La illaha illa Allah- There is only one God and that is Allah.
Today, I joined thousands of supporters of a group page on social networking site Facebook in protest against a court ruling allowing a Catholic magazine to use the word ‘Allah’ in its publication.
The Facebook page, named in Malay as “Protesting the use of the name of Allah by non-Muslims" (Menentang Penggunaan Nama Allah oleh Golongan Bukan Islam) expects to draw one million supporters.
The Catholic Church, which publishes a Malay version of its newspaper, The Herald, says that it uses the word ‘Allah” for "the Christian God to meet the needs of its Malay speaking worshippers in Sabah and Sarawak.
The word ‘Allah’ is widely used among the indigenous Christian groups, most of whom speak Bahasa Malaysia.
The ruling by the Kuala Lumpur High Court followed a ban imposed by the government on the weekly Herald in January last year over the use of the word ‘Allah’ by Christians.
According to Reuters, more than 43,000 Malaysians protested online over the court ruling. And the page was drawing 1,500 new supporters an hour yesterday after the court ruling.
The Home Ministry yesterday said it had filed an appeal against the court ruling to avert misunderstanding and confusion among the people.
Meanwhile, the Home Ministry today filed an application to stay the execution of the High Court ruling that the word ‘Allah’ can be used by Herald.
Hearing is tomorrow.
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