Preaching Religion VS Manipulating Religion

It is not the first time religion has been manipulated and has, consequently, become a bone of contention between two institutions in this country. Only that this time around, the issue is graver and can cause dire consequences.

First, a religious party’s leader gave his take on who is a martyr. I am no scholar but I do understand that determining this is only God’s jurisdiction; none of us will be questioned about who happens to be a martyr in our graves but it will be our own actions that would matter in there. Sadly, no one cares to peep into his/her own collar in this state but prefers to judge and to comment explicitly on what others are doing-people have grown so used to this phenomenon that they lament over the weak implementation of law in this state during a journey and then break a traffic signal the very next moment.

I perfectly contemplate that drone strikes as well as missions and attacks carried out by military in the past have affected the common people in tribal areas: citizens of these areas consider both situations as an attempt to sabotage their culture and suppress them. Nevertheless, the leader of a prominent party should have enough sense that the government has been trying recently to reconcile with the insurgent groups and its efforts remained inefficacious because of a recent drone attack. He should never have given a statement which will lead to more polarization in the society, will give rise to extremism by fueling the sentiments of those who have been affected by this war on terror-be it one side or the other- and will lead to more riots and violence, besides intensifying the conflict of ideologies in this society.

This quarrel will only create further ideological divide in our society and intensify the altercation between secularism and fundamentalism-the two illusions have been creating instability and propagating extremism for quite a long time now. Our religious-as well as other-authorities need to realize that it is imperative to shun this debate or it will create further polarization.

The point I want to make is that it is time that those who are concerned realize that religion should not be used as a tool to manipulate the emotions of the common man-who is very passionate about his/her religion. Instead, they should play a pragmatic role in helping the society heal from this disease that is called extremism or else this moth will gradually penetrate through the unity and peace of our country (whose condition is already too fragile). They should realize that in the broader interests of Pakistan, religion should not be used to fuel hatred but to promote peace, fraternity and harmony.