Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research, volume 570 Proceedings of the International Conference on Economics, Business, Social, and Humanities (ICEBSH 2021) Role of Alumni of the School of Pluralism to Maintaining Religious Harmony in North Sulawesi Suzy Azeharie1*, Wulan Purnama Sari2 1Faculty of Communication, Universitas Tarumanagara, Jakarta 11440, Indonesia 2Faculty of Communication, Universitas Tarumanagara, Jakarta 11440, Indonesia *Corresponding author. Email: [email protected] ABSTRACT As a multicultural country, the opportunities for clashes and conflicts in Indonesia are widely open. The plurality and heterogeneity of Indonesian society is reflected in multiple cultures, religions, and lifestyle diversity. In the national history of Indonesia, various inter-religion conflicts occurred in Poso in 1998 and Ambon in 1999 and others. There are uncountable casualties and material losses in the conflicts. Many conflicts with the religious flags have led Synod of Churches in North and Central Sulawesi to spearhead the Peace Love Movement as an interfaith movement. The Synod Am/SAG houses 13 other churches. The movement pioneer by the Synod Am/SAG later became a pioneer in building public awareness that despite our society is diverse, we are one nation. Therefore, it was initiated the School of Pluralism in 2014, the school that educates the interfaith youth through class encounter classes. It was held one week. This pluralism school is held annually. Based on the above background, the researchers are interested in examining the role of Pluralism School alumni in maintaining religious harmony in North Sulawesi. Keywords: Pluralism School, Interfaith Harmony, North Sulawesi 1. INTRODUCTION Differences in religion, tradition, and others are sources of community conflict. Religious conflicts generally occur due Indonesia as a multicultural country, the opportunities for differences in concepts or practices carried out by religious clashes and conflicts in Indonesia are widely open. The adherents that deviate from the provisions stipulated by plurality and heterogeneity of Indonesian society is religious law. From the differences, the conflicts begin [4]. reflected in the form of quite complex cultural, religious, In general, according to Yunus, there are two cause of the and lifestyle diversity. For example, despite there are six religious conflicts. Firstly, it relates to a truth claim. There major religions recognized by the government, i.e. Islam, is a tendency for a person to try to justify his/her religious Catholicism, Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism and teachings despite he / she may not really understand the Confucianism, hundreds of traditional beliefs exist and noble values contained in the religion he/she defends. It develop in society. And even though the Javanese are the makes that person degrading other people who do not agree largest population, according to Sudadi, the Central Bureau even despite they convert the same religion. This is due to of Statistics (BPS) in cooperation with the Institute of South the plurality of humans which causes the face of truth to Asian Studies mentions that there are around 633 ethnic appear different when it is interpreted. groups obtained from ethnic and sub-ethnic groupings in The second factor that triggers the conflicts is the jihad Indonesia [1]. Data from BPS show that the largest doctrine. Despite religious teachings are doctrines, population is Javanese with total number of 95.2 million adherents are given the freedom to interpret the scriptural people followed by Sundanese totaling 36.7 million people texts [4]. This freedom to interpret dogma frequently [2]. This makes Indonesian society both vertically and becomes the source of sectarian conflict in society. horizontally a country with the most plural society in the Various religion conflicts have colored the history of the world after the United States and India. Indonesian nation subsequently. Among others these were During the New Order era, the diversity of ethnicity in the Poso conflict in 1998, the Ambon conflict in 1999, the society as mentioned at above was considered a threat to the Sunni and Shia conflict in East Java in 2006, the achievement of national unity. Soedjatmiko stated in construction of the GKI in the Yasmin Housing Complex in Abdullah that the New Order had put aside the ethnic Bogor. The number of casualties and material losses is differences because it was seen as an inhibiting factor for uncountable. integration and therefore it was an obstacle to the The number of conflicts with the religious flag had led the development which was the only valid ideology for the New Synod Am of Churches in North and Central Sulawesi Order [3]. Church to make a movement, i.e. the Love Peace Movement as an interfaith movement. The Synod Am of Churches in Copyright © 2021 The Authors. Published by Atlantis Press SARL. This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY-NC 4.0 license -http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/. 480 Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research, volume 570 North and Central Sulawesi houses 13 other churches Another research was conducted by Muhammad Aji including the Christian Evangelical Church in Minahasa Nugroho with the title of Urgency and Significance of (GMIM), the Christian Evangelical Church in Sangihe- Multicultural Islamic Education on the Complexity of Talaud, the Christian Evangelical Church in Bolaang Diversity in Indonesia [8]. This research aims to present Mongondow, the Indonesian Protestant Church in religious expressions in accordance with their authentic Gorontalo, the Indonesian Protestant Church in Buol Toli sources, both in thought, action, and fellowship which is an Toli and others. expression that gives real goodness to life, is able to free The movement pioneered by the Synod Am/SAG later humans from ignorance, poverty, enmity and became a pioneer in the building of public awareness that backwardness. This research is a research library. despite in diversity, the society is one nation. Therefore, in 2014 the initiation of the School of Pluralism, a school that educates the interfaith youth through class encounter 1.2. Our Contribution classes, was initiated for one week. This School of Pluralism is held annually. It opens three The school of pluralism teaches interfaith youth about elementary classes and two advanced classes. Advanced religious diversity and it is a new and brilliant idea initiated class participants are graduates of the elementary class. by the Peace Love Movement. After the school has been Fifty participants attend each class with the same gender implemented for five years, the alumni are spread all over composition between men and women. The participants are Sulawesi. So it is interesting to see how the role of these Muslim, Christian, Hindu, Confucian and Buddhist youth alumni in maintaining religious harmony in North Sulawesi. (the interview with the resource persons in Manado on Researches on the School of Pluralism has never been October 23, 2020). conducted. In the class each participant learns what the teachings of Islam, Christianity, Buddhism, Confucianism and Hinduism are briefly. The concepts put forward in the 1.3. Paper Structure school is peace in differences and differences in brotherhood This paper is systematically structured as follows: Firstly, it To organize this School of Pluralism, cooperation is carried relates to the introduction to what the School of Pluralism out with other parties, for example with the Institute for is and the focus of this research is. Secondly, in the next Interfaith Dialogue in Indonesia or Interfidei which is section discusses the researches having been carried out by headquartered in Yogyakarta, as well as with the Indonesian previous researchers and what contributions the researchers Journalists Association. have made. Thirdly, it put in the research background and These alumni of the School of Pluralism are now scattered research methods. Finally, the paper discusses the research in Sulawesi, particularly in North Sulawesi. It is interesting finding and discussion. to see whether and how the role of the alumni of the School of Pluralism in maintaining religious harmony in the province. 2. BACKGROUND In maintaining the diversity and harmony, the communication aspect plays an important role. Because North Sulawesi is a province where the majority of the without communicating with various stakeholders, population is Christian and Islam is the second largest harmony will not be realized. Through communication religion. Data from the Central Bureau of Statistics in 2010 process, the various problems that exist can be resolved. show that the population is Christian totaling 63.60%, Islam From the above background, the researchers are interested (30.9%), Hindu (0.58%) and Buddhist totaling 0.14% [2]. in examining the roles of alumni of the School of Pluralism According to DP Salim, Islam came to this province due to in maintaining religious harmony in North Sulawesi the influence of Gowa Tallo Kingdom in the 15-16th Province and the obstacles they encounter when century while Buddhism was brought into the province due maintaining religious harmony in North Sulawesi. to trading activities during the Sriwijaya Kingdom era. Catholicism entered this province in the 16th century for Portuguese traders and Protestant Christianity developed 1.1. Related Work around 1905 [14]. The people of North Sulawesi hold the value of Torang Until