By Ivy Chai
KUCHING — Catholic Archbishop Dato Dr Simon Poh, who is also the President of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference Malaysia, invites citizens of all faiths in Malaysia to “walk side-by-side for peace and harmony”.
With the Muslim Ramadan 2025 coinciding with the Christian season of Lent, Archbishop Simon Poh reminds us that both these events are “sacred times for spiritual preparation for Hari Raya and Easter Sunday, respectively”.
In a message for Ramadan 2025, Archbishop Simon Poh included extracts of the annual message from the Dicastery for Interreligious Dialogue, Vatican City, issued to our Muslim brothers and sisters.
Vatican Ramadan Message – Christians and Muslims called to ‘walk side-by-side’
Extracts from the Dicastery for Interreligious Dialogue’s message:
- For this year, the proximity in the spiritual calendar offers Muslims and Christians a unique opportunity to walk side-by-side, in a common process of purification, prayer and charity.
- This year, as our two spiritual traditions converge in celebrating Ramadan and Lent, we have a unique opportunity to show the world that faith transforms people and societies, and for unity and reconciliation.
- May your fasting and other practices during Ramadan and the celebration of Id al-Fitr that concludes it, bring you abundant fruits of peace, hope, fraternity and joy.
Message for Ramadan 2025 from Archbishop Dato Dr Simon Poh – Extracts
Malaysia is a land of many religious faiths and traditions
This month, Muslims and Christians share the same traditions of praying, fasting and almsgiving. I take this opportunity to wish our Muslim friends Selamat Berpuasa. The Sikhs also celebrate their Sikh New Year. The Bahai community celebrates Naw-Ruz new day preceded by fasting, while the Taoist Day also takes place this month.
March is indeed a month filled with religious events. For us as Malaysians, living together with many neighbouring religions, let us consider this month of Ramadan for Muslims and Lent for Christians as a time of building bridges of harmony, goodwill and friendship. May our fasting, and almsgiving bless all who are in need.
I live in Kuching, declared as Malaysia’s first “City of Unity” in 2015, which also reflects the unity and the spirit of harmony throughout Sarawak. I take this opportunity to share this insight that I have spoken during Sarawak’s UNIFOR forum and JPNIN Perpaduan meetings. I invite everyone to consciously speak the positive concept of “mutual respect and acceptance” instead of the word “tolerance.” Tolerance in a sense, implies a limit or boundary that everyone respects and should not cross so that all can live in peace.
For me, it is not good enough to simply tolerate each other’s differences in belief or cultures. Positively, we need to acknowledge and accept the differences, respect each other and consciously strive to live as good neighbours in friendship with one another. This is “mutual acceptance and respect.”
We achieve “unity in diversity” when neighbouring religions live side-by-side in a spirit of mutual acceptance and respect. Sarawak is a model of this friendship and harmony as spoken by Premier Abang Jo: “Respect must be accorded to other races and religions as respect can only be earned in the inclusive development of religion and races.” (NZ RISEAP 26 June 2023)
Let us pray for our leaders – both political and religious – that we may always work together for the common good of everyone in Malaysia. We pray and put in practice “love of God and neighbours” and work together hand-in-hand to bless our tanah air for the succeeding generations of children yet to be born. Let this begin now, in this month of prayer, thanksgiving and almsgiving.
Thank you for your prayers for Pope Francis
The Catholic Church celebrated Pope Francis’ 12th Anniversary of his reign as Pope on 13 March. The Pope is considered as the Head of Vatican State, the smallest country in the world. His Holiness, Pope Francis has been hospitalised for more than a month in Rome with pulmonary issues.
Together with Vatican Ambassador Nuncio to Malaysia, Archbishop Wojciech Zaluski, the Catholic Church expresses our gratitude to all ambassadors, government and inter-faith leaders and friends of goodwill for your well wishes and prayers for the recovery of Pope Francis. May God bless you all.
Selamat Berpuasa & Ramadan Kareem to our Muslims brothers and sisters. Ramadan Mubarak.
