The ongoing campaign to ban the Ahmadiyah Muslim community underscores the challenges facing the nation in protecting human rights, forging a secular identity and strengthening the spirit of democracy and rule of law.
 
The political campaign obviously seeks to discredit the teachings of the Ahmadiyah community and to call attention to the "danger" faced from this intrinsically peaceful sect of Islam. It is worth recalling that freedom of belief is a fundamental human right, guaranteed by the Constitution, and no citizen can be denied this right on the grounds of his or her beliefs.
 
Any thinking citizen would agree that as a religious order, the Ahmadiyah has every right to preach and propagate all of its doctrines and beliefs, irrespective of the fact that it may or may not conform to the beliefs and practices of the other denominations in Islam.

Instead of displaying sectarian intolerance and moral bankruptcy, the orthodox leadership would do well to engage the Ahmadiyah Muslims in a theological, civilized, intellectual debate and thereby show a modicum of respect for the faith, intellect and convictions of ordinary Muslim citizens and others.
 
The sectarian politics of religious mobilization and its current manifestations will have divisive implications for the country's plural future. Clearly, banning the movement to prevent its spiritual appeal or declaring it a non-Muslim minority to stop its growth is not the business of a secular government.
 
Leaders of the country and conscientious citizens would do well to reflect over the politically disastrous and socially divisive legacy of Pakistan's experiment with the criminalization of the Ahmadiyah sect. Social scientists and political analysts have, in recent times, traced the growth of Muslim extremism and cultural intolerance in Pakistan to the divisive politics of anti-Ahmadiyah rhetoric.
 
What is at stake is the very notion of human rights and rule of law in a secular democracy. Extremists and right-wing Muslim orthodoxy should not be allowed to dictate the future of Indonesian identity.
 
Perhaps, even more importantly, what is at stake for practicing Muslims is the very meaning of being a Muslim in our times. After all, the Holy Koran explicitly states: "Let there be no compulsion in matters of faith." Islam's plural character and legacy of religious tolerance needs to be defended, ironically enough, against an "orthodoxy" that claims to represent it!