ID :
378630
Fri, 08/28/2015 - 18:24
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Turkey: Bahrain’s tolerance example should be emulated

By Muhannad Sulaiman Al Noaimi Ankara, Aug. 28 (BNA): The President of Religious Affairs in Turkey Mehmet Görmez said that Bahrain, despite its small geographical size, is an outstanding example of peaceful tolerance that should be emulated in the region. He added in a meeting with Bahraini journalists visiting the Turkish capital Ankara that he was pleased with the representation of all religious sects in the Supreme Council of Islamic Affairs in Bahrain. The high level of tolerance that exists in Bahrain, despite the difficulties and challenges confronting the region, is not matched by many countries in the area, he added. Görmez said he visited Bahrain in 2007 during the holy month of Ramadan and witnessed some of the deep-rooted traditions celebrated in the kingdom. He said he had the chance to visit some tents, a major feature of Ramadan in the country. He particularly appreciated the cohesion between the various sects. Turkey’s current Presidency of Religious Affairs was known as the Şeyhülislâmlık during the Ottoman times, but the institution was turned into a ministry during the Republic. Its status today is higher than the ministries, he said. Görmez added that the Presidency of Religious Affairs looked after religious services in mosques and outside and endeavored to promote awareness among people about religious natters and issues. The presidency has around 120,000 employees and has representatives in several countries. It oversees matters related to muezzins and sermon imams and various awareness programmes in 85,000 mosques. The presidency also looks after 30,000 centers for the memorization of the Holy Quran throughout Turkey and provides religious services to prison inmates, centers for people with special needs as well as youth and women’s centers. Görmez said thousands of Turks lived abroad, mainly in Europe, the Americas and Australia. Several mosques were built by Turkeys in host countries, he added. “The goal of the Presidency is to promote and spread the genuine values and messages of Islam. We want to show that Islam is a religion of compassion and peace. In our approach and work, we focus on combining traditions with modernism, and we have made numerous efforts to solve problems in our religion, be they related to violence or sectarianism. We do our best to communicate with Muslims from all over the world,” Görmez said. He added that the approach to deal with sectarian sermons was two-fold. “When it comes to highly crucial issues, we have one common sermon for all 85,000 mosques,” he said. “In the second case, we draft several speeches and the imam who will deliver the sermon selects the one he wants. In addition, the Presidency has offices and representatives in several areas and they can suggest sermons.” Görmez said the Presidency had never heard of any sermon that promoted hatred or incited divisions or sectarianism, adding there was never a need to interfere and take deterring measures. “There is a difference between religious education in Turkey and in the neighboring countries and I believe that the major issue in the Islamic world is when you have a rule without wisdom. My conviction is that the problem starts when some religious rulings based on Quranic texts are interpreted in a different way that leads to grave issues,” he said. Görmez said that some young Turks, in their hundreds, have joined the Daesh group. “Obviously they were deceived into joining Daesh, and we have always stressed that extremist ideologies endorsed by Jihadists or Takfiris (those who accuse other Muslims of apostasy) cannot thrive in Turkey thanks mainly to the efforts exerted by religious institutions to develop awareness among young people and to protect them from terrorist groups. I believe that the extremist religious movements have totally misinterpreted religious texts,” he said. Referring to the role of the Presidency in reinforcing tolerance among civilizations and religions, Görmez said they had outstanding relations with all religions both in Turkey and abroad.

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