Like Christians are celebrating Christmas, Every society has its own religious, cultural and national events. As far as religious events are concerned, they are celebrated by the followers with great joy and felicity, if they are in majority in a country.
Contrariwise, minorities in a society face numerous difficulties including intolerance, prejudice and discrimination, in the celebration of their specific events. This makes minorities to feel insecure, helpless and suspicious. In Pakistan the Christian community also faces some problems while celebrating Christmas.
Nevertheless, in countries having impeccable inclusivity such feelings of narrow-mindedness, partiality and discernment are not existed. The minorities not only celebrate their events with relish but also are cooperated by the people of fully of other faith in their celebrations. This ushers in viable inter-faith forbearance, coordination and sympathy.
By mutual celebrations, people are exposed to observe traditions and customs of others religions and culture. This makes life colorful. This also results in communal gatherings on events of all religions. There is a need to celebrate Christmas and festivals of other religions in Pakistan for developing a feeling of conjoint understandings and to avoid inter-faith conflicts in the society.
Furthermore, religious festivals provide the opportunities to care for the poor, backward, miserable segments of a society. In this way, they feel relaxation, and forget about their problems, and become able to enjoy the events.
Every religion in the world have religious festivals. Muslims celebrate Eids two times a year and various other religious events, same is the case in Hinduism, Christianity, Jewish religions. On the eve of the religious festivals, people share happiness, put on new clothes, enjoy delicious dishes, arrange get-together and exchange gifts.
Also Read: Here’s what Hindus from Pakistan told us about celebrating Diwali in Pakistan
The events fill people with fun and pleasure. Similar to the people of other religions, Christians also celebrate Christmas with full passion and fervor. The event of Christmas has exclusiveness: the mid-night church bells, mass services, decorated trees, people gatherings and the costume wearing of Santa Claus.
The people, especially the children wait for this day anxiously. The children enjoy the event with gifts, music and candies. All the Christian community whether they are Catholics or Protestants delight in the event with a feeling of oneness and cohesion.
Moreover, the fool proof security ought to be provided to the Christian community on the eve of Christmas as there remains a threat to the lives of the people celebrating the events in the country. The matter is of huge significance owing to scenario of 5th generation war that has been imposed on Pakistan by the arch-rivals across the borders.
The devastating event of December 2013 in Peshawar is a lucid confirmation of this very fact, in which a Christian gathering was attacked took place in Peshawar, and resultantly many people lost their lives, many became maimed and injured. Owing to the environment of insecurity, people celebrate Christmas with the fear and doubts; and uncertainty owing to the devastating past events.
This makes their happiness of celebrations-that are awaited by them for the whole year- fades away. The situation is created by the some insular people who turn pleasure into unhappiness and celebrations into bereavement. Such terrorists are less lenient and do not like any other faith to exist have other philosophies.
They destroy the lives of other people and consider the act of terrorism acceptable to enter in heaven. All these create fearful environment for the community on their special day.
The Islam is the religion of tolerance. Harmony and sense of brotherhood are the hallmarks of Islam. All the acts of terrorism and corruption are strictly prohibited in the religion of Islam. The religion teaches the message of love and humanity. There is no place of prejudice in Islam.
The Islamic teachings are the embodiment of human rights and minorities have no exception. In a true Islamic society, life, property and dignity of minorities are immaculately safeguarded. Being a Muslim country and having human rights in the constitution, Pakistan has a moral, religious and legal duty to help minorities in execution of their rituals, and to participate in their celebration in order to create the environment of synchronization.
The same was also asked by the Quaid-e-Azam at the time of independence when he said that minorities are free to go to their churches and temples. In the light of the saying of Quaid-e-Azam, it is not proper to change the opinions, thoughts and acuities about people who belong to minority religious clusters.
With the intention of creating sense of brotherhood and abide by the religious and moral teachings, the Pakistan’s government should take steps to provide the event specific things in discounted prices and make arrangements in such a way that the Christian community could make celebrations with ease and comfort. Christmas in Pakistan should be an event of congruence and unanimity.
Muslims have respect for all the holy prophets. Christmas is the day of birth of Christ. Muslims also have faith in the greatness and holy character of Christ.
Therefore, the Christian community ought to provide with such an environment in which they could celebrate their festivities with zeal, happiness and ease along with the sense of security.
Let the Christians decorate Christmas trees and meet with their family and friends and allow Santa Claus to visit them and carry gifts for the children and the elders safely and securely.
The day is sacred for all and one should express love, empathy, solidarity and animosity in a society to shatter the environment of prejudice. All should show love to Allah and Christ.
Owing to chauvinism towards minorities, being a minority is a fate no one want. The jaundiced eye views lead to gloom, unhappiness and frustration in a society. It is a requirement of morality based civilization and liberalism to eschew predisposition towards minorities, and allow them to move and act freely in term of their religious rituals. The attempts to persuade to change others faith and persecute minorities will be disastrous.
Also Read: How Christian Community Celebrate Christmas In Pakistan, Stories from the People
As the Pakistan already has problems of terrorism, ethnic and religious conflicts, harmony with minorities would lead to improving the soft image of the country in the world. The minorities should be helped so that they can inhale fresh air and feel delighted to be living among Muslims who care and love them.
All these efforts would help Pakistan to rise in a comity of nations in terms of soft power that would in turn help in development and prosperity of the country. To cap it all, the state of Pakistan has to collaborate with the Christians in making their event elated by all means to implement the constitution in spirit and to uphold the very principles of Islam.
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