2017-2020
Indonesian Consortium for Religious Studies (ICRS) in cooperation with the Ministry of Religious Affairs, the United Kingdom Embassy of Jakarta and the British Council organized a three-year religious literacy program, entitled “Religious Literacy for Promoting Social Justice, Religious Harmony and Multiculturalism.” The objective of the program is to promote awareness, understanding and interaction among religious communities, while enhancing capacity of local stakeholders to build social justice agenda and advocate for policy reform to ensure harmonious living and human flourishing. While the program focused on religious extension officers/religious councilors (penyuluh agama) in the Ministry of Religious Affairs, the program included other stakeholders such as religious teachers, representations of religious institution, youth organizations, academics, and non-governmental and civil society organizations. It covered eleven cities in Indonesia and altogether engaged and trained 1177 religious extension officers and other stakeholders. In two occasions the program has been blessed with the presence of the Minister of Religious Affairs, Mr. Lukman Hakim Saifuddin, and the United Kingdom Ambassadors for Indonesia, H.E. Moazzam Malik and H.E. Owen Jenkins (see the news coverage here).
The scope of the program was included one-day workshop in seven cities, i.e. Ambon, Bandung, Makassar, Manado, Medan, Pontianak, and Ruteng, two training of trainers (ToTs) in Yogyakarta, and religious literacy module assessments in five cities, i.e. Banjarmasin, Denpasar, Makassar, Malang, and Jakarta. The program covered seven main topics in its training program, i.e. Religion and Us, Religion and Society, Religion and the State, Religion and Human Dignity, Reimagination of the role of the Religious Extension Officer, Religion and Ecology, and Religion and Internet. The outcome of the program is a module for religious extension officer that extracted the aforementioned topics from seven to four main topics, i.e. Religion and the State, Religion and Human Dignity, Religion and Internet, and Religion and Ecology.
Link:
- “Learning about Religions: An Indonesian Religious Literacy Program as Multifaith Site for Mutual Learning” in Journal of Religions, Switzerland, Switzerland, MDPI, 2020. DOI: 10.3390/rel11090433.
- Religious Literacy Program ICRS, British Council & Kemenag RI (24-27 September 2018). Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcZZueN1RlM&t=370s