Tuesday, April 18, 2006

Under The Same Roof

This is soooooooooo nice!!! (my senior sent me the information.. I'll try to translate it :P)

In the city of Yogyakarta, Indonesia.. in the same property with Balai Budaya Puskat, just about 8km away from the heart of the city (heading to Kaliurang).. lies a square-shaped building, with a cone-shaped roof. What's so special from this building?

Its four walls each has the same length, that is 8m. On the west wall, there's a Arabic calligraphy like in a Mosques, saying "And God does not like destruction." On the south wall, a picture of doves is hanged, written on it "Look at the birds in the sky." which is usually can be seen in Churches... North wall, there's a picture of Swastika (Hindu symbol) with writings "I keep the trees alive.".. and last, on the east wall, there is a line of words saying "Let every creature cheers with joy", the words of Buddhism.

Those symbols and words are placed in the center of each wall, while the rest is covered with a painting of bamboos and the higher it is, the fader the color is. The place is designed to be used as a sacred place, where people of all religions (not just those four main religions) can pray and bring him/herself closer to our Creator. The Pastor/Priest (Romo) said "There is no partition up there, even though here we praise Him in different ways." And he also said that God has never see people differently, we are all just the same in His eyes, He opens Himself to us, everyone of us. I agree with that, there is no use in fighting over religions, for religions are just human made. God never talks about religions.

At first, the Catholics protested this place. They questioned why the picture that is used is doves picture, not the cross.. and why build such places for other religions too.. While the Moslems insisted that there should be no pictures at all.. But as time goes by, more people came there to pray, and the place got more accepted.

The article said that with more places like this, there would be no more fights on lands to build sacred places.. and please let me add to it, there would be no more sacred places being burnt down too..!!

Well, I think it's good! I think it's really good!! especially here in our country.. where religions have become the main reason to fight.. most people here are not racist for different cultures, but racist for different religions.. and still claiming to be pure as angels.. yuck!!

4 comments:

josey said...

I would like to see a place like that around here someday. Our churches all compete against each other. As far as the Catholics,...they need to quit crying about it and worry about worshipping Jesus Christ or God. The Bible talks about NOT worshipping idols,...so who do they have a statue of??? The Virgin Mary!! I don't see a cross in that picture. They shouldn't be crying about a cross on the wall at that place. Sounds to me like what the Bible says,...you talk about the splinter in your brothers eye and you cant even see the plank in your own.

dsentanu said...

Eh, emang ada yah bangunan begitu di Jogja? Mau gw cari ah... ^^

Romo = Pastor / Priest.

Nitingke said...

sekalian difoto yah! penasaran pengen liat juga hehe :D

Romo = Pastor/Priest? oooo kirain beda :D hehehe.. gonna change it then :D

but one of my senior just said that the Javanese call a Priest "Romo" but they dun always call a Romo "Priest" what's the difference?

dsentanu said...

"Romo" is actually means "father" in (polite) Javanese. So, a priest can always be called "father", but not all father can be called "priest". Begicu... ^^