NEWS RELEASE Mennonite World Conference

For Immediate Release January 21, 2003

INDONESIAN CHRISTIANS JOIN OTHER FAITH GROUPS TO CALL FOR PEACE IN 2003

Solo, Central Java — An estimated 2500 people sat in the pavilion at the Sultan’s Palace here on Sunday, January 12, for an inter-religious peace rally. Dressed in matching T-shirts, they declared 2003 as the year of the “Peoplehood of Peace.” Paulus Hartono, an Indonesian GKMI (Mennonite) pastor, who leads a small congregation in the city, played a key role in the interfaith committee that organized the gathering.

Solo has been the scene of inter-religious, inter-ethnic and economic tensions in the past years. Amid threats of war and violence, the committee spent many hours networking and organizing the large rally. In addition to Mennonites, Catholics and other Christians, the forum included members of the Muslim, Confucian, Hindu and Buddhist religions, the organization of university students and the palace of Surakarta. These groups, from a broad range of doctrines, agree on the need to follow a path of peace.

As the date of this extraordinary rally approached, the threat of violence grew. Rally organizers responded by inviting an ever widening circle to join in sponsoring the event. They invited Kombes Hasyim Irianto, the Solo chief of police, to offer a welcome and to participate in the peace declaration.

At the rally, enthusiastic applause interrupted a peace oration by Mesach Kristeya, Mennonite World Conference president, five times. Ustad Farid Ma’ruf, representing a fundamentalist Muslim group, appealed to all elements of society to remain united, to avoid spreading false messages regarding others and to reject all acts of violence. One leader prayed, “Guide our country into the path of peace.” Mennonite lay people, Muslim teens, Chinese business people and Catholic nuns then joined hands across the pavillion to declare 2003 as the year of the Peoplehood of Peace.

The T-shirts, provided by the Mennonite community with assistance from Mennonite Central Committee, became a uniting symbol. As vans and truckloads of people in matching shirts came from across the city, they could easily identify others heading in the same direction.

The T-shirts also had potential for conflict. Printing on the shirts at first named the “Mennonite Community” as the sponsor. A radical Muslim leader, who asked a Catholic leader who Mennonites are, took issue with the identification, fearing that the event was becoming “Christianized.” The Catholic, who understood Mennonites to be a sect, was also ready to withdraw because he had learned that the MWC president would speak at the rally. Paulus Hartono learned of this conflict and asked a moderate Muslim leader to intervene.

And so it happened that a moderate Muslim explained to radical Muslims and Catholics that Mennonites are a movement within Christianity and that they have good intentions! The resolution was to print the names of all the “communities” – Muslim, Hindu, Catholic, and Confucian – on the T-shirt. God works in mysterious ways!

Solo is one of two cultural centers of Central Java. In recent years, 12 outbreaks of violence have left the city scared. Paul Hartono began to take the initiative to call religious leaders together to work for peace. Key leaders in the GKMI and the other two Mennonite denominations in Indonesia have been promoting “peace, justice, truth and love” for several years, carrying the message among other Christians and throughout the society.

– Mennonite World Conference release from a report by Dan and Jeanne Jantzi, Indonesia

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