the LGBTIQ issue and train the Christian leadership to support the movement.

LGBTIQ Week was organized by a committee of students whose sexual orientation was not identified nor regarded relevant. It was apparent that some of students and the public who attended are members of the LBGTIQ community. The faculty members officially supported the event and Rev Stephen Suleeman, from its Sociology/Communications Department represented the faculty. He has his first degree from Trinity Theological College in Singapore in the seventies. At that time I was working with his father who was on the faculty of STT Jakarta in the ecumenical work in Indonesia.

Rev Miak and I were asked to share about the historical development of Free Community Church (FCC) and its mission and ministry in Singapore. In a second session Rev Miak gave a lecture on Queer Theology which was well-received. We brought as a gift  about 70 books relating to the studies of the LGBTIQ issue and they were appreciative.

The other sessions conducted included presentations by a panel of gays, lesbians, and trans-sexuals.   
A recent woman graduate pastor shared her programme of pastoral care to the LGBTIQ members in the congregation and in the community. It was important to see that secular groups supporting them were present and contributed financially to the event. In each daily session there were around 100 participants. Some of them came out to the audience and shared their personal stories.

The worship service was an impressive one with a fusion of songs and dances of religious music accompanied by musicians which included traditional drums and gongs. The liturgists danced as a processional bearing the cross, bible, candles, and bamboo trays of local bread. They were in line with local cultural elements in the act of worship. The worship center setting had rainbow drapes hanging from the ceiling, flanked by rainbow flags and a local painting of the crucified Christ in front. It was indeed a meaningful experience.

Rev Miak and I returned inspired and enriched by our participation in the LGBTIQ Week. In spite of the difficult context the LGBTIQ people are in within the church and the community in their country, they were able to witness to the truth and the necessity to form a Church which is truly inclusive regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation and economic status.

The special tee shirt has a bright rainbow emblem with the words Love is a Rainbow.

To God be the glory.

Yap Kim Hao


--
When we lose the right to be different in diversity,
we lose the privilege to be free in captivity.





























       

   
       
       
       

Levels of Support for Causes

People are motivated differently to support various causes. For people of religious faith, we make the choice or born into one religion over other religions. Much is due to the time and place in which we were born and the way we react to our  conditions. As a result we are now surrounded by a diversity of faith communities. The challenge before us in our globalized world is that we have to exist with people who relate to different religions and with no religion and those who sense they are spiritual but not religious but do not belong to any particular religious community.

Even within each religion with its own sacred text there are differences of interpretation of their holy writings leading to various schools of thoughts and sects in each religious community. I was fortunate to attend recently the lecture of Professor Farid Esack organized by Islamic Religious Council of Singapore (MUIS)  on "Text and Context" relationship to inter-faith relations and solidarity.

In all our sacred texts there are some "awkward" passages or even "clobber" verses attacking others within and outside the community itself who hold different interpretations. There is conflict within and without. All passages have to be scrutinized and evaluated by critical thinking especially by credible scholars of the text.  Our personal study and reflection lead to acceptance of a certain view or position.

In my own religious development, I had the privilege to study with professors who pursue critical analysis. I learnt to ask the question "Why." I was taught to deal with doubts and not resort too easily to suspend them and accept contradictory views in "faith." Are we honest enough that in spite of claims of revelations and loyalty to creeds, we as human beings admit that we can have approximations of truth. Only the Creator has the ultimate truth.

With our understanding of our experiences in life, we with our limitations need to plunge into the struggle  in controversial issues with faith knowing that it is only our claims of truth which often is not that of the majority of people.

When we offer support especially different causes there are nuances of the kind of support. For instance when I wrote about my impressions of Professor Farid Esack, I made the general statement which I want to correct so that it is more specific and precise and more accurate of the stance that he makes rather than the impression that I received.

My sentence “He supports the rights of gays, lesbians, bi-sexual, transgendered rights” should be corrected to  "He showed considerable insights into the challenges faced by gays, lesbians, bi-sexual, transgendered individuals when it comes to addressing the question of HIV.”

The degree and kind  of support need to be clear. However the support must show the degree also of consistency in order to gain credibility. To give full and total support to any cause is almost impossible. This is especially true in the political arena, it is generally known that compromises are expected to be made for the sake of security, harmony, economic growth. Yet, we need to evaluate how much we can accept the trade-offs in pursuit of our goals.

In the light of this perspective of support for causes and issues we must be realistic and weigh the consequences of our involvement. To engage we must. In faith take sides. Who we serve is the important criterion - the systems of domination or the poor, marginalized and oppressed.

Yap Kim Hao

My Impressions of Professor Farid Esack

Meeting personally Farid Esack for the first time, I was significantly impressed. He carries impeccable  credentials as an influential Muslim scholar and cleric, acknowledged prolific writer and articulate passionate speaker. He is recognized as a courageous Muslim interpreter of the Qu'ran, voice for the marginalized and oppressed, campaigner for social justice.

It was a special privilege for Singapore Interfaith Network on Aids (SINA) to organize the meeting on October 8,,2012 in which the distinguished Professor Farid Esack spoke on "The Challenges of HIV/Aids."  Professor Esack is a prominent advocate for the victims of Aids and initiated the movement known as "Positive Muslim" in South Africa.

Born in South Africa in 1959 to a poor family, he had his early education in  the traditional Islamic Studies program, in Madrasahs in Karachi, Pakistan. He secured his PhD at the University of Birmingham and post-doctoral work on Biblical Hermeneutics in Frankfurt-am-Main. He has taught at the University of the Western Cape, at Amsterdam, Hamburg and Gadjah Mada Universities and Union Theological Seminary in New York. He is a former Distinguished Mason Fellow at the College of William & Mary, and the Besl Professor in Ethics, Religion and Society at Xavier University in Ohio. Just before his current appointment as a Professor in the Study of Islam in the University of Johannesburg, he held a joint appointment  for two years at Harvard University between the Divinity School and the Faculty of Arts and Sciences as the William Henry Bloomberg Professor.

To participate in this important speech in Singapore were the practitioners who are directly involved in the HIV/Aids issue in Singapore. They represent the government Ministry of Health through its Health Promotion Board and the Communicable Disease Centre. Secular non-government organizations representatives were from  Action for Aids, Humanitarian Organization for Migration Economics (H.O.M.E.), Pelangi Pride Centre, Association of Women for Action and Research (AWARE). Faith-based staff members on HIV/Aids were from Tzu Chi Buddhist Foundation, Project X of Student Christian Movement, Catholic Care Centre), Kampong Kapor Methodist Church and Free Community Church. This group of fifty participants are actively and directly engaged in HIV/Aids projects of education, anonymous testing, counselling and healing support to People Living with Aids(PLWA), sex workers, domestic workers, migrant workers, shelters for the abused. They pursue the task advocacy for the rights of the victims to drugs, condoms, employment and housing. They battle with issues of discrimination and stigmatization..

Professor Esack shared his views especially on the broader aspects and the necessity of social justice in dealing with this public health issue. While it is an immediate need to deal with the physical and psychological aspects of people living with Aids, it is necessary to engage also individually and in solidarity with others in social, economic, religious and political problems that interlink with HIV/Aids.

What is the general response of the public to HIV/Aids? Professor Esack identified the levels beginning with ignorance, denial, scorn, pity, compassion, and justice.

He began by illustrating it in the scenario of an car accident in which a drunken driver was involved. We rush to the scene. There are those who ignore it and deny it for fear of being involved in a legal case. There is scorn thrown because the driver was drunk and deserves the dreadful consequences. But there are a few who express compassion for those who suffer physically. The ambulances were called but they delayed in arriving. The streets were not well lighted and there were potholes. Surrounding and leading to the accident are social justice issues which are related to the incident. To prevent accidents we must deal with such issues and must not treat it in isolation from the related factors.

Further he narrated the story of the woman who pick up the babies who were floating down stream and cared them. It is not enough for she needs also to be aware of how the babies were in the river in the first place. Someone upstream has been throwing the babies in the river. That situation must be dealt with too.

We are familiar with the story of the cars that plunged down from the cliff above. We rush to the scene below and provide the ambulance to care for the victims. This is necessary but we have to go up the cliff and find how we can prevent the cars from falling down. We are so busy with our ambulance work or caring for the victims without changing the conditions that cause the carnage.

While it is necessary to have compassion we must be engaged with justice issues. This was the clear challenge that Professor Esack posed to us who are so tied down with the care efforts of the victims of HIV/Aids without addressing the factors of culture, economics, religion. and politics. His compassion is to do justly to those who are afflicted and affected.

As I reflect about Professor Esack and his own involvement, he is not a single issue person or just touching the surface of different issues around him. He himself is hands-on and personally engaged in clusters of issues which are inter-related. He handles them according to his training and personal ability. He is a progressive Islamic scholar of the Koran.  In this minority religious community in South Africa he was active in the battle against apartheid. He is active in inter-faith relations.  He supports the rights of gays, lesbians, bi-sexual, transgendered rights. Nelson Mandela appointed him to serve as a Commissioner of Gender Equality promoting the rights of all women. I can see how he has embodied in his own life and career the inter-connected issues. Coming from a background of poverty and enslave ment, he has developed the passion for social justice. He has pushed the parameters, he has stretched the limits, he has widened the horizons as he got involved in HIV/Aids and other causes in his society.

In a subsequent meeting organized by the Centre for Contemporary Islamic Studies in which I am the only non-Muslim who was invited to be a member, I got a further insight about Professor Esack. To an audience comprised mainly of young progressive Muslims he conducted an open discussion with them. The theme of the talk was announced at different times to be "New Muslim" then "Modern Muslim" and finally publicised as "Good Muslim."  This indicated how the event could be interpreted differently. However Professor Esack shared on the topic of being a "Controversial Muslim." He emphasized that it is his willingness to take a stand and be different and not for the sake of just being different all the time. It is more of being courageous to deal with controversial issues even when it is not popular or in favour with the systems of domination by those in power. It is to be authentic and honest with his own convictions and to serve those who are voiceless, marginalized and oppressed. He made the further insightful observation that all the prophets of our religions have associated themselves with the hopes and aspirations of the downtrodden and showed the ways for their liberation. Being controversial is the perception of others but it has to be viewed positively as being courageous and prophetic.

It was an inspirational evening for those of us who were fortunate to be present and be enlightened by such an eminent personality.

Yap Kim Hao