Yogyakarta - The Ministry of Religious Affairs (Kemenag) has held another international conference on religious moderation. The forum entitled '2nd International Conference on Religious Moderation (ICROM) was held by the Directorate General of Islamic Public Guidance in Yogyakarta, Thursday to Saturday (24-26/8/2023).
In his remarks, Director General of Islamic Guidance Kamaruddin Amin said that the ICROM conference was held to maintain the spirit of nationality by involving the role of the academic community from potentially divisive ideas. The characteristics of Islam in Indonesia, he added, are unique because of the participation of the community and religious leaders in maintaining diversity.
"ICROM is one of our efforts to involve community participation to maintain and care for Indonesia from the penetration of ideas that have the potential to divide the nation," he said. Kamaruddin added, Muslim communities in Indonesia have practiced religious attitudes that play a role in building the nation by caring for diversity.
"This religious practice in Indonesia is not necessarily applicable in other countries. The Islamic pattern of Indonesian society is very democratic and tolerant," he said. In the conference, as many as 300 researchers from within and outside the country have sent scientific papers on the phenomenon of religious life in Indonesia. This was reported by the Director of Islamic Affairs and Sharia Development, Adib.
"Of the 300 scientific papers received by the committee, 70 were selected to be presented at ICROM 2023," he said.
Adib added that the ICROM conference was held to build a moderate religious life. "Without a moderate religious attitude, it is impossible to build a moderate national social life. ICROM is an effort to build this," said Adib.
Separately, the Head of Sub-Directorate of Islamic Religious Understanding and Conflict Handling, Dedi Slamet Riyadi added, the ICROM 2023 event became a momentum to introduce the idea of religious moderation to the world community. "This is a momentum to export and campaign for the value of religious moderation to other countries. The involvement of speakers and conference participants from within and outside the country is expected to expand the reach of religious moderation to the world community," he said.
Dedi added that ICROM 2023 is also an effort to build a religious moderation ecosystem in Indonesia. Therefore, the ICROM conference was held by involving UIN Sunan Kalijaga, CRCS Gadjah Mada University, LP2M UIN Syarif Hidayatullah, el-Bukhari Institute, Islami.co, and Mojok.co.
Attending the opening of ICROM 2023 were religious moderation figure Lukman Hakim Saifuddin, preacher Habib Hussein Jakfar al-Hadar, academics from domestic and foreign universities, a number of Ministry of Religious Affairs officials, and 500 participants who attended and donated to victims of religious conflict in Indonesia through Kitabisa.com.
Previously, in 2022 the Ministry of Religious Affairs had also held an international conference on religious moderation in Jakarta. In the conference, 72 out of 200 scientific papers were selected for presentation.