The so-weak and superficial Muslims' faith

"... Is the faith of the Muslims so weak and superficial that Muslims can be so easily swayed, induced and bribed to renounce their faith in spite of the fact “the al-Quran is disseminated through loud speakers, television, radio and at government functions,” ... 

"Doesn’t this situation call for some soul searching as to why – in spite of great efforts made and billions of ringgit spent on building mosques, suraus, madrasahs, religious instructions, al-Quran reading competitions – all this had failed to strengthen the faith of the Muslims? Does this suggest that the method of religious teachings undertaken to instil the Islamic faith among the Muslims is either totally wrong or utterly ineffective." - P. Ramakrishnan, ALlRAN President

Read Mr PR's ramblings at Kit Siang's blog, Unscrupulous Actions, Unethical Behavior.

Perhaps the guy has never liked the fact that Islam enjoys precedence in this country, or maybe he does not love some Muslims around him (or all of us for that matter), but that does not make P. Ramakrishnan an expert on the question of our faith. Neither does it make him an authority on evangelism, covert or otherwise.

But this man sure writes as if he is both. And that's his problem.

The issue isn't about our weak or superficial faith, or how many billions have been spent on Quran competitions, on our mosques, or suraus. Rather, a PAS leader from Selangor, Hassan Ali (who sleeps on the same Pakatan Rakyat bed as DAP strongman Lim Kit Siang), is causing PR a lot of points for defending the raid on a church conducted by the State's Islamic religious police. There was talk about the involvement of this church in the conversion of Muslims, which is against the law.

How messy was that? Khalid Ibrahim, the Selangor MB, had to issue a gag order which I believe is still enforced until today, so Hassan Ali and JAIS's action must have been very damaging to the Opposition.

The raid by JAIS and the attempts by PR to sweep the issue under the carpet and bully Hassan into silent submission have absolutely nothing to do with the teachings of Islam to Muslims in this country. It is the politics of Pakatan Rakyat. Hassan Ali, Khalid Ibrahim, Lim Kit Siang - they all belong to the same side - Pakatan Rakyat. I don't know and don't care what Rama's political leanings are, although a paragraph of his article does seem to worship Lim Guan Eng, but let's not deliberately use their political game to foster religious discord among the ordinary Malaysians. Don't try to drag the ordinary peace-loving Muslims into your unholy politics, Mr Rama, and don't use this as a cover to attack the sincerity of those Muslims.

Do not worry yourself about our faith. Don't pretend to care about our souls or if the methods we use to teach our children about Islam are wrong or ineffective. The Muslims in this country are a peaceful lot. We have agreed to peaceful and harmonious co-existence with the other faiths in this country for hundreds of years.

Read also Helen Ang's The bishop's back, siap dengan sidekick sekali (the sidekick obviously refers to our Mr PR here)