By: Mirwan Ahmad )*
Christmas is a momentum to reflect on the presence of humans as agents of peace in Indonesia. Living Christmas means realizing the presence of humans as peacemakers. Indonesia as a country that recognizes six religions that live side by side, meaning it also recognizes all holidays from the six religions.
Even though Indonesia is the majority of the population embracing Islam, but as a form of religious tolerance, everyone helps each other to achieve peace and security for the holidays of every religion. For example in Ambon, at the 2016 Christmas celebration, hundreds of Muslim youth from various religious organizations helped to help the security forces in securing a number of churches in Ambon City during the celebration of the Christmas service.
Basically, the sense of tolerance among religious people has been very good, but, lately our country is filled with various tensions, even crises. The existence of the state as a shared house is no longer well understood by the citizens of the nation. Various clashes between groups in the community make citizens no longer able to live peacefully.
Various groups try to show their strength in front of other groups that are considered a threat. In an effort to provide security to all citizens, the government has not fully succeeded in taking concrete steps towards a harmonious and peaceful togetherness.
As a society that understands itself as an integral part of the joint region, namely the Unitary State of the Republic of Indonesia, in harmony and peace, it should have helped maintain the peace and security of the country. This is because this diverse Indonesian nation believes in the motto of Unity in Diversity, which is different but still one. The meaning is, we may come from different cultures so that the religion is different, but it is still an Indonesian nation whose ideology is Pancasila.
We long for a peaceful state that gives citizens a sense of security, regardless of ethnicity, religion, race and political affiliation. This sense of security enables citizens to work together to create common prosperity.
With security, all citizens can establish relationships without feeling threatened, depressed, or ostracized. Indeed, many positive efforts to create peace have been carried out by all components of the nation. However, this business has not yet achieved the maximum expected results and must still be carried out in a directed, planned and quality manner.