Abu Mubarak, let me assure you are decidedly wrong, in your letter, Islam is the official religion - don't forget it .

Laws are supreme only as far as they do not reduce the dignity of man. It is insane to think that my life will be dictated by norms and practises that I have no right to examine in the public domain, where my fellow citizens exist.

The right to congregate and exchange ideas is far more paramount than even an established democratic government. In fact it is the former that lends credibility to the latter. Any government of an emancipated people that chooses to clamp down on expression is only quickening its expiration.

Western society had experienced a spell of blatant intolerance in the guise of the Spanish Inquisition. Jews and Muslims were persecuted because they were Jews and Muslims. Protestant were then added to the list of people who allegedly left the right path, and were therefore promptly abused.

Though hundreds of years have passed since then, the principle error of those who executed the innocent still remains as a telling lesson.

The point is that the Catholic Church and the Spanish Throne did not really think that the rights of minorities or their objections mattered since, well, they are minorities and Spain was a Catholic state. I think some bureaucrat then must have said to vivid protestors, "Catholicism is the official religion - don't forget it".

Then you would probably point out that there are no limbs lost in these apostasy cases in Malaysia. You are right, but spirits are severed. How would a person feel when that person's wish to express her faith publicly is abrogated? Faith is a personal issue before it becomes a communal issue, not the other way around.

How more complete can you destroy the will of a person than to tell them that what they can believe in is in the hands of the state and not theirs? Adopting an attitude that persecution is justified because you have God's permission is a dangerous track to take in any multicultural society.

Right or wrong has to be ascertained by the mind through reasons articulated - let your personal faith guide you - but your dogma cannot be the basis to force me to agree with you, or the other way around. Our differences are to be reconciled through reason, and not by the repetition of an unethical provision in the Malaysian Constitution.

You have to ask yourself as a thinking electorate whether what is done is fair or not, or not we all might as well pick pitchforks and stand in our respective trenches, and wait warily and wearily for the other side to attack us.

For dogma without rationale will always keep the believers in opposite corners.

Apostasy is not the only area of whether Islam is affecting secular rights of individuals in Malaysia.

Introduction of more Islamic elements in subjects like moral and history in schools, increase in grandiose mosque projects using public funds and the incorporation of Islamic tenets into public administration. Why should any Malaysian not ask questions?

A Muslim may not like spending on overarching mosques to show great architecture. He may prefer real development projects for all Malaysians in order that they improve their lot in life. That does not mean that he opposes Islam, it just means he opposes large architectural show off projects.

And if it was a non-Muslim verbalising that, then it is still the same thing. Accusing people of not being religious or of harbouring anti-religiosity is an old tactic to deflect from the real effects of a policy.

It is because Islam has a role in the way this country is run that it is questioned. It is not that individuals want to show effrontery to Islam. Responsible Malaysians are forced to engage in a discourse over it since national policy discussion involves Islam.

Malaysia has just over half its population as Muslims, but details in their identity cards do not define them in the entirety.

There are corporate Muslims, policemen Muslims, female Muslims, artists Muslims, urban Muslims, scholar Muslims, conservative Muslims, Kadazan Muslims who are told they are Malays and not Kadazans anymore, cross-dressing Muslims and many, many others.

To assume there is complete uniformity in the way all Muslims in Malaysia think is a bit presumptuous. A Muslim majority does not mean that most Malaysians want religion to permeate all spectrums of their lives and governance.

On Malaysia having Islam as the official religion, true. But that does not mean a vast number of Malaysians prefer that, Muslim and non-Muslims alike. A lot of countries with Muslim majorities have chosen to remain secular, like Nigeria and Indonesia.

Therefore it does not follow that a Muslim majority by default forces a nation in the direction of Islamisation, the same way a Christian majority in western nations precludes an automatic Christianisation policy within their shores.

The cruel Inquisition ended hundreds of years of Islamic civilisation in Spain. All Muslims were either converted to Christianity, murdered or forced out of Europe. All in the name of religious righteousness. And in the end, Spain had no more Muslims.

Only in 1976 under the missionary work of Shaykh Abdalqadir as-Sufi did the first Spaniards since the end of Islamic Spain convert into Islam.

The point is how would the initial five young men have become Muslims if the Spanish government had a law that prohibited Catholics from converting? And how would they be able to spread the word of Islam in Spain, if the Spanish government allowed them only to spread it to non-Catholics only, when the nation is overwhelmingly Catholic?

That is why an official religion, or expressing opinions and policies in cognisant with the main religion will give rise to discrimination, double standards and inequity.

The immersion of any faith into our laws and policies has to be decided by public discourse and the personal profession of any faith is no one's business accept the individual.

The final piece of the jigsaw that always excites me is the qualifier, 'You should not talk about things that you are not well versed in'.

I think this is quite similar to the restrictions the church adopted in the Middle Ages, keeping them above investigation and exempting them from explaining why the rules are in place.

Let us see how the dominoes fall if this is applied. Clerics ask for an increased role for Islam and their judgement in prescribing that role. All these will be beyond the examination of Parliament, the cabinet or constitutional courts because these are matters that secular bodies are ill-qualified to talk about.

Then the role of Islam is increased even further and the clerics' role grow exponentially, and again the secular institutions are helpless. Where will it end?

The voice of the man on the street is the start of the process of check and balances that build a working democracy. All national legislation, policy and debate is within the purview of all citizens. Thinking otherwise is to assert that human dignity is insignificant.