A Christian church in Singapore has apologized for a sermon by one of its pastors that mocked Taoist beliefs, the second such incident this year in the city-state where religious speech is closely controlled.
New Creation Church, which says it has a congregation of 20,000 worshippers, said it apologized for a sermon by Mark Ng (黃馬可) in 2008 that was posted last week on YouTube and subsequently picked up by local media Web sites.
In the audio clip, Ng, who heads the church’s Mandarin and Hokkien ministries, makes fun of some Chinese traditions and compares praying to a Taoist god to paying a criminal gang for protection.
“We Chinese are under a lot of superstition and rituals,” Ng said in the sermon. “Praying to him for what? For protection. It’s just like a secret society, you know, gangster.”
Singapore, whose 5 million people include an ethnic Chinese majority along with significant Malay and Indian minorities, enforces a strict ban on speech about race and religion.
The government argues the restrictions are necessary to avoid conflict among the different groups, which include Buddhists, Christians, Muslims, Hindus and Taoists.
EVANGELICAL PRESENCE
Large evangelical Christian churches have become more popular in Singapore in recent decades, especially among the wealthier, English-educated ethnic Chinese.
Christians accounted for about 15 percent of the population in 2000, the year of the last census survey, up from 10 percent in 1980.
“Pastor Mark has explained to us that his intention was to highlight what he viewed as some inconsistencies in the local Chinese practices,” New Creation said in a statement earlier this week.
“He humbly appeals to those whom he has offended to forgive him of this serious indiscretion,” the church said.
DISCUSSION
The Singaporean Ministry of Home Affairs said officials from the country’s intelligence police, the Internal Security Department (ISD), discussed the sermon with church officials, but declined to give details of the meeting.
In February, ISD officers met with pastor Rony Tan (陳順平) of the Lighthouse Evangelism church, who apologized for mocking reincarnation and nirvana, beliefs of Buddhism and Taoism.
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