No right to insult a religion: Fr. Cyril Gamini Fernando

• No one should politicize the insulting of Dalada Maligawa

By Yohan Perera   

No one has the right to insult sacred places belonging to any religion followed by another person, a prominent Catholic priest from the Archdiocese of Colombo said yesterday.    

“No one has the right to insult a religion or a sacred place belonging to another religion followed by another fellow citizen,” Fr. Cyril Gamini Fernando told a media briefing referring to the defamatory statement made by Sepal Amarasinghe on the Dalada Maligawa recently.   “We don’t underestimate a person’s right to express himself or herself, but one should not insult a place of worship. Media is the platform where people express their views and it is up to the media personnel to control this platform. We believe that the media should be allowed to create and maintain their own ethics,” he said.   “No one should politicize the insulting of Dalada Maligawa,” he also said.     

• “We don’t underestimate a person’s right to express himself or herself, but one should not insult a place of worship”