Religion
Most indigenous Babar Islanders are baptised into the Protestant Church of Maluku (Gereja Protestan Maluku, GPM). The GPM's roots are in the Dutch Reformed Church started by the Dutch colonists. Due undoubtedly to the aridity of the islands and the lack of natural resources, there has been no mass transmigration from more populous Indonesian areas. In Tepa, there are 3 other denominations with church buildings: a Catholic church, a Seventh-day Adventist church, and a Pentecostal church. There is also a mosque in Tepa that serves the small community of Muslims. All the other towns have one GPM church each, totaling 56 GPM churches in the entire GPM diocese of Babar islands ("Klasis GPM Pulau-pulau Babar"). While these world faiths are represented, there is much hybridization with the preexisting animist beliefs and practices. The traditional dance of Babar is "Seka".
Read more about this topic: Babar Islands
Famous quotes containing the word religion:
“Cultures essential service to a religion is to destroy intellectual idolatry, the recurrent tendency in religion to replace the object of its worship with its present understanding and forms of approach to that object.”
—Northrop Frye (b. 1912)
“When I read of the vain discussions of the present day about the Virgin Birth and other old dogmas which belong to the past, I feel how great the need is still of a real interest in the religion which builds up character, teaches brotherly love, and opens up to the seeker such a world of usefulness and the beauty of holiness.”
—Olympia Brown (18351900)
“The religion of England is part of good-breeding. When you see on the continent the well-dressed Englishman come into his ambassadors chapel and put his face for silent prayer into his smooth-brushed hat, you cannot help feeling how much national pride prays with him, and the religion of a gentleman.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (18031882)