Qatar to get first church for Easter

Doha: The Catholic community is gearing up for the consecration of St. Mary's church, the first church in Qatar, on March 14.

Built with the donations of the Catholic communities living in Qatar and across the Gulf, the $15 million (about Dh55 million) complex will comprise a church with a capacity of 2,700 seats, staff houses, meeting halls and other multipurpose buildings.

"Work is in its final stage and we are gearing up for the consecration on March 14," said St. Mary's parish priest Father Tomasito Veneracion, a Filipino.

The church is located in Mesaieer on the outskirts of Doha on a land which the Qatari leaders leased out to the catholic community at a nominal fee. It will not bear any external religious symbols or the traditional bell tower, in respect for the religious sensibility of the host country.

The Catholic church will be part of a larger complex, including five more churches of the other denominations.

Work is on at the other sites that will host the Anglican, the Coptic and the Greek Orthodox communities, and an Inter-denomination Christian Church Centre, where 11 Indian churches will converge under a single roof.

Qatar pursues a policy of tolerance and promotion of religious rights, which has also become law under the new Qatari Constitution.

While Christians are officially registered as a religious group, other religious communities such as the Hindus, Buddhists and Baha'is do not have recognition but are tolerated and they exercise religious practices in private.

Prof Ebrahim Al Nuaimi, former president of Qatar University and head of the Doha International Centre for Inter-faith Dialogue, had told Gulf News the construction of the new churches was welcomed by the Qatari population.

"Christianity and Islam and Judaism are [Prophet Ebrahim's] religions and we [Muslims and Christians] are brothers in the faith. Our religion and our culture are tolerant and our people are ready to accept the presence of churches," he said.

Mohammad A.H., a young Qatari national, said Qataris should tolerate the construction of other religious buildings.

"There are churches in other Gulf countries also and since a long time. Qatar is late in this regard," he told Gulf News.

But an Egyptian imam at the Islamic Centre Al Fanar disagreed. "Churches can create confusion among Muslims. Christians were tolerated and [they] prayed even before, there was no reason to ask for a church."

Lawyer and former justice minister Najeeb Al Nuaimi also objected to building churches in Qatar on "legal and social" grounds.

"The cross should not be raised in the sky of Qatar, nor should bells toll in Doha," wrote columnist Lahdan Bin Eisa Al Muhanadi in the Doha daily Al Arab, adding an apology in case the concept upset any readers in this country of 900,000, of whom only 200,000 are native Qataris.

Population: 120,000 Christians

Qatar is home to some 120,000 Christians of all denominations out of a population of almost a million, whose majority is Muslim.

The authorities do not release official statistics regarding religious affiliation, but the International Religious Freedom Report for 2007 puts the approximate number of Roman Catholics in Qatar at 80,000, Eastern and Greek Orthodox and Anglicans at 10,000, and Copts at 3,000.