Mob threats lead to closing of Indonesian church

SIPIROK, Indonesia — Police and local government officials joined forces with a Muslim mob to close a church in North Sumatra province July 30. Church leaders were forced to promise never to hold services at the site.

Pastor Leritio Panjaitan of the Binanga Huria Kristen Batak Protestant Church on the Gunung Tua-Sibuhan Highway in Siboris Dolok Village, Sipirok, North Sumatra province said government officials and mobs threatened to burn the facility if worship continued there. Panjaitan said rejection of the church was aided by the presence of a Quranic boarding school, Darul Hasnah Madrassa, which appeared in the vicinity six months ago. “I have received information that the leader of that ‘madrassa’ (Islamic school), Dr. Gong Matua Siregar, has incited citizens to reject the presence of the church,” she said, adding that a local government official admitted to her that the head of the school had pressured him to close the church. Panjaitan added that the church had applied for a building and worship permit long ago but that authorities had not acted on it, and that all necessary administrative requirements had been fulfilled.

The head of the Assembly of Indonesian Muslim Clerics, Haji Fahri Harahap, has said it is clear that the residents of the area, long predominantly Muslim, do not want a church there. The closure means 80 people have lost their worship place. Local government officials and Muslim clerics warned church leaders that unless the congregation stopped meeting at the site, they would not be responsible if protestors burned the church.