UMNO Minister Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor should fully withdraw and apologise to the Christian community in Malaysia for his wrong example that churches are a centre of fake news to spread untruths in their sermons. Tengku Adnan later clarified that he only referred to churches as an example, because his message is to all houses of worship including mosques, suraus, and temples.
In the interests of religious harmony and mutual respect amongst different faiths, it is wrong to single out churches even though he is using this as an example. This would only lend a negative impression of churches especially when all places of religious worship are dedicated towards disseminating truth about their religion and not untruths or fake news.
The Council of Churches of Malaysia(CCM) has expressed shock at such unfounded remarks by Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor, which calls into question the spiritual integrity of the church. CCM considered it an affront to the church for Tengku Adnan to insinuate that the religious duty in preaching during worship services are ‘lies’ because it is critical of societal issues.
No religion should be singled out even as an example because it will only create mistrust and ill-will towards Christianity, especially with past false and baseless reports of Christian churches converting Muslims. That is why it is important for Tengku Adnan to withdraw and apologise for his unfortunate choice of using churches as an example, to demonstrate his respect for freedom of religion.
Malaysians should celebrate diversity by also celebrating the contributions of Malaysian religious communities in helping to make the nation what it is today by promoting justice, peace and harmony.
LIM GUAN ENG