Fire, fire, fire

EARLY on Sunday morning, October 15, arsonists set fire to three temples and a mosque at Lautoka in Western Viti Levu. The burning threatened to set in flames Fiji’s political and economic recovery prog rammes and drew the country close to another major crisis. Two days later, in a reprisal attack, a Methodist Church in Lautoka was firebombed but no major damage was done.

Hit in the Sunday morning attack were two Hindu temples, a Sikh temple and a Muslim mosque. The attacks were linked to Methodist fundamentalists opposed to the presence of other faiths in the country. But it attracted so much vicious criticism from all races and faiths

in Fiji that the attackers were quickly isolated, even by factions of the Method ist Church.

Eighteen people, members of the Methodist Youth Fellowship group, were arrested and charged. Many indigenous

Fijians reacted strongly against the attack

on the temples and mosque, and said it was an embarrassing example of Christ ians who misinterpreted the teachings of Jesus Christ. Government sent Cabinet Ministers to Lautoka and the Fiji Council of Churches, a grouping of major Christian churches, called the burning of the temples and mosque “an instance of gross desecration and sacrilege involving sacred places, sacred books and sacred objects. The apparent religious motives only adds to the insult and sacrilege and calls for a deep sense of sorrow and shame on the part of all Christians.” □