{"id":331,"date":"2018-10-09T12:16:01","date_gmt":"2018-10-09T16:16:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/?p=331"},"modified":"2018-10-09T12:16:01","modified_gmt":"2018-10-09T16:16:01","slug":"indonesian-authorities-use-legal-loophole-close-christian-churches-despite-religious-freedom-laws","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2018\/10\/indonesian-authorities-use-legal-loophole-close-christian-churches-despite-religious-freedom-laws.html","title":{"rendered":"Indonesian Authorities Use Legal Loophole to Close Christian Churches Despite Religious Freedom Laws"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_332\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-332\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-332\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/409\/2018\/10\/3513683910_5d18e84d56_o-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"wnstn | Flickr.com\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-332\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">wnstn | Flickr.com<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Indonesia officially requires that freedom of religion be ensured for all citizens, but that has not stopped authorities from finding ways to show Christians they are not welcome in the Muslim-majority country. The latest in Christian persecutions is the sudden closure of churches in Sumatra without warning or explanation. The International Christian Concern said that Sumatran authorities likely stated that the grounds for the closure of the churches were \u201cadministrative reasons,\u201d a loophole which would allow them to circumvent the legal protections for religious freedom.<\/p>\n<p>Gomar Gultom, the General Secretary for the Communion of Churches in Indonesia, said she does not understand why authorities insist on singling out Christian churches. \u201cThere are thousands of other places of worship that don\u2019t have permits, but continue to operate. I just can\u2019t understand why they won\u2019t let us have our churches,\u201d Gultom said. \u201cI can understand if the local government prohibited us from having the permits if we used the buildings for criminal activities, but we used them to praise God.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Communion of Churches in Indonesia is sending a legal team to Sumatra to challenge the closures, but Gultom is hoping to use a \u201ccultural approach, rather than a legal approach\u201d to secure the reopening of the churches. That said, she has made it clear that the Communion of Churches in Indonesia will pursue legal redresses if necessary.<\/p>\n<p>Aan Anshori, coordinator of the Islamic Anti-Discrimination Network, condemned the closing of the churches. \u201cIslamic teaching seems to fail to understand that other religions, especially Christianity, need to be respected in a democratic country like Indonesia,\u201d Anshori said.\u00a0 \u201cBut there\u2019s a strong impression that other religions are considered enemies of Islam. It shows that there is something wrong in Islamic teaching and also in understanding the rights of all citizens, no matter what their religion.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>More than 1,000 churches have been closed in the last decade in Indonesia, and those that remain open have been attacked by suicide bombers as well as being targeted by extremists in other ways. The increase in such attacks and attempts to tighten blasphemy laws have caused Indonesia to be ranked as the 38<sup>th<\/sup> worst country in the world for Christian persecution, and the situation may only continue to deteriorate as certain factions push for even stronger Islamic laws.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Indonesia officially requires that freedom of religion be ensured for all citizens, but that has not stopped authorities from finding ways to show Christians they are not welcome in the Muslim-majority country. The latest in Christian persecutions is the sudden closure of churches in Sumatra without warning or explanation. The International Christian Concern said that&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":616,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[137],"tags":[31,138,143,210],"class_list":["post-331","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-christian-persecution","tag-anti-christian","tag-christian-persecution","tag-church","tag-indonesia"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Indonesian Authorities Use Legal Loophole to Close Christian Churches Despite Religious Freedom Laws<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Christian churches in Indonesia have been shut down by authorities due to a legal loophole that allowed them to circumvent religious freedom laws.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2018\/10\/indonesian-authorities-use-legal-loophole-close-christian-churches-despite-religious-freedom-laws.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Indonesian Authorities Use Legal Loophole to Close Christian Churches Despite Religious Freedom Laws\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Christian churches in Indonesia have been shut down by authorities due to a legal loophole that allowed them to circumvent religious freedom laws.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2018\/10\/indonesian-authorities-use-legal-loophole-close-christian-churches-despite-religious-freedom-laws.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Christ News Today\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-10-09T16:16:01+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Stephanie Hertzenberg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:image\" content=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/files\/2018\/10\/3513683910_5d18e84d56_o-300x200.jpg\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Indonesian Authorities Use Legal Loophole to Close Christian Churches Despite Religious Freedom Laws","description":"Christian churches in Indonesia have been shut down by authorities due to a legal loophole that allowed them to circumvent religious freedom laws.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2018\/10\/indonesian-authorities-use-legal-loophole-close-christian-churches-despite-religious-freedom-laws.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Indonesian Authorities Use Legal Loophole to Close Christian Churches Despite Religious Freedom Laws","og_description":"Christian churches in Indonesia have been shut down by authorities due to a legal loophole that allowed them to circumvent religious freedom laws.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2018\/10\/indonesian-authorities-use-legal-loophole-close-christian-churches-despite-religious-freedom-laws.html","og_site_name":"Christ News Today","article_published_time":"2018-10-09T16:16:01+00:00","author":"Stephanie Hertzenberg","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_image":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/files\/2018\/10\/3513683910_5d18e84d56_o-300x200.jpg","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2018\/10\/indonesian-authorities-use-legal-loophole-close-christian-churches-despite-religious-freedom-laws.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2018\/10\/indonesian-authorities-use-legal-loophole-close-christian-churches-despite-religious-freedom-laws.html","name":"Indonesian Authorities Use Legal Loophole to Close Christian Churches Despite Religious Freedom Laws","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2018\/10\/indonesian-authorities-use-legal-loophole-close-christian-churches-despite-religious-freedom-laws.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2018\/10\/indonesian-authorities-use-legal-loophole-close-christian-churches-despite-religious-freedom-laws.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/files\/2018\/10\/3513683910_5d18e84d56_o-300x200.jpg","datePublished":"2018-10-09T16:16:01+00:00","dateModified":"2018-10-09T16:16:01+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/#\/schema\/person\/2accd57241ae3de281b15e255b66b126"},"description":"Christian churches in Indonesia have been shut down by authorities due to a legal loophole that allowed them to circumvent religious freedom laws.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2018\/10\/indonesian-authorities-use-legal-loophole-close-christian-churches-despite-religious-freedom-laws.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2018\/10\/indonesian-authorities-use-legal-loophole-close-christian-churches-despite-religious-freedom-laws.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2018\/10\/indonesian-authorities-use-legal-loophole-close-christian-churches-despite-religious-freedom-laws.html#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/files\/2018\/10\/3513683910_5d18e84d56_o-300x200.jpg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/files\/2018\/10\/3513683910_5d18e84d56_o-300x200.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2018\/10\/indonesian-authorities-use-legal-loophole-close-christian-churches-despite-religious-freedom-laws.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Indonesian Authorities Use Legal Loophole to Close Christian Churches Despite Religious Freedom Laws"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/","name":"Christ News Today","description":"Christian News From Around the Globe","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/#\/schema\/person\/2accd57241ae3de281b15e255b66b126","name":"Stephanie Hertzenberg","sameAs":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/authors\/s\/stephanie-hertzenberg.aspx"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/author\/shertzenberg"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/616"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=331"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":334,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331\/revisions\/334"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=331"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=331"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=331"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}