The Essence of Agree in Disagrement: Religious Tolerance in a Multicultural Society

This article was written with the aim that religious life, especially in Indonesia, can be harmoniously fostered. Coherent life in a pluralistic society will be harmonious if all people of different religions have a tolerance for each other. History records many bloodshed in the name of religion due to the lack of understanding between one another, which should be manifested in an attitude of tolerance. The ethnographic method used refers to a new ethnography that considers events as social and cultural formations of society that exist in stucturing the mind, deeply explored, therefore, they come out of the mind of the research object. This study additionally uses a phenomenological approach. Research with a phenomenological approach seeks to understand the meaning of various events and human interactions in a specific situation. In multicultural societies, followers or adherents of religion play a dominant role in the religious teachings they embrace or even among them there are groups of people who are indifferent to the religion they believe in. Such circumstance can lead into disturbance but also direction toward understanding the existence of a religion along with the bearers. The emergence of interfaith awareness manifested in tolerance can reduce or minimize clashes between communities of different religious views. The motto of "agree in disagreement" is a strong social capital in religious tolerance