> -----Original Message----- > From: S Saikia [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > Sent: Monday, September 08, 2003 11:16 AM > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: [Assam] re: conversion & supreme courtdown your > > The REAL problem with > religious > conversions in India is expressed beautifully in the > following article by Dr > Justice P. Venugopal (Retd). The conclusion, even though said > from the point > of view of a zealous Hindu, is perhaps very true. >
Following up on your recommendation, I tried to read the zealot's conclusion. I found it to be equally problematic and lousy as the main body of the article. And its not just that the author has little sense of history - lumping together the spread of christianity in Europe with that in the Americas or making the absurd claim "The ancient Rome and Greek Civilisations have gone into the archives after the advent of Christianity" (that alone is enough to show how blinded by zeal the author has even forgotten to revise his facts - to distinguish between chronology and causality). Its more than that. First, the claim that there is only one country for Hindus and that is India is not really different from claiming that Hindus have a special status in India - for others "have other countries" but the Hindus of India have no other. Its simply another way of positing theocratic foundation for India. Second, the eminent jurist distinguish between voluntary conversion and forced conversion. In other words, he is calling for a restraint on all conversions. That, to me, is a violation of very integral human right. Does every human being have to subscribe to the faith he or she is born into? Does not a human being have the right to propagate her religious belief (faith!) if its different from the official category he or she is put into by birth? > In the > world there are > 52 countries for Muslims and 88 countries for Christians. For > Hindus there > is only one country and that is India. Should Hindu India be > allowed to be > exterminated and wiped out as happened to other countries of > the world? Yes! Faith is personal and IF all Indians voluntarily decide to convert to Christianity or some other religious belief today -persuaded by its tenets as propagated by the heralders, thats what should happen! To invoke the power of the state in order to artificially restrain it is as problematic as sanctifying forced conversion. Even the human race will be surely extinct in the long run. All faiths must die too. (The Roman Catholic church might be one of the first to go.) > > Christians came to this land with Bible and preached their > religion. Muslim > invaders came to India with the sword and spread their > religion. Spiritually > liberated, as Indians are, we accommodated both and also > assimilated their > religions as we were confident that Hinduism would not be > impaired by such > accommodations and assimilations. But Hindu generosity and liberal > hospitality should not be allowed to be exploited to spread > other religions > and convert Hindus to other religions as it would amount to > debasing and > sabotaging Hindu religion which does not believe in > conversion or go to > other countries to market their religion. The man must have lost his mind. How could christianity have come to India if people had not converted throughout? The spread of any religion is a process of conversion. (There has been proportionally little in-migration of christians to India from other nations.) Further, what kind of logic dictates the argument that because Hindus do not allow others to convert to Hinduism(certain sects of Hindus do actually), converting Hindus to non-Hindu faith should be prohibited? In fact, it seems to me that the author is making an argument that actually says the following - Hindus are special in India, they do not allow others in, they will die out if people allowed to convert to other faiths; this needs to be restrained and the interpretation of law has to take this into account. The invocation of the global christian conspiracy and power of missionaries is just a way of defining the monster. Santanu. _______________________________________________ Assam mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://pikespeak.uccs.edu/mailman/listinfo/assam
