SHAH ALAM: The church at the centre of Sunday’s Taman Medan protest can put up its cross, said Selangor Menteri Besar Mohamed Azmin Ali.

He said the cross is a sacred symbol to the Christians and people of other faiths would have to respect that.

“Yes, it is not a problem. In fact, the question is, why was the church forced to remove it?

“This is because the cross is a sacred symbol to the Christian community and society has to respect that,” he told reporters at the state secretariat building in Shah Alam yesterday.

Mohamed Azmin also said stern action must be taken against those who protested against the church, as the action was unacceptable.

He said in Selangor, citizens of different faiths must respect each other.

On Sunday, some 50 Taman Medan residents staged a protest in front of the church, demanding that the cross displayed on the building be removed. The protesters said that the cross was a challenge to Islam and would sway the faith of the youth in the Muslim-majority neighbourhood.

On Wednesday, Taman Lindungan Jaya Umno branch chief Datuk Abdullah Abu Bakar, who is the elder brother of Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar, was questioned by the police for almost three hours over the protest.

Driven by fear to remove the cross, the church is now seeking police protection to prevent similar incidents in future.

A representative of the church told the police that she had been filled with fear by the angry demeanour of one of the protesters, who directly confronted her that day and demanded that she take down the cross.

“One of the other men was wearing a red baju melayu with a black songkok. He looked very angry and said to bring the cross down now [turunkan sekarang],” she told police on Tuesday.

“I looked at him ... and said that I would do it because I was fearful for my and my members’ safety, and I just wanted to defuse the situation. I felt his anger and I was distressed and was fearful about my people’s safety.”

The Sabah Council of Churches has urged the police not to take action against the protesters, saying that to penalise and humiliate them would breed more hatred.

Instead, it urged Putrajaya to foster interfaith understanding among Malaysians and fight the ignorance that sparks such protests.

“The fact that the true meaning of the sacred symbol of our Christian faith could be distorted in this manner shows just how deeply the mistrust and misunderstanding have developed among us.

“This — above everything else in this unfortunate episode — truly fills our hearts with sorrow,” said its president, Reverend Datuk Jerry Dusing. — The Malaysian Insider

This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, on April 24, 2015.