Al-Azhar Al-Sharif strongly condemns the brutal assault against a number of churches in eastern Pakistan and reiterates its unequivocal condemnation of such heinous crimes. Al-Azhar stresses that the Glorious Qur’an itself, which is being desecrated by some wrongdoers, is the same scripture that instructs its followers to protect Muslim and non-Muslim places of worship, even forbidding all forms of transgression against them and holding any such a transgression as heinous as offenses against the Glorious Qur’an and Muslim places of worship. This Islamic teaching is in line with other religions, sacred scriptures, human morals and sound customs.
While condemning such barbaric criminal acts, Al-Azhar also affirms the need to prosecute all extremists who attack the Glorious Qur’an, churches, and other places of worship, calling for taking all legislative, legal, and security measures that guarantee the protection of sanctities of peoples and their places of worship from any kind of attacks that raise discord and incite forms of bigotry and hatred.
Al-Azhar, on its part, urges all people to hold fast to the voice of reason and the language of dialogue, and to return to the tolerance of divine laws that call for accepting the other and seek to foster tolerance, human fraternity, and the culture of peace among people.