By Rohana R. Wasala Courtesy The Island
Secularism and nationalism are two terms which are deliberately
misdefined by internal and external destabilizing agents in various forms in
the current political context in Sri Lanka for confusing and misleading the
largely monolingual Sinhala or Tamil speaking electorate. Properly understood,
secularism will be found to be quite compatible with the country’s
accommodating religious background, which is predominantly Buddhist and Hindu.
Similarly, these diabolical destabilizers and their mindless dupes attack the
rising nationalism as something reactionary that is not found in the
West.
The purpose of such verbal misrepresentation is not far to seek:
it is to suppress the emergence of a truly independent stable state where the
majority and minority communities live together in peace and harmony as equal
citizens while realizing their potential for achieving contentment and
happiness in accordance with their different ethnic and cultural identities and
worldviews, without having to experience any discrimination based on those
differences. Such suppression seems to be the wish of the powers that be whose
agendas prescribe a politically destabilized and economically disabled Sri
Lanka. Here I will focus only on what secularism means and why it need not
cause any anxiety among Sri Lankans.
The word secularism is usually translated into Sinhala as
‘anaagamika’ (not concerned with religion, not having to do with religion),
which is usually misunderstood by common people as meaning anti-religion, or
rejective or dismissive of religious values. This, I think, is mainly because
of the term’s novelty. Hypocritical anti-Sinhala Buddhist champions of sham
reconciliation propagate this misconception. What the word actually means in
the relevant (political) context does not involve a rejection of religious
values or any hostility towards religion in the affairs of ordinary life.
In terms of general dictionary definitions, secularism involves
the rejection or exclusion of religion from social and political activities, or
neutrality towards religion in these spheres, which is not a bad thing. But
let’s go to the origins of secularism in the West. The idea of
separation between church and state” came to prominence in political
discussion after its advent in a letter dated January 1, 1802, written by
Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826), who was the principal author of the American
Declaration of Independence of 1776 and the third president of the USA, among
other things. It was addressed to the Danbury Baptist Association in
Connecticut. The letter was later published in a Massachusetts newspaper.
Jefferson was a steadfast advocate of democracy, republicanism, and individual
rights and freedoms. He wrote thus in the above mentioned letter:
‘Believing with
you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that
he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate
powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with
sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that
their legislature should “make no law respecting an establishment of
religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” thus building a wall
of separation between Church & State….’
The phrase
‘separation of church and state’ is actually a rewording from the First
Amendment (1791) to the US Constitution. However, the idea behind separation
between Church and State” did not originate with Jefferson. The credit for that
goes to an Englishman who preceded him by nearly one and a half centuries,
Roger Williams (1603-1683). Williams was a Puritan minister, theologian and
writer. (Puritans were English Protestants who sought to free the Church of
England from Roman Catholic influence and its practices.) He was the 9th
president of the Colony of Rhode Island and the founder of Providence
Plantations on the east coast of America. Williams supported religious freedom,
separation of church and state, and fairness in transactions with American
Indians. He was a pioneer abolitionist, who organized events urging the
abolition of slavery in the American colonies. Roger Williams was expelled by
the Puritan leadership from the Massachusetts Bay Colony for propagating new
and dangerous ideas”. In Thomas Jefferson’s language we hear echoes of this
earlier revolutionary politician who, in 1644, wrote of the time
‘When they [the
Church] have opened a gap in the hedge or wall of separation between the garden
of the church and the wilderness of the world, God hath ever broke down the
wall itself, removed the Candlestick, etc., and made His Garden a wilderness as
it is this day. And that therefore if He will ever please to restore His garden
and paradise again, it must of necessity be walled in peculiarly unto Himself
from the world, and all that be saved out of the world are to be transplanted
out of the wilderness of the World’.
The term
‘secularism’ itself was coined by British writer George Jacob Holyoake
(1817-1906), an agnostic, to describe his idea of a social order that is
separate from religion. Like his predecessors in his line of thought, Roger
Williams and Thomas Jefferson, George Holyoake did not actively dismiss or
criticise religious belief, though he did so as a private person. Jefferson
didn’t go that far in his secularism, but he was unorthodox in his religious
beliefs and rejected such doctrines as that Jesus was the promised Messiah or
that he was the incarnate Son of God. All these secularists accepted the moral
code of Christianity, while refusing to mix government with religion. So,
Jefferson’s attitude was that the government should be indifferent to the
Church: religion should not be persecuted, nor specially protected.
Holyoake’s
following argument was compatible with Jefferson’s enunciations:
‘Secularism
is not an argument against Christianity, it is one independent of it. It does
not question the pretensions of Christianity; it advances others. Secularism
does not say there is no light or guidance elsewhere, but maintains that there
is light and guidance in secular truth, whose conditions and sanctions exist
independently, and act forever. Secular knowledge is manifestly that kind of
knowledge which is founded in this life, which relates to the conduct of this
life, conduces to the welfare of this life, and is capable of being tested by
the experience of this life.’
Holyoake also
described secularism in more positive terms (in his 1896 publication ‘English
Secularism’):
‘Secularism is a
code of duty pertaining to this life, founded on considerations purely human,
and intended mainly for those who find theology indefinite or inadequate,
unreliable or unbelievable. Its essential principles are three: (1) The
improvement of this life by material means. (2) That science is the available
Providence of man. (3) That it is good to do good. Whether there be other good
or not, the good of the present life is good, and it is good to seek that
good.’
Professor Barry
Kosmin of the Institute for the Study of Secularism in Society and Culture
divides modern secularism into two types as hard and soft: Hard secularism
considers ‘religious propositions to be epistemologically illegitimate,
warranted neither by reason nor experience’; according to soft secularism ‘the
attainment of absolute truth was impossible, and therefore skepticism and
tolerance should be the principle and overriding values in the discussion of
science and religion’. According to the Wikipedia as of January 11, 2020 (which
is the source I consulted in developing my argument up to this point and
which is also the source of all the extracts given above), contemporary ethical
debate in the West is predominantly secular; the work of well known moral
philosophers like Derek Parfit and Peter Singer, and the whole field of
bioethics (that is, ethics of medical and biological research) are described as
clearly secular or non-religious.
It is a fallacy
to believe that secular states in the West are indifferent or hostile to
religion. Former British PM David Cameron (2010-2016) took pride in claiming
that the British are a Christian nation; he described what his government had
done to support the Church. His predecessor Tony Blair was fanatical about his
Christian faith. The Americans flaunt their faith even in their currency
notes.Evangelical Lutheran Christianity was the state religion of Norway until
a constitutional amendment in 2012; even after that, though, the state of
Norway continues financial support to the Lutheran Church of Norway where
Lutheran Christians form 69.9% the population, with non-affiliates, Muslims and
Catholics accounting for 17.4%, 3.3%, and 3% respectively, according to 2018
figures. Though these avowedly secular states are, for the most part, protected
by the enlightened principle of a ‘wall of separation between church and
state’, they can’t exist in denial of their traditional religious culture that
decides the moral standards of the ordinary society.
The
constitutional makers of the Yahapalanaya were determined to make Sri Lanka a
‘secular’ state by denying Buddhism the prominence given by Article 9 of the
current constitution. They and the anti-national forces they represented held
that giving special recognition to Buddhism was prejudicial to other religions.
It was apparently because of that they supported secularism. But it is a known
fact that the country’s Buddhist cultural background is the best guarantor
of the rights of other religions. Some others of the same bandwagon who pose as
friends of the Buddhists, seem to take the opposite course: they oppose
secularism deliberately misrepresenting it as a rejection of religion. But
Buddhists don’t have to worry about secularism, because it is compatible with
the soundest moral principles that can be worked out – science based secular
ethics, which they can have no problem with. While this is true, the
Buddhasasanaya itself needs to be protected from the destructive activities of
religious extremists of other persuasions.
This is why
President Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, while opening the new session of parliament on
January 3, 2020, was able to state confidently: (NB: He doesn’t say ‘the
majority community’)
We must always
respect the aspirations of the majority of the people. It is then that (the)
sovereignty of the people will be safeguarded. In accordance with our
Constitution I pledge that, during my term of office, I will always defend the
unitary status of our country and protect and nurture the Buddha Sasana whilst
safeguarding the rights of all citizens to practice a religion of their
choice”.
