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Isle Sikh community calls for end to religious biasAug 20, 2012 (The Honolulu Star-Advertiser - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- To local doctor Birendra Huja, a member of the Sikh faith, the massacre at a Sikh temple in Wisconsin earlier this month was not just as act of misguided hatred carried out by a racist gunman against a community he didn't know or understand, but a failure of something much more fundamental. "We cease to be human when we cannot reason with each other," said Huja, one of about 50 religious leaders, lawmakers and community members who participated in a special prayer service Sunday at the ISKCON Hawaii Temple in Nuuanu. Among those attending the late-afternoon service were Gov. Neil Abercrombie, state Sen. Pohai Ryan and Democratic congressional nominee Tulsi Gabbard. "It shows that we have lost the language and ability to communicate effectively," Huja said. "We should be ashamed that we are in this age of communication, with thousands of years of literature and philosophy, and we behave like animals on a survival mode. Even animals avoid confrontation." Huja, one of about 50 Sikhs in Hawaii, was in Germany when he received word of the tragedy in Wisconsin, in which white supremacist Wade Michael Page shot and killed six people at a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wis., allegedly mistaking his victims for Muslims. Like several of the speakers at the service, Huja called on the assembled to reject violence as a means of resolving differences -- "an indication of our immaturity," as he called it -- and to live in ways consistent with a recognition of people's shared humanity. "We need to look at people who look different not with fear, but as our own family, who look a little different," Huja said. "They have mothers, fathers, families and children like us. There is no need to be suspicious of others without a good cause just because they look different. I have just come back from a 10-country tour, and never once did I feel profiled, except in my own country, America. "We need to grow up," he said. Abercrombie joined Ryan, Gabbard and others in a ceremonial offering of flower petals to start the service. Addressing the audience later, he praised the peaceful nature of the Sikh faith and recalled the hospitality he received from Sikh followers during a tour of East Africa in the late 1960s. "We always knew that if we went to a Sikh temple, we would be welcome and safe," Abercrombie said. "It was my first encounter with an institutional religion in which people truly lived their philosophy." Gabbard drew from a different set of personal experiences, recalling the sectarian violence she witnessed during deployment to the Middle East as a member of the Hawaii Army National Guard. Gabbard called for an end to religious bigotry and intolerance before reciting the names and ages of the six Wisconsin shooting victims. Raj Kumar, founder of the Gandhi International Institute for Peace and one of the organizers of the event, said Hawaii is in a unique position to demonstrate how disparate cultures and religions can coexist. "We are a great example due to our acceptance of others, our diversity and our religious harmony," Kumar said. "It's my dream that Hawaii will become the headquarter of world peace one day." ___ (c)2012 The Honolulu Star-Advertiser Visit The Honolulu Star-Advertiser at www.staradvertiser.com Distributed by MCT Information Services |