Response of Students Majoring in Religion Towards Religious
Tolerance
Yohanes Bahari
Program Studi Pendidikan Sosiologi, Fakultas Keguruan dan Ilmu Pendidikan, Universitas Tanjungpura, Pontianak,
Indonesia
Keywords: Religious Tolerance.
Abstract: This study is intended to describe the response of students majoring in religion towards religious tolerance.
The three things were to be described, namely: (1) student perception, (2) student attitude and (3) student
action/participation towards religious tolerance. The study used a descriptive quantitative survey method. The
students majoring in Theology at IAIN (State Institute of Islamic Studies), Abdi Wacana Theological
Academy and Pastor Bonus Theological Academy in Pontianak in the academic year of 2016 constituted the
research population. Meanwhile, a sample of 50 students was taken from the population. Indirect
communication technique was used as technique of data collecting, with the instrument of data collecting
being a questionnaire. Quantitative descriptive percentage analysis was used to process the data. The results
revealed that the response (perception, attitude and participation) of the students majoring in religion towards
religious tolerance was categorized as good.
1 INTRODUCTION
News reports about ethnic, religious, racial and
intergroup relations (SARA) is on the rise. Throughout
2016 almost every day social media such as
Facebook, line, YouTube, detik.com, kompas.com,
tribun.com, twitter and televisions carried news
articles highlighting the pros and cons on the issue of
SARA, particularly in the context of the Jakarta
governor election. Conflicting opinions from
different groups of society ranging from the lay
people, artists, cultural elites, religionists,
intellectuals, political elites, bureaucrats and military
and police officers have become the norms of the day.
Open and massive debates on the issue of SARA
by public figures through social media and mass
media in a rather long duration triggered intolerance
between ethnicity and religion. Public demonstrations
with the nuance of SARA between the pros and cons
took place in every region, with the biggest being the
demonstrations defending Islam in Jakarta in
November 4, 2016 and December 2, 2016 which were
attended by millions of participants (detik.com,
kompas.com and tribun.com, 2016).
The problems of religious and racial intolerance
are highly sensitive, and have the potential to trigger
conflicts as happened repeatedly in various parts of
Indonesia, for example in Ambon and Poso in 1999,
in Sambas, west Kalimantan and Sampit, central
Kalimantan in 2000.
Intolerance and conflict are always causing
instability in various aspects of life in society, and it
takes a long time to recover, and requires substantial
social and economic costs. As experienced by many
countries such as South Africa, Iraq and Afghanistan,
social reconciliation is not easy. It takes a long time
to happen, and very costly. In Indonesia
reconciliation following the Indonesian Communist
Party abortive coup that happened many years ago is
an uphill struggle and until now has not yet
materialized.
The research conducted by Vermonte (2013) on
religious tolerance revealed higher tendency of
intolerance among religious practitioners. The above
findings of Vermonte are in line with the research
findings on religious conflicts in Indonesia since the
reform era which showed an increase in violence,
intolerance and religious radicalism (Tholkhah,
2012).
A survey study on religious harmony in Indonesia
which was conducted in 2014 showed that although
in general the condition of religious harmony was
good, and the harmony has been cultivated for a long
212
Bahari, Y.
Response of Students Majoring in Religion Towards Religious Tolerance.
In Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Sociology Education (ICSE 2017) - Volume 2, pages 212-217
ISBN: 978-989-758-316-2
Copyright © 2018 by SCITEPRESS – Science and Technology Publications, Lda. All rights reserved

time, deviation from social and cultural norms in the
form of religious conflicts happened frequently and
could not be avoided (Christian Solidarity
Worldwide, 2014; Tholkhah, 2012). In particular, the
survey findings also showed that the tolerance of
Muslims was lower compared to those of other faiths.
One of the factors contributing to intolerance and
conflict among religion practitioners is concerned
with differences in the interpretation of the holy
scriptures which act as sources of religious teaching
(Pines and Maslach, 1993).
The issue of SARA in west Kalimantan is
potentially high enough. The phenomena could be
seen in repeated interracial conflicts (the last being in
2000), demonstration rejecting the FPI (Islamic
Defenders Front) in 2013, rejecting the construction
of places of worship of particular religions, rejecting
the GAFATAR movement in 2016, rejecting the
placement of transmigration in border areas in 2015,
the rejection by provincial legislator towards
provincial regulation on customary society in 2016,
and the phenomenon of vote polarization between
those supporting and abstaining in the election of
institution heads in various levels when the
candidates were of different faith from the voters.
Based on the above background and the fact that
two regional elections would be held in west
Kalimantan in 2017 and 2018, as well as the tendency
towards greater issue of SARA in every regional
election in other regions, it is predicted that the use of
SARA discourses would be on the rise. To find out the
truth of the above assumption, it is necessary to do an
early detection through this research on the response
of students majoring in religion towards religious
tolerance.
2 LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 Response
Response is a kind of positive or negative reaction
given by an individual. Response appeared after an
individual or a group of individuals perceive the
presence of an object and interpret the object they
perceived (Adi, 1994). Daryl (2002) defines response
as a kind of behaviour or attitude in the forms of
detailed comprehension, evaluation, influence,
rejection, and likes or dislikes as well as taking
advantage from a phenomenon.
According to Adi (1994), Thalib and Gill (2012)
the most important thing in measuring responses is to
know perception, attitude and participation. In other
words, to know the response of an individual or a
group of individuals towards something, it is
necessary to know their perception, attitude and
participation in that thing.
Adi (1994) states that perception refers to our
seeing, hearing, feeling and smelling of the world
around us. Perception is formed by the data we get
from our surrounding which were absorbed by our
senses as well as from other things. Perception is a
cognitive process experienced by everyone in trying
to understand information about their surrounding
either from sight, hearing, feeling and accepting.
Perception is a unique interpretation of a situation and
not a correct record of the situation. The above
analysis shows that perception is an individual or
society’s understanding of an object that is still in
their thoughts.
An individual perception of something will have
an influence on his/her attitude. As far as attitude is
concerned, Adi (1994) defines it as an individual’s
inclination or willingness to behave in a certain way
when faced with a particular stimulus. Attitude is an
organization of an individual’s opinion or belief
towards a relative object or situation coupled with a
particular feeling. It provides the basis for an
individual to respond or behave in ways they have
chosen.
Stimulus refers to both inner stimuli like self-
actualization and physical one like the results or
outcome of development. A change of attitude could
depict the way an individual response towards a
particular object like a change of atmosphere over
another situation. The attitude that appears could be
positive, in that the person likes, approaches and
expects the object. Alternatively, the attitude could be
negative, in that the person shuns, or hates a particular
object.
Participation refers to a process of mental attitude
whereby an individual or members of society actively
contribute their creativity and initiative in an attempt
to enhance their quality of life. Adi (1994)
furthermore states that participation is very important
and absolutely necessary if we want to know or
measure an individual or group responses to
something.
As far as participation is concerned, the factor that
gives a lot of influence is vast scope of society’s
knowledge about something. The level of knowledge
about something possessed by an individual could
determine their intention in conducting an activity.
This knowledge will subsequently influence their
attitude, intention, and behaviour. Having knowledge
about the benefit of something will lead the person to
have a positive attitude about that thing. A positive
attitude will influence a person’s intention to
Response of Students Majoring in Religion Towards Religious Tolerance
213

participate in an activity relating to that thing. The
intention to conduct a particular activity will
eventually determine to a considerable degree
whether the activity is actually carried out. The
activity carried out is known as attitude or behaviour.
2.2 Religious Tolerance
Religious tolerance refers to an attitude accepting
diversity and freedom to practice religions/the beliefs
of other people or groups. This can happen because
the existence of a group, religion or belief is respected
by other parties. The acknowledgement is not only
limited to equality both in the setting of state, society
and in the sight of God, but also in differences in
religious instilling and worship which is in line with
a civilized and just humanity (Emmanuel, 2003,
Rahman and Khambali, 2013, Fios and Gea, 2013).
Religious tolerance however can be said to be
ability of a religious group to appreciate and accept
other religions’ beliefs and practices without
necessarily involve or practice it. It is respecting and
relating with other peoples’ religious beliefs and
values (which is quite different from personal faith
and beliefs), without enforcing personal interested
religion on others who are not adherent followers
(Alao, 2017).
According to Osborn (1993) aspects of religious
tolerance consist of: (a) acceptance, (b) appreciation,
(c) patience, (d) freedom and (e) cooperation. The key
to tolerance is accepting another person the way
he/she is. In line with the above viewpoint, Eisenstein
(2008) states that tolerance manifests itself in a
person’s willingness to accept the opinion, values,
behaviour of another person which is different from
his/her own. Therefore, it could be understood that
acceptance is a person’s willingness to accept another
person the way he/she is.
In addition to acceptance, another important thing
relating to tolerance is a person’s willingness to
appreciate everything rejected or defied by someone
(Sullivan et al., 1993). Ananda (2015) states that
tolerance manifests itself in a person’s willingness to
respect another person’s faith even though he/she
does not approve it. The willingness to respect should
be based on the belief that it is not right for anyone to
force his/her will on another person or group. No
person or group should monopolize truth, and this
conviction is based on the belief that faith is a
personal matter.
Every religion practitioner should respect the
existence of other religions with the understanding
that they respect the diversity and differences in
religious teaching of each respective religion and
belief whether the religion is sanctioned or not yet
sanctioned by the state. Confronting this reality
requires that every religion practitioner should always
be able to instill the values of diversity and position
themselves in the context of diversity based on the
spirit of mutual respect and appreciation among
different faiths. They are not supposed to defame
other religions or force their faith on to other people.
Another important thing relating to religious
tolerance is patience which constitutes a sympathetic
attitude towards different point of views and attitudes
of other people. Neufeldt (1999) states that tolerance
manifests itself in a person’s willingness to be patient
towards other people’s philosophical belief and moral
which are supposed to be different, debatable, or even
faulty. Such attitude does not mean that one shows
approval towards other beliefs. Nor does it mean that
one is indifferent towards truth and goodness, and one
should not be agnostic and sceptical. Instead, one
inclines to have the attitude of respect towards
diversity and different human dignity. Patience in the
context of religious tolerance could be taken to mean
the ability to refrain from the things disapproved or
disliked, in the framework of building better social
relationship (Khisbiyah, 2007).
Another aspect of tolerance is to give freedom to
fellow human beings or fellow residents to practice
their faiths or regulate their lives and decide their
respective destiny (Walt, 2014). The most essential
human rights are the right to freedom/independence,
both freedom to think, freedom to have their own will,
and freedom to practice their religions/ faiths.
Freedom is such a fundamental human right that it is
capable of differentiating humans from other
creatures. Religious freedom is often misunderstood
to mean freedom to practice more than one religion.
Here religious freedom means freedom to choose and
practice a faith or religion which they think is the right
way to salvation without being forced or intimidated.
In the context of Indonesia, the 1945 Constitution
article 29 section 2 states that “The state guarantees
the freedom of every citizen to profess their
respective religions and to worship according to their
religions or faiths”. It is clear that the state itself
guarantees the freedom of their people in choosing
and professing their respective religions or beliefs, as
well as guarantees and protects their people in
carrying out worship according to their respective
religions or beliefs.
Yusuf (2013), states that understanding religious
tolerance entails two interpretation towards this
concept. Firstly, there exists negative interpretation
which states that religious tolerance only requires the
attitude to let someone have their own way, and not
ICSE 2017 - 2nd International Conference on Sociology Education
214

hurting the feeling other people who profess different
or the same faiths. Secondly, there exists positive
interpretation which states that there must be
assistance or support towards the existence of other
people or group. There are two kinds of religious
tolerance, namely: static tolerance and dynamic
tolerance. Static tolerance is a kind of cold tolerance
which does not result in cooperation. If association or
relationship among religion practitioners is in the
form of static tolerance, the result would be pseudo
tolerance. Dynamic tolerance is an active tolerance
which results in cooperation for common good. Thus,
harmony among religion practitioners is a reflection
of togetherness of religionists as one nation.
Therefore, one can understand that the
manifestation of religious tolerance is in the form of
willingness to cooperate with people of other faiths.
Based on the above exposition, it could be
concluded that aspects of religious tolerance are as
follows: 1) Acceptance is the willingness of
religionists to accept the behaviour and belief which
is different from theirs, even though they may not
approve of it. 2) Appreciation is the willingness of
religionists to appreciate the opinion, viewpoint,
belief, custom, behaviour, etc. which are different
from theirs or even contradictory to their own
conviction. 3) Patience is the ability of religionists to
refrain from the things disapproved or disliked, in the
framework of building better social relationship. 4)
Freedom is the willingness of religionists to give
freedom to fellow human beings or fellow residents
to practice their faiths or regulate their lives and
decide their respective destiny. 5) Cooperation is the
willingness of religionists to cooperate with people of
other faiths.
3 METHODS
Descriptive quantitative with survey method was the
research method used. The students majoring in
Theology in Pontianak constituted the research
population. Meanwhile, a sample of 50 students was
taken from the population, consisting of 23 students
of IAIN (State Institute of Islamic Studies), 12
students of Abdi Wacana Theological Academy and
15 students of Pastor Bonus Theological Academy.
Indirect communication technique was used as
technique of data collecting, with the instrument of
data collecting being a questionnaire. Descriptive
qualitative percentage analysis was the data analysis
used (Sugiyono, 2009). The criteria/ indicator of
questionnaire quality are as follows: 81%-100% =
very good/ very high, 61%-80% = good/ high, 41%-
60% = good enough/ medium, 21%-40%= bad/ low,
and 0%-20%= very bad/ very low.
4 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
4.1 Results
4.1.1 Perception of Students Majoring
The research on the perception of students majoring
in religion towards religious tolerance shows the
following results:
Table 1: Recapitulation on the perception of students
majoring in religion towards religious tolerance.
Note:
VK= Very Knowledgeable, K= Knowledgeable, LK=
Less Knowledgeable, NK= Not Knowledgeable, TNK=
Totally Not Knowledgeable.
Based on data recapitulation on the perception of
students majoring in religion towards religious
tolerance, 28% of students have very good perception
towards religious tolerance, 63% have good
perception and only 9% having not so good
perception. 0% of students have bad and very bad
perception. Thus, the data show that the perception of
students majoring in religion towards religious
tolerance is already good.
4.1.2 The Attitude of Students Majoring
Results on the attitude of students majoring in
religion towards religious tolerance is depicted by the
data below in table 2:
Num.
Aspects of Perception
Percentage
VK
K
LK
NK
TNK
1
General Perception
27
58
15
0
0
2
Perception towards
Acceptance
26
68
6
0
0
3
Perception towards
Appreciation
30
56
14
0
0
4
Perception towards
Patience
32
64
4
0
0
5
Perception towards
Freedom
22
66
12
0
0
6
Perception towards
Cooperation
30
66
4
0
0
Total
167
387
55
0
0
Average
28
63
9
0
0
Response of Students Majoring in Religion Towards Religious Tolerance
215

Table 2: Recapitulation on the attitude of students majoring
in religion towards religious tolerance.
Numb.
Aspects of
Attitude
Percentage
SA
A
LA
NA
TNA
1
Attitude towards
Acceptance
22
68.7
9.3
0
0
2
Attitude towards
Appreciation
19.3
72.7
8
0
0
3
Attitude towards
Patience
17.3
76.7
6
0
0
4
Attitude towards
Freedom
23.3
70.7
6
0
0
5
Attitude towards
Acceptance
22
68.7
9.3
0
0
Total
105
360
35
0
0
Average
21
72
7
0
0
Note:
SA= Strongly Agree, A= Agree, LA= Less Agree, NA=
Not Agree, TNA= Totally Not Agree.
Based on data recapitulation on the attitude of
students majoring in religion towards religious
tolerance, 21% of students have very good attitude
towards religious tolerance, 72% have good attitude
and 7% having not so good attitude, and 0% of
students have bad and very bad attitude respectively.
Thus, the data show that the attitude of students
majoring in religion towards religious tolerance is
categorized as good and very good.
4.1.3 The Action/Participation of Students
Majoring
Results on the action/ participation of students
majoring in religion towards religious tolerance is
depicted by the data in table 3:
Table 3: Recapitulation on the action/ participation of
students majoring in religion towards religious tolerance.
Num.
Aspects of Action
Percentage
VG
G
LG
NG
TNG
1
Action towards
Acceptance
19.3
73.3
7.4
0
0
2
Action towards
Appreciation
18.7
73.3
8
0
0
3
Action towards
Patience
25.3
70.7
4
0
0
4
Action towards
Freedom
18
76
6
0
0
5
Action towards
Cooperation
20
74
6
0
0
Total
101
367
31
0
0
Average
20
74
6
0
0
Note:
VG= Very Good, G= Good, LG= Less Good, NG= Not
Good, TNG= Totally Not Good.
Based on data recapitulation on the
action/participation of students majoring in religion
towards religious tolerance, 20% of students have
very good action/ participation towards religious
tolerance, 74% have good action/ participation, 6%
having not so good participation, and 0% of students
have bad and very bad action/ participation
respectively. Thus, the data show that the action/
participation of students majoring in religion towards
religious tolerance is categorized as good and very
good.
4.2 Discussion
In general, the research results show that the response
of students majoring in religion towards religious
tolerance is categorized as good and very good. In
particular, the perception, attitude and action/
participation of students majoring in religion towards
religious tolerance fall into the category of good and
very good.
Referring to Vermonte (2013) and Tolkhah
(2012), the research results were out of expectation
because the research was conducted amid widespread
reports and discourse on the issue of SARA in the
nation. Moreover, the province of west Kalimantan
was ravaged by racial intolerance several decades
ago, and regional elections are fast approaching.
The fact that the students were not influenced by
the issue of SARA in their view of religious tolerance
could be attributable to their being intelligent
individuals who give priority to rationality and
objectivity and to their receiving correct religious
education from their lecturers. It could also be
attributable to inclusive religious cultivation in their
respective campuses.
Although the research findings show heartening
religious tolerance and harmony, anticipation and
care should be taken in order not to plunge into
intolerance in the future considering that religious
tolerance and religious harmony in the nation are
always dynamic in nature.
5 CONCLUSIONS AND
RECOMMENDATION
5.1 Conclusions
Based on research findings and discussion in Chapter
IV, the general conclusion is that the response of the
students majoring in religion towards religious
tolerance is categorized as good. Meanwhile the
specific conclusions of this research are the
perception, the attitude and the action/participation of
ICSE 2017 - 2nd International Conference on Sociology Education
216

students majoring in religion towards religious
tolerance is categorized as good.
5.2 Recommendation
Based on the research conclusions, the researcher
gives the following recommendations:
 The response of the students majoring in
religion towards religious tolerance which is
categorized as good should be maintained by
always guarding the religious tolerance;
 Religion-based universities should promote
students’ activities towards preserving
religious tolerance through intra or inter
university activities;
 Although only a few students majoring in
religion responded negatively towards
religious tolerance, they should be given
greater attention so as not to cause destructive
tendency. They should be given persuasive and
educative cultivation.
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