Two churches in Hikkaduwa were attacked last Sunday. The Assembly of God church and Calvary free churches were attacked during Sunday Morning mass.
Video footage, aired by a Sri Lankan television channel, showed monks hurling stones, destroying pictures, and burning documents with the help of protesters at the sites.
Police were reportedly called by the pastors to when the attacks started. Police Spokesperson Ajith Rohana admitted that police were unable to stop the attack due to the small number of personnel present.
Police on Monday said that 24 people were identified as attackers and will be arrested. Eight of the attackers (who will be arrested) were monks, said the Police Spokesperson. No arrests have been made so far.
Another prayer centre in Homagama was reportedly torched during the early hours of Sunday.
A new research released by the Pew Research Center categories Sri Lanka as a country with “very high” social hostilities along with Syria, Lebanon, Bangladesh, Thailand, and Myanmar.
2013
In some countries, violence toward religious minorities intensified from the levels reported in previous years. In Buddhist-majority Sri Lanka, for example, monks attacked Muslim and Christian places of worship, including reportedly attacking a mosque in the town of Dambulla in April 2012 and forcibly occupying a Seventh-day Adventist church in the town of Deniyaya and converting it into a Buddhist temple in August 2012.4
Bhikshus must act as guiding light to the Buddhist nation. We must refrain from milking the story for our political purposes. Christians will be praying for the Buddhist monks – “Father they know not what they are doing”. The police could charge them for disturbing the peace. Buddhist monks in general and in particular in the rural SL have to be taught to open their minds to inter-religious dialogue. As for aggressive religious conversion tactics have to be moderated by Pentecostal/Evangelical churches which have indeed mushroomed in various parts of the island. This can be opposed by other religious extremist factions. The Bhikshus tend to have an upper hand owing to their view of seeing SL as Buddhist land and Sinhala religion. Political Buddhism or that matter any religious faith affiliated with political power can and will have a corrupting influence. That absolute power is problematic in ANY nation.
Buddhist monks are practitioners of meditation. The monks we see galavanting, damaging religious places are cross-dressers. They have to be de-robed and made to grow their hair long. Each monk who was involved in such a disgraceful act must be named, shamed and must be ordered to wear dungarees helping to rebuild the places they damaged. This will put a stop to silly monkey business.