By Danielle Lussier (Grinnell College) and Mohammed Iqbal Ahnaf (University of Gadjah Mada)

[Image note: Syuhada Mosque, Yogyakarta, Indonesia, author photograph]

In contrast to popular assumptions that mosques are a space where religious values become politically mobilized in Muslim-majority contexts, our research newly published open access in Politics & Religion finds that religious leaders in Indonesia are not a driving force for the politicization of religion. Rather, they largely seek to keep worship spaces politically neutral.

Worship Spaces and Electoral Mobilization

In Indonesia, the world’s largest Muslim-majority democracy, religious identification and practice is a significant part of public life. The World Values Survey (WVS) indicates that more than 62% of Indonesians attend religious services in mosques or churches at least once a week—a level that has remained consistent in WVS results for twenty years and is substantially higher than most other countries surveyed. Naturally, religion has been often central in political processes despite the fact that Indonesia’s political system separates religious and political authority. In 2017, polarizing identity politics gained momentum when a prominent Christian gubernatorial candidate in the country’s capital city of Jakarta, Basuki Tjahaja Purnama (commonly known as “Ahok”), was convicted for alleged blasphemy against Islam. The political contest was defined prominently in religious terms. A key part of this was the widespread public perception that mosques play a direct role in politicizing religious themes and mobilizing adherents.

While it is clear that the 2017 Jakarta governor election illustrates a key role of mosques in mobilizing political participation, it has been unclear if a similar pattern is also at play beyond this unique election in the capital region. Despite the widespread belief that religion serves as a motivator of political behavior in Muslim-majority contexts, we have very little evidence about how political messaging takes place in sacred spaces, particularly in mosques. Almost all of the work on political messaging in houses of worship looks at Christian settings. Work by Rebecca Glazier, Amy Erica Smith, and Gwyneth McClendon and Rachel Reidl – who look at clerical messages in Christian communities in the U.S., Latin America, and sub-Saharan Africa, respectively – point to a complex, dynamic relationship in tracing the impact of political messages offered by clergy. Their findings show that the impact of these messages can vary based on the content included, the predispositions of the people in the pews, and the frequency of repetition.

We examined the role of houses of worship in shaping political messages during elections in 2017 and 2019 through participant observation of 71 sermons in twelve houses of worship in the city of Yogyakarta — a more typical Indonesian city than the country’s capital. Like Indonesia as a whole, Yogyakarta is Muslim majority with a sizable Christian minority composed of both Catholics and a range of different Protestant denominations. We selected mosques and churches that are representative of the organizational, theological, geographic, and political diversity found in the city. We examine the frequency with which political themes are mentioned in sermons and public prayers in worship spaces, the style and tone of political content, and the consistency of political messages in mosques and churches prior to an election. We also gathered information about other formats through which individuals may encounter political messages, including posters or print material visible in the house of worship or included in bulletins worshippers can take with them.

Frequent, Broad Political Messages

Our team of trained master’s students in the program for Religious and Cross-Cultural Studies at the University of Gadjah Mada attended Friday prayers at the mosques and Sunday services at the churches for four weeks prior to elections in 2017 and 2019. The figure below demonstrates the frequency with which sermons in Friday and Sunday services mentioned the elections and referenced other non-electoral political content. We also tracked references to the Ahok controversy in 2017. In the figure, each instance of observed political content appears as a block with the colors indicating the year and nature of political content observed. For example, in Mosque 6 (“M6”) electoral and non-electoral political content was observed in both 2017 and 2019.

Our analysis yields several noteworthy observations from the evidence available in the figure below. First, political messaging in houses of worship appears widespread among both mosques and churches. We also observed an increase in the frequency of political messages between 2017 and 2019. While we have no pre-campaign baseline to determine whether the frequency or content of the messaging fits into a normal pattern or was heightened due to the Ahok controversy in Jakarta, our findings provide a reference point for future studies of political messaging.

M = Mosque; PC = Protestant Church; CP = Catholic Parish

(M1, M3, M7, M8, PC2 and CP2 were not observed in 2019)

Second, we find that in both 2017 and 2019, political messages contained within religious sermons reflected a broad cross-section of ideas, were not very explicit, and were often inconsistent within a single house of worship. One reason why is that rotation of preachers is common in both mosques and churches in Yogyakarta. Mosques frequently invite preachers from outside their communities to preach during Friday prayers. We identified the preacher in 27 of the 31 mosque sermons observed in 2017, and no individual ever preached at a mosque more than once in the observation period. Under these conditions, it is highly unlikely that an invited preacher would know what was preached in the previous week, making it difficult for a political message to be repeated. This pattern of messaging suggests that political mobilization along religious lines is happening outside of worship spaces, not within them.

Between 2017 and 2019 we further noted a slight shift in tone to neutrality and tolerance. Both the increase in frequency of political themes and shift in tone in 2019 may reflect broader efforts by religious leaders to counteract the politicization of religion by political actors through the deliberate incorporation of non-partisan discussion that emphasized tolerance and participation.

Third, we observed that even when sermons lack political themes, worshippers can still encounter political content through their sacred spaces, either directly through print materials, or through the fluidity with which houses of worship are embedded in broader community structures. For example, campaign posters might be placed without permission on exterior bulletin boards, or candidates may visit mosques or churches to fulfill worship obligations while on the campaign trail, giving the appearance of religious endorsement even if that is not intended.

These findings suggest that houses of worship in Indonesia are generally seeking to be politically neutral spaces, even though political content is frequently present in them prior to elections. The politicization of religion is occurring outside of sacred spaces, and mosques and churches appear to be reacting to this politicization through a different form of messaging. Both Muslim and Christian leaders are consistently (though not universally) appealing to worshippers to draw on their religious values to support democratic electoral practices and encouraging them to make thoughtful voting decisions. As a 2019 sermon at Mosque 6 reminded worshippers, “the matter of choosing a president is not number one. Remember that. God’s command is to obey God, that is number one.” These findings show that in a highly religious and democratic country like Indonesia, political encounters through houses of worship are often unavoidable, but they do not necessarily translate into an effective means of political mobilization. The level of explicitness and consistency in messaging are key in the role of houses of worship in political mobilization.

Danielle N. Lussier is Associate Professor of Political Science at Grinnell College. She is the author of Constraining Elites in Russia and Indonesia: Political Participation and Regime Survival and co-author (with Mohammed Ayoob, Michigan State University) of The Many Faces of Political Islam Second Edition.

Mohammed Iqbal Ahnaf is a member of the faculty at the Graduate School of the University of Gadjah Mada, Centre for Religious and Cross-cultural Studies. He is the author of multiple publications in both Indonesian and English on topics related to religion, violence, peace-keeping, and democracy.