The number of Acehnese Christians is small, however, a full Bible translation is available. I do not know at all what the current situation of the Christian Chinese community is in Aceh. Christians in Aceh consist mainly of soldiers, Chinese, and Bataks in the central and southwestern regions. There is no notable “Christian” area in Aceh, unlike neighbouring North Sumatra.
Since the 1950s Aceh has been considered a “special region”, with certain concessions to its Islamic character. Government offices of religious affairs certainly support and promote Islam.
Church burnings have been an intermittent occurrence for the past 30 years. (Aceh was a forerunner in the significant increase of attacks on churches that has taken place throughout Indonesia.) The most significant protestant church in Banda Aceh, the capital, was burned down in the early 90′s. Subsequently, permission to rebuild was refused.
Local church communities can have great difficulty getting permission to have a place for worship, e.g. having to build over water, or use the back of a shop.
Christians employed as teachers in schools (posted by the state education system) can come under enormous pressures to convert to Islam. Prayer for these isolated Christians is urgently needed.
The potential for conflict is perhaps greatest in South Aceh, where Batak ethnic communities include both Christians and Muslims. Without a clear ethnic-religious alignment, conversion to Christianity does not bring loss of ethnic identity and this can make conversion easier. Consequently, greater pressure could be brought to bear on the Christian community. (This is just my hypothesising about why South Aceh has been a region of conflict.)
Persecution of Christians is sometimes hard to distinguish from persecution of Chinese. During the massacres of “communists” in the 1960′s, many Chinese Christians were killed. In Aceh a religious test was sometimes applied: if the person could not recite the Arabic confession of faith in Islam they were put to death. I had this from a Muslim person who narrowly survived the massacres.
SHARI’A – THE ISLAMISATION OF ACEHNESE CULTURE
The implementation of shari’a punishments is a profound change in Aceh, which has not been governed by the shari’a for over 100 years.
Most Acehnese people do pray regularly, and attend the Friday prayers. However in cities, not everyone would have complied. The use of force to require attendance, on pain of caning, is a disturbing trend.
In Aceh traditional ways – referred to as “adat” – have in the past been a very important authority for regulating daily life. The role of adat is recognized in Indonesian law, and was central to the role of Acehnese rulers in pre-colonial Aceh. This adat or “custom”, being linked to the secular authority of the sultan, was always a balance to the shari’a. The recent introduction of shari’a law in Aceh is part of a centuries-long process of Islamising Acehnese culture, ultimately replacing adat with shari’a.
One can anticipate that there will be various areas of tension or conflict between adat and shari’a. For most Acehnese people, the whole Acehnese way of life is regarded as “Islamic”, so this tension will be confusing. It will slow the rate of shari’a implementation. Paradoxically, Christians could be more vulnerable in this context, because non-Acehnese adat has little authority in Aceh.
