Catholic Writers and Political Islam in Postcolonial Indonesia

international journal of asian christianity 1 (2018) 225-249 brill.com/ijac The Pain of Being Hybrid: Catholic Writers and Political Islam in Postcolonial Indonesia Albertus Bagus Laksana Sanata Dharma University, Yogyakarta, Indonesia [email protected] Abstract Informed by postcolonial theories and approaches, and based on the works of three Indonesian Catholic writers, this essay looks at the ways in which these writers address the question of identity. They propose the notion of hybrid identity where the identity of the nation is built upon different layers of racial, ethnic, and religious belongings, and loyalties to local tradition and aspirations for modernity. While this notion of identity is inspired by the framework of “catholicity”, it is also “postcolonial” for a number of reasons. First, its formation betrays traces of colonial conditions and negotiations of power. Second, it reflects the subject position of these writers as Indonesian natives who embraced a religion that has complex ties to European colonialism and problem- atic relations with Islam. Third, it criticizes the post-colonial state and society, which perpetuate many of the ills of the colonial political system, including racism and the abuse of power. Their discourse also reveals the pain of being hybrid, mainly in their inability to appropriately tackle the question of political Islam. The recent political upheaval reveals the need for more creative engagement with political Islam in order for this hybrid identity to work. Keywords Hybridity – Postcolonial – Literature – Indonesia – Catholic Identity Introduction There are signs of identity crisis in Indonesia, especially among its Christian population, as can be seen in the current political tensions surrounding the © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2018 | doi 10.1163/25424246-00102004Downloaded from Brill.com09/25/2021 07:33:04PM via free access <UN> 226 Laksana gubernatorial election of Jakarta that deeply concerns the role and the future of Christian communities in the country vis-à-vis the political Islamic movement. Basuki Tjahaya Purnama, a devout Christian of Chinese descent, has been the front runner in the election. Unlike most politicians in the country, Mr Basuki has been hailed as a professional politician with unblemished records in public service, boosted by personal integrity that is deeply rooted in his Christian faith. A few months prior to the election, however, political machinations of his opponents have succeeded in accusing him of blasphemy against the Quran (based on his impromptu statement against using the Quran to score political point, namely preventing the election of a non-Muslim leader).1 These high level machinations skillfully use radical Islamic mass organization for its purpose, and have succeeded in galvanizing many ordinary Muslims into taking action in defense for their Holy Book as well as against the Christian politician and other nationalist forces behind him, including the President. As a result, Christian-Muslim relations in Indonesia have reached a new level of tension, not seen in the last decade or so since the fall of the Soeharto regime. These political tensions also led to a renewed discourse on identity, which now tends to be defined, at least in some circles, as quite narrow, purist, and exclusive, mostly along religious and racial lines. Religions are pitted against each other. Universal religions and local cultures are understood as diametri- cally opposed within a purificationist agenda. The ghost of racial discrimina- tion and violence has also returned to haunt Chinese Indonesians, including a sizeable number of them who are Christians. In my view, these current political and societal dynamics reveal the precariousness of a hybrid national identity that has been formulated since the birth of the nation, and is rooted in the enduring pluralism of Indonesian reality. It also highlights the persistent postcolonial condition, namely, the struggle to deal with the complex question of national identity, race, and religion, more particularly with Christianity’s past history and current role. In a way, this problem of identity is not totally new. As this essay will make clear later, postcolonial Indonesian Catholic intelligentsia and writers have been dealing with this question and propose a hybrid identity for the whole nation, that is, a national unity built by layers of difference (racial, religious, and ethnic) and marked by aspiration to modernity and rootedness in local traditions. For their own communities, these writers envisage a similar hybrid identity where loyalty to universal Catholic values and networks is combined with commitment to, and rootedness in the local reality, including Indonesian 1 Cf. Andang L. Binawan, “The Case of a Christian Governor in Jakarta as a Sign of the Times for Catholics (and Christians), International Journal of Asian Christianity 1 (2018), 135–42. international journal of asian christianityDownloaded from 1 Brill.com09/25/2021 (2018) 225-249 07:33:04PM via free access <UN> The Pain of Being Hybrid 227 nationhood. In this regard, they also problematize the ambiguities, tensions, and agonies of this hybrid identity. However, the question of political Islam remains largely unresolved, not even addressed directly, revealing one of the most thorny questions faced by post-colonial Indonesian Christians, including Catholics. This essay consists of three main parts. The first part discusses the theoretical and historical background of the topic, namely the specificities of postcolonial literature in Indonesia and the place and contribution of Catholic writers, particularly on the question of identity, including aspects of religion, race and nationalism. The second part continues the discussion by providing a broader theoretical framework in postcolonial studies on literature, religion, and identity. Finally, in the third part, we will discuss the particular insights of the three Catholic writers under consideration on hybrid identity and its com- plexities, including how the question of Islam is tackled. Catholic Writers and Postcolonial Literature in Indonesia The topic of literature and national identity features prominently in postcolonial studies. In this regard, what is less prominently explored is perhaps not the theme of “religion” per se, but rather the role of the religious identity of the writers and their religious community. In Indonesia, the situation is perhaps even worse, in that postcolonial discourse on the intersection between literature, identity, and religion is scarce, to say the least. In general, postcolonial discourse in Indonesia has mainly concentrated on the question of politics. In a seminal discussion on Indonesian postcolonial literature, Clearing a Space: Postcolonial Readings of Modern Indonesian Literature, Keith Foulcher and Tony Day offer a useful understanding of postcolonial approaches to the study of literature:2 Postcolonial approaches to the study of literature are concerned with the way in which literary texts, in many different ways, reveal the traces of the colonial encounter, the confrontation of races, nations and cultures under the conditions of unequal power relations that has shaped a significant part of human experience since the beginning of the age of European imperialism.3 2 Keith Foulcher and Tony Day, eds., Clearing a Space: Postcolonial Readings of Modern Indone- sian Literature (Leiden: kitlv Press, 2002). 3 Foulcher and Day, Clearing a Space, p. 2. international journal of asian christianity 1 (2018)Downloaded 225-249 from Brill.com09/25/2021 07:33:04PM via free access <UN> 228 Laksana As Foulcher and Day argue further, postcolonial approaches help to identify traces of colonialism in critical as well as literary texts and evaluate the sig- nificance of these traces, while also referring to and interrogating the subject position of the postcolonial writer and his/her narrative voices.4 A postcolonial approach is attentive to the interplay of multiple forces, local and global, that give form and meaning to literary texts. I find this understanding of postcolonial approaches to literature useful for the main purpose of my exploration in this essay. Within this understanding, religion and religious communities and their members, their role and agency, can be regarded as forces whose interplay with other elements (culture, politics, economy, nationalism etc.) give meaning and form to literary texts, including the texts written by members of these religious communities. In this connection, it has to be stated that Catholicism has been a part of both colonial and post-colonial Indonesia.5 Catholics have participated in public life and discourse, among others, through the world of literature and serious writing.6 Yet, the question of nationhood and identity in the works of post-colonial Indonesian Catholic writers is underrepresented in scholarly discourse.7 So, informed by postcolonial studies on literature, this essay aims to take up questions of hybrid identity and nationhood among three major In- donesian Catholic writers and attempts to see how these writers problematize the encounters between different races, cultures, and religions in the framework of the nationhood. Furthermore, I will show how they are attentive to their subject position as a Catholic who belongs to a minority community that has complex relationship with the Dutch colonial legacy; how they negotiate their personal identity vis-a-vis religious and national Indonesian

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