Political And Religious Extremism Threatens Peace And Harmony In Sri Lanka
By Ayathuray Rajasingam -July 15, 2014
Ayathuray Rajasingam
The rise of extremism and violence against minorities signals the threat to peace and harmony. Compromise has no place within the philosophy of religious extremism. The noble philosophy of the religious teachings are blind folded when extremism march towards its goal of destruction. Recent conflict between the Buddhist extremists and the Muslims in Sri Lanka have demonstrated that human values are fully ignored and the laws of jungles prevail with the entry of political and religious extremism.
The ongoing tussle between the Buddhist extremists and the Muslims have demonstrated religion as a cruel killer, and not as a healer. Both parties have failed to see that religion has the force of compromising towards each other to endorse harmony with other communities embracing different faiths. The behaviour of both factions deviating from the concept of righteousness, have only demonstrated that they were preaching false religions, similar to some type of Cult organizations. Cult organizations and religious extremism have the same characteristics of a violent organization. Those engaged in propaganda of false religions failed to realize that realization of the divinity is the purpose of life which is the essence of religion and that it does not consist in erecting places of worship merely to show that this is a land of a particular faith. They failed to see what religion is about. Religion is the manifestation of the divinity already within man. The idea of realization is common to all religions. This is where religious extremists make blunders and mislead the people.
Various people from various countries with difference languages and culture search for God in pursuit of peace of mind. It is at this juncture the question arises as to how the mind roams about in search of God. The search for God revolves around the issue of spirituality. Places of worship represent as the meeting places where people could direct their minds towards God by way of meditation and the priests and preachers are there only to guide.
According to Lord Buddha ‘Goodwill toward all beings is the true religion; cherish in your hearts boundless goodwill to all that lives’ .Read More
