Surin Pitsuwan, who served as secretary-general of the 10-member regional grouping from 2008 to 2012, said celebrating differences between member states was as important as celebrating their similarities.

“How do you look beyond our different religions? We have to adopt a new mindset and realise that all religious communities at one point of transcendence talk about the same thing: goodness, kindness, the awareness of humanity,” said Surin in his keynote address at the 2017 Asean Integrity Dialogue here.

But Surin said most members of religious communities were often caught up in symbolism.

“We are human beings, and as human beings we are symbolisational animals,” said the prominent Muslim intellectual.

“There is a sufi lesson that goes: When you use your index finger to point at the moon, your dog or cat will look at that finger, not realising that the finger is pointing at something beyond it.

“Our problem is, we are fighting about symbols such as the description of hell and heaven while what we need to do is to realise that while the practices may be different, all religions talk about the same thing.”

Surin said the solution is to hold more open dialogues on comparative religion.

“Many philosophers believe that this is the way forward. Start with the oneness of humanity, universal norms of what is good and bad, how we all agree that stealing and killing is bad.

“All these are golden rules of all religions.”