Pope hails Indonesia tunnel linking mosque, cathedral as symbol of coexistence

JAKARTA – In the main event of his three-day visit to Jakarta, Pope Francis Thursday visited the city’s famed Istiqlal Mosque, where he and Muslim leaders outlined their vision for a moderate and tolerant society and called for an end to violent extremism.

Speaking at the underground “Tunnel of Fraternity,” which connects the mosque to the Catholic Cathedral of Our Lady of the Assumption across the street, Pope Francis called the tunnel “a place of dialogue and encounter.”

While tunnels are often thought of as dark places, “Here it is different, for everything is illuminated,” he said, telling the interreligious leaders present that “you are the light that illuminates it.”

“You do so by your friendship, by the harmony you cultivate, the support you give each other, and by journeying together, which leads you in the end towards the fullness of light,” he said.

Religious communities must respond to various global challenges with friendship, he said, saying that “by welcoming others and respecting their identity, fraternity urges them on a common path travelled in friendship and leading towards the light.”

“I am grateful to those who work with the conviction that we can live in harmony and peace, and are aware of the need for a more fraternal world,” he said, and voiced hope that their respective communities “may increasingly be open to interreligious dialogue and be symbols of the peaceful coexistence that characterizes Indonesia.”

Pope Francis visited Istiqlal Mosque after traveling to the cathedral across the street the night before for a meeting with Indonesian bishops, clergy and religious.

He is in Jakarta as part of a broader Sept. 2-13 tour of southeast Asia and Oceania, which will also take him to Papua New Guinea, East Timor and Singapore.

So far, dialogue with Islam and the push for tolerance has been a key talking point in Indonesia, which, with a population of around 275 million, is roughly 87 percent Muslim, making it the largest Muslim country in the world.

In a speech to national authorities Wednesday, Pope Francis urged them to fight extremism and foster interreligious tolerance and social development. Likewise, he urged the church’s pastors in a subsequent meeting to be openminded and inclusive.

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Francis was welcomed to the mosque Thursday by its Grand Imam, Nasaruddin Umar, who called it “a joy.”

Umar noted that the mosque, founded in 1961 and can host up to 250,000 worshippers, was designed by a Christian architect named Friedrich Silaban, who won a design competition.

Due to its vast size, Istiqlal is the largest mosque in Asia and the third largest in the world after Mecca and Medina, Umar said.

“It is not only a house of worship for Muslims, but also a great home for humanity,” he said, voicing his belief that “humanity is one and so anyone can enter and benefit from the Istiqlal Mosque.”

“Anyone is welcome to seek the good of humanity through this Mosque,” he said, noting that it regularly hosts interreligious and intercultural events, as well as diplomatic activities, and it also provides education from preschool to secondary school, and has facilities for sports and the arts, among other things.

He said it also has female cadre programs for at both the master’s and doctoral levels in partnership with the University of Qur’an Science in Jakarta and various universities in Egypt, Morocco, and the United States.

“It is our specific goal and expectation that alumni of Ulama Cadre become moderate and internationally recognized leaders,” he said, noting that non-Muslims are also able to access the mosque’s gym, retreat and business centers.

“This mosque also seeks to promote religious tolerance and moderation in Indonesia,” he said, calling the Tunnel of Fraternity linking it to the Catholic cathedral “proof of the role of the Istiqlal Mosque as a melting pot, especially for the citizens of the pluralistic nation of Indonesia, who adhere to the maxim Bhinneka Tunggal Ika,” meaning “Unity in diversity.”

Umar said the pope’s presence at the mosque was “a great honor for all the citizens of Indonesia,” and a joy for the community.

“God willing, the message and ideals expressed by Your Holiness, Pope Francis, will be put into practice by all of us and brought to fruition,” he said.

Pope Francis said the fact that the mosque was designed by a Christian illustrates the fact that “the Mosque, like other places of worship, are spaces of dialogue, mutual respect and harmonious coexistence between religions and different spiritual sensibilities.”

This respect must cultivate this every day, “so that religious experiences may be reference points for a fraternal and peaceful society and never reasons for close-mindedness or confrontation,” he said.

Referring to the Tunnel of Fraternity, Francis said it “allows for encounter” among different religious traditions and urged the community at Istiqlal Mosque to “continue along this path.”

He condemned extremism, saying the path of encounter is essential, “so that all of us, together, each cultivating his or her own spirituality and practicing his or her religion, may walk in search of God and contribute to building open societies, founded on reciprocal respect and mutual love, capable of protecting against rigidity, fundamentalism and extremism, which are always dangerous and never justifiable.”

Pope Francis then offered two suggestions he said would be helpful in continuing to build unity and harmony in Indonesia, and in society at large.

His first suggestion was to “always look deeply” at the other, “because only in this way can we find what unites despite our differences.”

The visible aspects of religion, the rites and rituals, are important and must be preserved, he said, but he also said that what is underneath, running underground like a tunnel, “is the one root common to all religious sensitivities: the quest for an encounter with the divine, the thirst for the infinite.”

“Let us remember that by looking deeply, grasping what flows in the depths of our lives, the desire for fullness that dwells in the depths of our hearts, we discover that we are all brothers and sisters, all pilgrims, all on our way to God, beyond what differentiates us,” he said.

Francis also told attendees to “preserve the bonds between you,” noting that the tunnel was built to link two different and distant places, and that in this sense, “It connects, creating a bond.”

While some view interreligious encounters as a matter of “seeking common ground between different religious doctrines and beliefs no matter the cost,” the pope said that this approach “may end up dividing us, because the doctrines and dogmas of each religious experience are different.”

Rather, what draws communities together, he said, is creating a connection in the midst of diversity and cultivating friendship.

“These relationships link us to others, allowing us to commit ourselves to seek the truth together, learning from the religious tradition of others, and coming together to meet our human and spiritual needs,” he said.

This friendship also allows the different traditions to work together to promote human dignity, fight poverty and promote peace, he said, saying “Unity is born from personal bonds of friendship as well as mutual respect and defense of the ideas of others and their sacred spaces.”

He pointed to the joint declaration that the interreligious leaders will sign, the aim of which is “fostering religious harmony for the sake of humanity.”

By adhering to this declaration, he said, “we take on the responsibility to address the serious and sometimes dramatic crises that threaten the future of humanity,” such as war and conflict, “which are unfortunately caused at times by the manipulation of religion,” as well as the climate crisis.

Faced with these challenges, he quoted the joint declaration, saying it is important that the values common to all religions be promoted in order to help society “defeat the culture of violence and indifference” and promote reconciliation and peace.

While Indonesia has one of the world’s largest gold mines – the Grasberg mine located in Mimika Regency, Central Papua – Pope Francis said the country’s greatest treasure “is the determination that differences can be harmonized through concord and mutual respect instead of being a cause for conflict.”

“Do not lose this gift! Do not impoverish yourselves of this great treasure. On the contrary, cultivate it and pass it on, especially to the young. May no one succumb to the allure of fundamentalism and violence,” he said.

He closed his speech voicing hope that “everyone instead be awestruck by the dream of a free, fraternal and peaceful society and humanity!”

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