Abstract
Although population of many countries consists of diverse religious groups, religious pluralism was scarcely experienced nonetheless. For that reason this paper aims at clarifying what is needed to be done in order to live in peace and stability with people from different religions. Peter L. Berger (2014) states that “if pluralism is combined with religious freedom, all religious institutions become in fact voluntary association”, so to be honest respecting others is essential for living in peace and harmony. One must first and before anything go deep into his religion, into it teachings and everything concerning it, so that he or she will be tolerant towards others with different religious views. It is always important to offer freedom of religion practice and tolerance in order to acquire a peaceful environment.
Social cohesion and immigrant integration are among the most debated subjects in recent times politically as well as sociologically. Religious diversity is considered as a threat to the faith, claimıng that minority groups or immigrants tend to be taking over the faith and believes of the majority groups. The way which governments or societies deal with religious pluralism are different and so the better religious pluralism the more cohesive a society will be. Religious pluralism can help create a multicultural and adhesive society. When it is taken into account and compared with other religion beliefs, one can find they have more in common than they actually thought.
Recently there is confusion between religious pluralism and existence of religious differences. These terms and issues should be simplified to deal with the problems they evoke. Religious pluralism does not necessarily come along with religious diversity. It is the result of tolerance, recognition of other values and beliefs. Religious pluralism doesn’t restrict but rather enhances social cohesion and immigrant integration as long as it is accompanied by recognition of other beliefs, religious tolerance, and freedom of religious choice.
Religious diversity and pluralism
There can be many answers to what religious diversity or pluralism is, depending on our understanding of the term which defines our approach to religious diversity and pluralism. Now let us consider the aspects of sociology and politics and take a look at how many different approaches and definitions we can come up with.
Firstly in sociological frame of reference we can say that religious diversity, which is the existence of many distinct religion groups within one country, is considered to be the same as the religious pluralism. For peaceful coexistence each group ought to undertake some processes in which that group should show their respect towards the rest, communicate and cooperate with each other, for example at work as coworkers or at college as classmates.
Politicians approach religious pluralism more politically by developing policies which aım to recognize the diversity among beliefs to ease the integration of the religious communities into the society. But many questions have risen in public education and employment sector. For instance, whether Muslim girls while at college should be allowed to wear headscarves and burkas, or whether a person can ask for a leave to fulfilling their religious duties. Answers to such questions must be as objective and inclusive as possible. A proper investigation should be done and all opinions should be taken into account.
Religious pluralism in western public education
Public education in western countries has become a “melting pot.” Because of the cultural and religious diversity, public educators are experiencing many challenges when are faced with students from different religious groups. Sure, they must be very critical but inclusive when dealing with problems such as allowing a Muslim girl to wear burka and creating a holiday schedule fitting Christian holydays (basinger, 2015).