NEW FILM ON CHRIST
Text of the news report today in the DNA newspaper of Mumbai and the full text of my emailed response to their questions earlier in the week. The DNA ignored the pith of the response, as possibly it did of the other Chuirch spokesmen it quotes, possibly because it did not suit newspapers seeking controversy with no reference to facts or truth.
New film may spark crisis of faith
DNA Mumbai, Sunday, November 25, 2007 09:45 [IST]
Clergy says Hollywood will confuse the faithful about what to believe: Bible or movie By Anjali Thomas
If Jesus had a grave, he’d be turning in it. Even though he was believed to have been born somewhere between 6 and 4 BC, controversy still dogs his footsteps. Even as the dust from the attacks on Shekhar Kapur’s movie Elizabeth: The Golden Age begins to settle, a new controversy is rearing its head.
The party in question is Hollywood, and the bone of contention is a $20 million movie, Aquarian Gospel, which will portray Jesus as a wandering sage who visited India, lived in Buddhist monasteries, and fought the evils of the caste system. And no, this is not the work of an overactive Hollywood scriptwriter’s imagination, but based on a book The Aquarian Gospel of Jesus the Christ, written in 1908 by Levi H Dowling. Dowling claimed to have based his research on early manuscripts like the Akashic Records, which document the life of Jesus Christ between the ages of 13 and 30 - something the Bible only touches upon.
“It’s easy to exploit religious history for media purposes, and I’m sure that this movie is a potential box office hit,” says Father Myron Pereira, director of the Xavier Institute of Communications.
“There is lots of literature on Jesus, like the gospel of Thomas and Philip that are not part of the official canon. In the ancient world, the fact that something did take place took second place to the meaning of what took place. It was only later that fact was sifted from fiction, and canonised. The Gospels place their emphasis on Jesus’s message, not on the personal details of his life. Writings which have not been validated by the Church are called Apocryphal scrolls, and are concerned with the sensational elements of Jesus’s life, often fictitious,” he adds.
The movie will be shot using actors and computer animation in the style of Beowulf and 300. Director Drew Heriot has been quoted as saying the film would “follow Christ’s journey to the East, where he encounters other traditions”.
Hollywood is glamourising a theory that has been around for centuries. In 1894, Nicholas Notovitch authored The Unknown Life of Christ, where he wrote about Jesus recuperating from a broken leg in a monastery near Ladakh. German author, Holger Kersten’s book, Jesus Lived In India examines the evidence of Christ’s life in India and the Middle East.
“Aquarian Gospel is another in a long line of controversial books and movies, many of which have stirred up a storm, but have died down without affecting the Christian faith,” says Rev Babu Joseph, spokesperson, Catholics Bishop Conference of India. He adds that serious Biblical scholars claim no hard evidence to suggest that Jesus came to India.
When it comes to entertainment, it’s a question of creative licence. In response to the criticism that Elizabeth was an “anti-papal travesty”, director Shekhar Kapur told DNA, “I am a filmmaker, and what is the use of making films that do not evoke any kind of reaction.”
There has always been a clash between freedom of expression, the media and the arts, and traditions and beliefs that people hold sacred. Dr John Dayal, president of the All India Catholic Union says, “Hollywood is not the most pious institution in the US.” He adds: “I have always maintained that the Censor Board and government institutions have to take suo motu action if they wish to. They should not pass the buck to the Church, nor should the Church allow itself to be caught in a ‘damned if we say yes, and damned if we say no’, situation. The Indian law is clear - no one can hurt a community’s feelings, nor should anyone do or depict anything that can provoke tension between communities.”
According to both Rev Joseph and Father Myron, the film will come as a shock to the average Christian not properly initiated in Biblical literature. “They will begin to doubt what is true and what is not, which is never a good thing,” says Rev Joseph.
------------------
DNA,. Mumbai, questions to and answers from Dr John Dayal
Member, National Integration Council, Govt of India and President, All India Catholic Union {Founded 1919, representing the 16 million Catholic Laity in India]
Question 1. This is the third or fourth movie which will in a way be 'attacking' or 'probing' into Christian beliefs. The others were Da Vinci Code, Last Temptation of Christ, and Elizabeth. What do you make of Hollywood's take on this? Do you think that Hollywood is taking too much of a creative license with the Bible?
Answer: Hollywood is not exactly the most pious institution in the US, and the American First Amendment on Freedom of Expression has nothing to do with it. Please remember that when Hollywood wants to, it can have its own policing and its own moral code. It was Hollywood that hounded Communists that once banned black men being shown in love with white women in support of prevailing codes against miscegenation and in support of the prevailing racist mood. Though it has made Old Testament films, it also has, as has Europe, made many films that apparently seem to portray Jesus in all too human a light, none of which can be supported by textual material from the New Testament.
Hollywood makes films which it hopes will make money. They range from the anti spiritual film called the Exorcist, on to many others. Films such as The Last Temptation of Christ have had some critical, but no financial success, though critics too, by the way, have been generous to such films as apparent expressions of the freedom of the media. Regarding Shekhar Kapoor and his film Elizabeth, the Christian community need hardly be bothered. When a few European churchmen speak of this matter, they do so in the backdrop of the Catholic Protestants schism of the past. The issues today are different – they relate to issues of combating racism, of gender justice, of relating to sexual preferences, and on getting rid of ghosts of the last two centuries or more. Queens and princesses, living or dead, are the stuff of entertainment now, not of strife.
By the way, there is a a long tradition in Hollywood for the Faith groups to have their own codes – not censorship – and their own rewards for films they approve so their followers are well guided. If you do not like the film, don’t go and see it, and certainly don’t buy a ticket to make the producer rich.
Question 2. How will the new movie, based on the Acquarian Gospel affect the church, and more importantly, the average Catholic? Will there be protests as we have seen in earlier movies?
Answer: As I said during the controversy on the Da Vinci Code, I have always maintained that the Censor Board and government institutions have to take Suo Moto action if they wish to. They made the rules, they have the powers. They should not pass the buck to the Church, nor should the Church allow itself to be painted into a corner in a “damned if we say yes, and damned if we say no” situation. The Indian law is very clear. No one can hurt people’s feelings, Christians, Hindu, Muslim, Sikh, nor should anyone do or depict anything that can provoke enmity or tension between communities.
But there is no scope for anyone to do a private moral or theocratic policing. I am against any bigoted protests or moral policing, especially by the Church. And in our faith, of course, there is no place for violent protest at all.
I cannot – ands even if I could, I certainly would NOT -- issue a fatwa to anyone to have or not to have a protest, but I can all but guarantee that even if there is a protest somewhere, they will remain very peaceful.
Question 3. Is there any truth in the fact that Jesus came to India and used the knowledge that he got in his teachings?
Answer: There is nothing in the Bible about this. Or in any other book. There are no corroborative texts of that time to sustain any such thesis. Mahavira and Buddha were born five hundred years ago, stood against what we today call Brahmanism. Buddha’s influence must have spread along the Silk route and the road to Damascus and to Rome. Having travelled in those parts, I can tell you the curly locks of the Buddha and his flowing robes as depicted in a million statues are strikingly evidence of Hellenic influence on Buddha’s followers, at least the writers and artists of the time. The drapery came from the near West! Silk and thoughts traveled in both directions.
Unlike perhaps today when there has been such bigotry, those must have been times of great intellectual ferment and great intellectual democracy and communication. Aristotle, Plato, The giants of Egypt and Rome and China, and why not great men of India, breathing the same air, give or take a few centuries are part of the exchange of ideas and thoughts. If silk can travel across continents, why not thoughts. Paper certainly did.
But at the end of the day, one looks for tangible evidence -- and there is none.
By the way, may I also comment on other occasional stories in the media of the grave of Jesus in Kashmir. If there is indeed a grave remotely traceable to the first century AD, I hope it is empty. To me, Christ has risen to come again. The grave is empty, wherever it is.
My faith does not depend on such issues.
Hollywood of course specializes in fiction, and in fictionalizing truth. But if research proves an interaction between Christ and India in the years before his private ministry, the years that he spend wandering, it will only go to further strengthen my faith as it will be added evidence to prove the historicity of Jesus. Jesus is a historical figure. Of how many others can this be said?
Sunday, November 25, 2007
Tuesday, November 20, 2007
THE CHURCH AND THE PATH TO A COMMISSION FOR EQUAL OPPORTUNITY AND HUMAN RIGHTS IN INDIA
JOHN DAYAL
One of these days, the Indian Government will present the Indian Church with a surprise. It depends on the Christian community and its religious and secular leadership if it is to be a pleasant surprise. Or, at its worst, very unpleasant; like many other decisions in the past in Parliament or by the Union and State Governments which have often presented the 25 million strong Christian community in the country with a pungent fait accompli. There are myriad laws, institutions and structures in whose making the community has had no intervention and less say, and which, therefore, ignore, in cold blood or by default, issues and matters which are peculiar to Indian Christians because of the nature of their faith and religious practices, and their demographic dispersal.
I say this with some anguish in what I observe to be a singular Christian absence in three or four or five major discourses recently in the secular space in India.
These discourses have to do with the Civil Society opposition to the Communal Violence prevention Bill moved in Parliament by the Government earlier this year, the setting up of the Prime Minister’s High-powered Committee under former Delhi Chief Justice Rajinder Sachchar, the Plan process, and the drafting of the Civil Society response on Indian’s human rights record which has to be submitted to the newly set up United Nations Human Rights Council soon, and the moves that Government has initiated to set up an Equal Opportunities Commission in the country.
The Church remained silent when the Sachchar committee was set up to merely on the Muslim community instead of all religious minorities. Admittedly, Indian Muslims are highly discriminated against in the devolution of a just development process, and Justice Sachchar has been able to quantify that and prove it by quoting facts and figures.
But how do we know that Dalit Christians, a hefty 60 per cent of all Christians, and Tribal Christians, another 20 per cent or so, do not suffer from similar, or aggravated, development infirmities. There has been little effort even to assess, define and catalogue their crises since independence.
The Christian community has also not been served well by the several national commissions. The National Human Rights Commission correctly says its charter does not cover religious and linguistic minorities because there are separate commissions for them. It is of course not to be forgotten that one of its chairperson – and NHRC chairperson has to be a retired Chief Justice of India – had in his time on the Bench, upheld such a draconian law as POTA, the dreaded Prevention of Terrorism legislation in which scores of Muslims were arrested just because they were Muslims.
The National Commission for Scheduled Castes had, till Dr Buta Singh became its chairman, adopted a very hostile attitude towards Dalit Christians – whether the chair was a Congress person or a Bharatiya Janata Party ideologue and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh stalwart.
The National Commission for Minorities, barring the brief interlude when Dr James Massey, a Dalit, was the Christian member, has almost always had time servers or political appointees whose interests were anything but relating to the community. Some have been hostile to the community, some have been corrupt, and some have been retired politicians or bureaucrats whose ignorance has been exceeded only by their unconcern. One went to the extent of saying he saw no persecution, because he had never been persecuted. Another was keen to bring the community to its knees before the RSS in the guise of a dialogue.
Little wonder, therefore, that when the Union Cabinet devised the so called Communal Violence prevention Bill, it just did not cover the issues of Christians, and hate crimes and persecution of the micro minority. The Muslims, after their Gujarat pogrom experience, and Sikhs with the 2004 massacres, rightly rejected the CV Bill out of hand because it strengthened the hands of the police without helping the victims of communal violence. The CV prevention Bill did not even understand the persecution of Christians in various parts of India, or the massive hate campaign against the community carried out in tribal belts, villages and even in cities. Sad to say, in the many seminars organised by Civil Society and by Muslim groups and intellectuals, there were hardly any Christians present, and almost no formal representation by Catholic and Protestant hierarchies.
I hope this will not be repeated in the path to the formation, some time in the future, of the Equal Opportunities Commission on the pattern of a similar Commission which has been set up in the United Kingdom by merging all existing Human Rights organisations and commissions which had been set up since the race issues came to the fore in the wake of the massive immigration from India and the Caribbean in the Nineteen Hundred and Sixties.
The chief executive of the British Commission, Dr Kay Hampton, took a series of seminars recently educating Indian Civil Society on the entire gamut of factors and issues relating to this new organisation. Needless to say, while there were Muslim intellectuals and representatives of organisations, there were hardly any Christians in the audience at the seminars. Dr Kay Hampton, by the way, traces her origins to Tamil Nadu though she was born in South Africa and went to London less than two decades ago.
The matter is of some urgency, and of great import to all minorities. The Justice Rajinder Sachchar Committee which studied the socio-economic condition of Muslims had suggested in his report the need for setting up a commission on the lines of the British Equal Opportunities Commission as a watchdog which should be effective in overseeing the implementation of the recommendations.
The Government of India is reportedly keen on implementing the Sachchar Committee report and is understood to have set up a three man committee to study such commissions abroad and look for ways and means to ensure its full implementation. Though a recommendation of a committee which was only looking at the Muslim issue, the Equal Opportunities Commission, if and when it becomes a reality, will of course look at the denial of opportunities to all others discriminated against, presumably ranging from Dalit Christians, Kashmiri Pandits, OBCs, women, the physically and mentally challenged, children and the old.
As Kay Hampton explained at her seminars, the UK Equality Act 2006 gained Royal Assent on February 16th, allowing for the establishment of the new CEHR from October 2007, which will bring together the work of the Disability Rights Commission and Equal Opportunities Commission from October 2007; and that of the Commission for Racial equality by 2009, putting expertise on equality, diversity and human rights in one place. The Act and the commission banning discrimination in service-provision on grounds of race, religion and sexuality. The CEHR will take on all of the powers of the existing Commissions as well as new ones to enforce legislation more effectively and promote equality for all.
The CEHR is required to produce a regular ‘equality health check’ for Britain and to work with individuals, communities, businesses and public services to find new, more effective ways to give everyone in society the chance to achieve their full potential.
The Act introduces a new ‘gender duty’ which will require public bodies to take account of the different needs of men and women to ensure equality of opportunity when preparing policies or providing services. It outlaws discrimination on grounds of religion or belief in providing goods, facilities or services, education or rented accommodation.
The commission -- and I quote Dr Hampton -- will encourage and support the development of a society in which:
• People’s ability to achieve their potential is not limited by prejudice or discrimination
• There is respect for and protection of each individual’s human rights
• There is respect for the dignity and worth of each individual
• Each individual has an equal opportunity to participate in society, and
• There is mutual respect between groups based on understanding and valuing of diversity and on shared respect for equality and human rights (Clause 3)
… as an independent and influential champion the Commission will seek to
• promote and celebrate a diverse Britain where - there are good relations between communities, and people are not discriminated against because of their race, gender, disability, religion or belief, age or sexual orientation
The Commission will also use its powers and functions to work to achieve equality and human rights for all and promote and encourage good practice and an awareness of rights about equality, diversity and human rights and work to eliminate unlawful discrimination and harassment, promote an understanding of the importance of good relations between different groups (especially between different racial and religious groups) and between members of groups and others, monitor the effectiveness of the equality and human rights enactments, identify changes that have taken place in society and the results Britain should aim for in order to achieve the Commission’s vision (Clauses 8 –12) The Equality Act 2006.
To this, the Commission will advise employers and service providers on good practice and the promotion of equality and good relations, conduct inquiries and carry out investigations, provide advice and information on rights and equality laws. campaign on issues affecting the diverse groups in society that can suffer discrimination, make arrangements for conciliation to assist with disputes, assist individuals who believe they have been the victim of unlawful discrimination, provide grants. It will in time work with stakeholders and partners to become a single cohesive force acting for positive change on equality and diversity issues, human rights and good relations and able to influence policy and practice.
An interesting aspect of the British exercise is also to set up standards in appointing leadership and executive staff devoid of political patronage and in a fully accountable manner. Quite unlike the Indian practice.
The talent hunt works on what is called the Nolan principle, a set of guidelines on just what sort of a person is required to head such a unique organisation.
Bishops and other heads of institutions may be interested in the list of seven underpinning Principals of Governance formulated by the Nolan Committee which should apply to all in the public service. These are:
Selflessness: Holders of public office should act solely in terms of the public interest. They should not do so in order to gain financial or other benefits for themselves, their family or their friends.
Integrity: Holders of public office should not place themselves under any financial or other obligation to outside individuals or organisations that might seek to influence them in the performance of their official duties.
Objectivity: In carrying out public business, including making public appointments, awarding contracts, or recommending individuals for rewards and benefits, holders of public office should make choices on merit.
Accountability: Holders of public office are accountable for their decisions and actions to the public and must submit themselves to whatever scrutiny is appropriate to their office.
Openness: Holders of public office should be as open as possible about all the decisions and actions that they take. They should give reasons for their decisions and restrict information only when the wider public interest clearly demands.
Honesty: Holders of public office have a duty to declare any private interests relating to their public duties and to take steps to resolve any conflicts arising in a way that protects the public interest.
Leadership: Holders of public office should promote and support these principles by leadership and example.
Responsibility also devolves on us all.
We must take the initiative.
We must let our views, and creative suggestions, made known to the Government even if those in power choose not to invite us for consultations. If for nothing else, then to ensure that the Government of India too follows these seven principals when appointing people to the existing and future commissions meant for our welfare.
To be affective, we will have to have effective strategies of advocacy and political mobilisation, and a thoughtful laity and leadership formation programme. Above all, we must have accurate socio-economic and development data about our community, the sort of data that the Sachchar committee and its brilliant economist member secretary Dr Al-saleh Sharrief have b4en able to garner.
The government cannot be trusted to help us collect and anaylse such data. At one level, it is reluctant to collect data which can prove its own bigotry against religious minorities, or expose 60 years of sustained neglect of entire peoples groups.
The census data is insufficient. The National Sample Surveys seldom touch the Christian horizons. Because of our political marginilisation – made the worse because without Scheduled caste rights, we are also effectively out of the Panchayati Raj system barring a few places in the North East, Kerala and Tamil Nadu – political groups make no effort to even find out the ground reality. It does not matter to them, and does not impact on their political strategies. This is one reason why the struggle of the Dalit Christians has taken such a long time to be resolved. We just do not have the deprivation data that will convince courts and Parliament at a cinch. In fact, it is the other way around. There is all too much ill-informed printed opinion from high church signatories claiming there is no poverty in the Christian community that no Christian suffers from caste prejudice in the wider Indian society.
So if the government will not set up the equivalent of a Sachchar committee to assess the Christian community’s developmental health, the Church and community will have to do it by itself. The Church – and I use the phrase holistically to include Catholics, Protestants, Evangelicals, Cardinals, Archbishops down to the itinerant Independent Pastors and the last sentient Lay person – will have to join forces and find energy and resources for carrying out this process. Such a SWOT analysis, Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats, has never been done in the past. It can wait no longer.
I would like to propose that the Church sets up its own commission. It has the brain power. Out together a group of social and political scientists, demographers, development economists. Use the vast network of parishes, parish priests and mission stations and institutions, to collect data. Crunch that data and publish the report. It will put the government to shame, expose the Planning Commission, Public Sector Banks, even the gerrymandering by Election offices.
It will be a small price to pay if in the process the hierarchy and the Church establishment is also shamed. The last Census, in the very few insights it offered into the innards of the community, showed us the scale of illiteracy amongst women in Tribal areas where the Church ahs been working for a century or more. This study may also show how, despite the large number of institutions it runs, most of them with a shamefully small body of Christian students, faculty and staff, we are not only rapidly becoming redundant in the national development process but, at the same time, are also not being able to raise the group standards of own community, Dalit, tribal, landless labour and the large urban service sector employees in metropolitan towns and state capitals. We remain the waiters, seldom the hotel owners. We are the motor mechanics, seldom the garage owners, and of the group working in the Gulf and other places, just how many of us are engineers and doctors and cyberspace bosses. We remain a service class, not an entrepreneur or leadership group. Honest sweat has its rewards, but our people must have the opportunity to do better.
It is this poverty and disempowerment of the poor, and the shrinking role of the institutional church in development processes [the private sector and Hindu religious organizations are investing far more in education and health, for instance in comparative as well as absolute terms] that makes the Christian community in India now so vulnerable to attacks from right wing religious fundamentalist groups and bigotry in the government and political systems.
We must be able to quantify it and articulate it as and when the Equal Opportunities Commission comes into being, and while waiting for that, we must raise it before existing forums. It is not a matter of mere foresight or due diligence. We are in duty bound to do this for our coming generations who should be able to enjoy their rights as citizens of a free and fair country.
John Dayal
New Delhi, November 19, 2007
One of these days, the Indian Government will present the Indian Church with a surprise. It depends on the Christian community and its religious and secular leadership if it is to be a pleasant surprise. Or, at its worst, very unpleasant; like many other decisions in the past in Parliament or by the Union and State Governments which have often presented the 25 million strong Christian community in the country with a pungent fait accompli. There are myriad laws, institutions and structures in whose making the community has had no intervention and less say, and which, therefore, ignore, in cold blood or by default, issues and matters which are peculiar to Indian Christians because of the nature of their faith and religious practices, and their demographic dispersal.
I say this with some anguish in what I observe to be a singular Christian absence in three or four or five major discourses recently in the secular space in India.
These discourses have to do with the Civil Society opposition to the Communal Violence prevention Bill moved in Parliament by the Government earlier this year, the setting up of the Prime Minister’s High-powered Committee under former Delhi Chief Justice Rajinder Sachchar, the Plan process, and the drafting of the Civil Society response on Indian’s human rights record which has to be submitted to the newly set up United Nations Human Rights Council soon, and the moves that Government has initiated to set up an Equal Opportunities Commission in the country.
The Church remained silent when the Sachchar committee was set up to merely on the Muslim community instead of all religious minorities. Admittedly, Indian Muslims are highly discriminated against in the devolution of a just development process, and Justice Sachchar has been able to quantify that and prove it by quoting facts and figures.
But how do we know that Dalit Christians, a hefty 60 per cent of all Christians, and Tribal Christians, another 20 per cent or so, do not suffer from similar, or aggravated, development infirmities. There has been little effort even to assess, define and catalogue their crises since independence.
The Christian community has also not been served well by the several national commissions. The National Human Rights Commission correctly says its charter does not cover religious and linguistic minorities because there are separate commissions for them. It is of course not to be forgotten that one of its chairperson – and NHRC chairperson has to be a retired Chief Justice of India – had in his time on the Bench, upheld such a draconian law as POTA, the dreaded Prevention of Terrorism legislation in which scores of Muslims were arrested just because they were Muslims.
The National Commission for Scheduled Castes had, till Dr Buta Singh became its chairman, adopted a very hostile attitude towards Dalit Christians – whether the chair was a Congress person or a Bharatiya Janata Party ideologue and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh stalwart.
The National Commission for Minorities, barring the brief interlude when Dr James Massey, a Dalit, was the Christian member, has almost always had time servers or political appointees whose interests were anything but relating to the community. Some have been hostile to the community, some have been corrupt, and some have been retired politicians or bureaucrats whose ignorance has been exceeded only by their unconcern. One went to the extent of saying he saw no persecution, because he had never been persecuted. Another was keen to bring the community to its knees before the RSS in the guise of a dialogue.
Little wonder, therefore, that when the Union Cabinet devised the so called Communal Violence prevention Bill, it just did not cover the issues of Christians, and hate crimes and persecution of the micro minority. The Muslims, after their Gujarat pogrom experience, and Sikhs with the 2004 massacres, rightly rejected the CV Bill out of hand because it strengthened the hands of the police without helping the victims of communal violence. The CV prevention Bill did not even understand the persecution of Christians in various parts of India, or the massive hate campaign against the community carried out in tribal belts, villages and even in cities. Sad to say, in the many seminars organised by Civil Society and by Muslim groups and intellectuals, there were hardly any Christians present, and almost no formal representation by Catholic and Protestant hierarchies.
I hope this will not be repeated in the path to the formation, some time in the future, of the Equal Opportunities Commission on the pattern of a similar Commission which has been set up in the United Kingdom by merging all existing Human Rights organisations and commissions which had been set up since the race issues came to the fore in the wake of the massive immigration from India and the Caribbean in the Nineteen Hundred and Sixties.
The chief executive of the British Commission, Dr Kay Hampton, took a series of seminars recently educating Indian Civil Society on the entire gamut of factors and issues relating to this new organisation. Needless to say, while there were Muslim intellectuals and representatives of organisations, there were hardly any Christians in the audience at the seminars. Dr Kay Hampton, by the way, traces her origins to Tamil Nadu though she was born in South Africa and went to London less than two decades ago.
The matter is of some urgency, and of great import to all minorities. The Justice Rajinder Sachchar Committee which studied the socio-economic condition of Muslims had suggested in his report the need for setting up a commission on the lines of the British Equal Opportunities Commission as a watchdog which should be effective in overseeing the implementation of the recommendations.
The Government of India is reportedly keen on implementing the Sachchar Committee report and is understood to have set up a three man committee to study such commissions abroad and look for ways and means to ensure its full implementation. Though a recommendation of a committee which was only looking at the Muslim issue, the Equal Opportunities Commission, if and when it becomes a reality, will of course look at the denial of opportunities to all others discriminated against, presumably ranging from Dalit Christians, Kashmiri Pandits, OBCs, women, the physically and mentally challenged, children and the old.
As Kay Hampton explained at her seminars, the UK Equality Act 2006 gained Royal Assent on February 16th, allowing for the establishment of the new CEHR from October 2007, which will bring together the work of the Disability Rights Commission and Equal Opportunities Commission from October 2007; and that of the Commission for Racial equality by 2009, putting expertise on equality, diversity and human rights in one place. The Act and the commission banning discrimination in service-provision on grounds of race, religion and sexuality. The CEHR will take on all of the powers of the existing Commissions as well as new ones to enforce legislation more effectively and promote equality for all.
The CEHR is required to produce a regular ‘equality health check’ for Britain and to work with individuals, communities, businesses and public services to find new, more effective ways to give everyone in society the chance to achieve their full potential.
The Act introduces a new ‘gender duty’ which will require public bodies to take account of the different needs of men and women to ensure equality of opportunity when preparing policies or providing services. It outlaws discrimination on grounds of religion or belief in providing goods, facilities or services, education or rented accommodation.
The commission -- and I quote Dr Hampton -- will encourage and support the development of a society in which:
• People’s ability to achieve their potential is not limited by prejudice or discrimination
• There is respect for and protection of each individual’s human rights
• There is respect for the dignity and worth of each individual
• Each individual has an equal opportunity to participate in society, and
• There is mutual respect between groups based on understanding and valuing of diversity and on shared respect for equality and human rights (Clause 3)
… as an independent and influential champion the Commission will seek to
• promote and celebrate a diverse Britain where - there are good relations between communities, and people are not discriminated against because of their race, gender, disability, religion or belief, age or sexual orientation
The Commission will also use its powers and functions to work to achieve equality and human rights for all and promote and encourage good practice and an awareness of rights about equality, diversity and human rights and work to eliminate unlawful discrimination and harassment, promote an understanding of the importance of good relations between different groups (especially between different racial and religious groups) and between members of groups and others, monitor the effectiveness of the equality and human rights enactments, identify changes that have taken place in society and the results Britain should aim for in order to achieve the Commission’s vision (Clauses 8 –12) The Equality Act 2006.
To this, the Commission will advise employers and service providers on good practice and the promotion of equality and good relations, conduct inquiries and carry out investigations, provide advice and information on rights and equality laws. campaign on issues affecting the diverse groups in society that can suffer discrimination, make arrangements for conciliation to assist with disputes, assist individuals who believe they have been the victim of unlawful discrimination, provide grants. It will in time work with stakeholders and partners to become a single cohesive force acting for positive change on equality and diversity issues, human rights and good relations and able to influence policy and practice.
An interesting aspect of the British exercise is also to set up standards in appointing leadership and executive staff devoid of political patronage and in a fully accountable manner. Quite unlike the Indian practice.
The talent hunt works on what is called the Nolan principle, a set of guidelines on just what sort of a person is required to head such a unique organisation.
Bishops and other heads of institutions may be interested in the list of seven underpinning Principals of Governance formulated by the Nolan Committee which should apply to all in the public service. These are:
Selflessness: Holders of public office should act solely in terms of the public interest. They should not do so in order to gain financial or other benefits for themselves, their family or their friends.
Integrity: Holders of public office should not place themselves under any financial or other obligation to outside individuals or organisations that might seek to influence them in the performance of their official duties.
Objectivity: In carrying out public business, including making public appointments, awarding contracts, or recommending individuals for rewards and benefits, holders of public office should make choices on merit.
Accountability: Holders of public office are accountable for their decisions and actions to the public and must submit themselves to whatever scrutiny is appropriate to their office.
Openness: Holders of public office should be as open as possible about all the decisions and actions that they take. They should give reasons for their decisions and restrict information only when the wider public interest clearly demands.
Honesty: Holders of public office have a duty to declare any private interests relating to their public duties and to take steps to resolve any conflicts arising in a way that protects the public interest.
Leadership: Holders of public office should promote and support these principles by leadership and example.
Responsibility also devolves on us all.
We must take the initiative.
We must let our views, and creative suggestions, made known to the Government even if those in power choose not to invite us for consultations. If for nothing else, then to ensure that the Government of India too follows these seven principals when appointing people to the existing and future commissions meant for our welfare.
To be affective, we will have to have effective strategies of advocacy and political mobilisation, and a thoughtful laity and leadership formation programme. Above all, we must have accurate socio-economic and development data about our community, the sort of data that the Sachchar committee and its brilliant economist member secretary Dr Al-saleh Sharrief have b4en able to garner.
The government cannot be trusted to help us collect and anaylse such data. At one level, it is reluctant to collect data which can prove its own bigotry against religious minorities, or expose 60 years of sustained neglect of entire peoples groups.
The census data is insufficient. The National Sample Surveys seldom touch the Christian horizons. Because of our political marginilisation – made the worse because without Scheduled caste rights, we are also effectively out of the Panchayati Raj system barring a few places in the North East, Kerala and Tamil Nadu – political groups make no effort to even find out the ground reality. It does not matter to them, and does not impact on their political strategies. This is one reason why the struggle of the Dalit Christians has taken such a long time to be resolved. We just do not have the deprivation data that will convince courts and Parliament at a cinch. In fact, it is the other way around. There is all too much ill-informed printed opinion from high church signatories claiming there is no poverty in the Christian community that no Christian suffers from caste prejudice in the wider Indian society.
So if the government will not set up the equivalent of a Sachchar committee to assess the Christian community’s developmental health, the Church and community will have to do it by itself. The Church – and I use the phrase holistically to include Catholics, Protestants, Evangelicals, Cardinals, Archbishops down to the itinerant Independent Pastors and the last sentient Lay person – will have to join forces and find energy and resources for carrying out this process. Such a SWOT analysis, Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats, has never been done in the past. It can wait no longer.
I would like to propose that the Church sets up its own commission. It has the brain power. Out together a group of social and political scientists, demographers, development economists. Use the vast network of parishes, parish priests and mission stations and institutions, to collect data. Crunch that data and publish the report. It will put the government to shame, expose the Planning Commission, Public Sector Banks, even the gerrymandering by Election offices.
It will be a small price to pay if in the process the hierarchy and the Church establishment is also shamed. The last Census, in the very few insights it offered into the innards of the community, showed us the scale of illiteracy amongst women in Tribal areas where the Church ahs been working for a century or more. This study may also show how, despite the large number of institutions it runs, most of them with a shamefully small body of Christian students, faculty and staff, we are not only rapidly becoming redundant in the national development process but, at the same time, are also not being able to raise the group standards of own community, Dalit, tribal, landless labour and the large urban service sector employees in metropolitan towns and state capitals. We remain the waiters, seldom the hotel owners. We are the motor mechanics, seldom the garage owners, and of the group working in the Gulf and other places, just how many of us are engineers and doctors and cyberspace bosses. We remain a service class, not an entrepreneur or leadership group. Honest sweat has its rewards, but our people must have the opportunity to do better.
It is this poverty and disempowerment of the poor, and the shrinking role of the institutional church in development processes [the private sector and Hindu religious organizations are investing far more in education and health, for instance in comparative as well as absolute terms] that makes the Christian community in India now so vulnerable to attacks from right wing religious fundamentalist groups and bigotry in the government and political systems.
We must be able to quantify it and articulate it as and when the Equal Opportunities Commission comes into being, and while waiting for that, we must raise it before existing forums. It is not a matter of mere foresight or due diligence. We are in duty bound to do this for our coming generations who should be able to enjoy their rights as citizens of a free and fair country.
John Dayal
New Delhi, November 19, 2007
Saturday, November 17, 2007
Rise in Anti Christian Violence in India
PRESS STATEMENT
November 17 2007
Four cases of Christian persecution a week in 2007, and counting
Cases of Persecution of Christians in India recorded in 2007 (from 1st January to November 16th 2007) -- 190
Persecution Cases recorded in 2006 - 178
Persecution Cases Recorded in 2005 - 165
The victims include members of almost every Church denomination in the country, Catholics, Protestants, and Evangelicals. They include Catholic Fathers, catholic Nuns, Priests, independent Pastors, wives of Pastors, believers, Seminarians and Bible School students, and ordinary folks. Violence includes attempted murder, armed assault, sexual molestation, illegal confinement and grievous injury.
These figures do not include cases that have not come to the notice of the All India Christian Council, the All India Catholic Union, the GCIC, the Evangelical Fellowship of India and the Christian Legal Association. There are other cases which have come to my notice, but where the Church groups involved or the pastors have chosen not to file cases with the police, or have sought anonymity for fear of violence against the families of innocent people, particularly in Madhya Pradesh and Orissa.
This, of course, does not include widespread incidents which we do not want to include as “violence” but which certainly are indices of religious intolerance, bigotry, social discrimination and ostracisation -- as in many parts of the states in the lower Himalayan ranges [Himachal, Uttarakhand, part of Jammu and Kashmir, Sikkim], Orissa and other tribal areas. These cases include refusal to give share of the community profits in forest produced to those who have converted to Christianity, denial of civic and social benefits to Christians, particularly Dalits, in many parts of the country, denial of official permission to hold community meetings, official and informal ban on Bible sale and tract distribution in places where religious tracts and books of other majority faiths are freely distributed.
This list also does not include anti Christian Hate crimes. Nor does it include violence in which Christians are the victim together with others, such as the police actions in Chhattisgarh, Orissa, Madhya Pradesh and other places, the displacement of Tribals because of government action, the suicides of farmers in Andhra and Maharashtra because of crop failures and the debt trap.
The Christian community acknowledges a debt of gratitude to the secular people of India, their brothers and sisters. Those in authority, including leaders of political parties, perhaps are not as concerned with a micro community that hardly figures on their political radar because it does not matter electorally in most states, barring perhaps Tamil Nadu and Kerala and the micro states of Goa, Nagaland, Meghalaya and Mizoram where it impacts on a handful of Lok Sabha and Assembly seats.
In fact, leaders of the Bharatiya Janata party and its mother organisation, the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh, continue an almost daily harangue against the Church while militant frontal organisations such as the Bajrang Dal, the Akhil Bharatiya Vanvasi Kalyan Ashram and others peak the hate campaign at a feverish pitch.
The Evangelical Fellowship of India has called for a National Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church on Sunday, November 18, 2007
[I acknowledge the significant help of CLA and the All India Christian Council and AICU leaders in various states in documenting and investigation of cases of persecution]
Dr. John Dayal
Member: National Integration Council
Government of India
National President: All India Catholic Union (Founded 1919)
Secretary General: All India Christian Council (Founded 1999)
President: United Christian Action, Delhi (Founded 1992)
505 Link, 18 IP Extension, Delhi 110092 India
Email: johndayal@vsnl.com
http://groups.google.com/group/JohnDayal
Phone: 91-11-22722262 Mobile 09811021072
November 17 2007
Four cases of Christian persecution a week in 2007, and counting
Cases of Persecution of Christians in India recorded in 2007 (from 1st January to November 16th 2007) -- 190
Persecution Cases recorded in 2006 - 178
Persecution Cases Recorded in 2005 - 165
The victims include members of almost every Church denomination in the country, Catholics, Protestants, and Evangelicals. They include Catholic Fathers, catholic Nuns, Priests, independent Pastors, wives of Pastors, believers, Seminarians and Bible School students, and ordinary folks. Violence includes attempted murder, armed assault, sexual molestation, illegal confinement and grievous injury.
These figures do not include cases that have not come to the notice of the All India Christian Council, the All India Catholic Union, the GCIC, the Evangelical Fellowship of India and the Christian Legal Association. There are other cases which have come to my notice, but where the Church groups involved or the pastors have chosen not to file cases with the police, or have sought anonymity for fear of violence against the families of innocent people, particularly in Madhya Pradesh and Orissa.
This, of course, does not include widespread incidents which we do not want to include as “violence” but which certainly are indices of religious intolerance, bigotry, social discrimination and ostracisation -- as in many parts of the states in the lower Himalayan ranges [Himachal, Uttarakhand, part of Jammu and Kashmir, Sikkim], Orissa and other tribal areas. These cases include refusal to give share of the community profits in forest produced to those who have converted to Christianity, denial of civic and social benefits to Christians, particularly Dalits, in many parts of the country, denial of official permission to hold community meetings, official and informal ban on Bible sale and tract distribution in places where religious tracts and books of other majority faiths are freely distributed.
This list also does not include anti Christian Hate crimes. Nor does it include violence in which Christians are the victim together with others, such as the police actions in Chhattisgarh, Orissa, Madhya Pradesh and other places, the displacement of Tribals because of government action, the suicides of farmers in Andhra and Maharashtra because of crop failures and the debt trap.
The Christian community acknowledges a debt of gratitude to the secular people of India, their brothers and sisters. Those in authority, including leaders of political parties, perhaps are not as concerned with a micro community that hardly figures on their political radar because it does not matter electorally in most states, barring perhaps Tamil Nadu and Kerala and the micro states of Goa, Nagaland, Meghalaya and Mizoram where it impacts on a handful of Lok Sabha and Assembly seats.
In fact, leaders of the Bharatiya Janata party and its mother organisation, the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh, continue an almost daily harangue against the Church while militant frontal organisations such as the Bajrang Dal, the Akhil Bharatiya Vanvasi Kalyan Ashram and others peak the hate campaign at a feverish pitch.
The Evangelical Fellowship of India has called for a National Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church on Sunday, November 18, 2007
[I acknowledge the significant help of CLA and the All India Christian Council and AICU leaders in various states in documenting and investigation of cases of persecution]
Dr. John Dayal
Member: National Integration Council
Government of India
National President: All India Catholic Union (Founded 1919)
Secretary General: All India Christian Council (Founded 1999)
President: United Christian Action, Delhi (Founded 1992)
505 Link, 18 IP Extension, Delhi 110092 India
Email: johndayal@vsnl.com
http://groups.google.com/group/JohnDayal
Phone: 91-11-22722262 Mobile 09811021072
Wednesday, November 14, 2007
Concern at coercion and threats in the Resolution adopted by the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh against full rights for Dalit Christians, Muslims
PRESS STATEMENT
15 NOVEMBER 2007
In democratic India, even the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the bigoted, xenophobic and hyper nationalist founder of the Bharatiya Janata Party, has the right to take a political position on various issues, but the Supreme Court of India, the Union Government and the Election commission must take note of the threatening tone of resolutions recently adopted by its executive committee in their annual meeting.
These resolutions not only challenge Constitutional guarantees to the minorities, but are specially targeted at Christians and Muslims to instill fear and terror in the two communities.
The resolution also seeks to blackmail and coerce the Government of India by saying there will be “serious consequences” if the rights of the Dalit Christians and Muslims, taken away the nefarious Presidential Order of 1950, are restored.
The RSS also threads on thin legal ice when it charges the minorities with “brazenness” in moving the Supreme Court of India for the restoration of their rights, a demand which have been supported by the National Commission for Religious and Linguistics Minorities headed by former Chief justice of India Rangnath Misra. The Supreme Court is hearing a bunch of writ petitions by Dalit groups on the issue. The next hearing is scheduled for later in November.
Every law abiding citizen and organisation, including the Government, must condemn this arrogant attack on the right of aggrieved people to seek redress in the highest court in the land.
Not content with its vitriolic against the minority communities and their leadership, the RSS goes further in creating a confrontation between Dalits espousing various faith.
The BJP is contesting elections in Gujarat and Himachal and its resolutions go against the letter and spirit of the Code imposed by the Election Commission.
I hope the Chief Election Commissioner and other Commissioners will take Suo Moto cognisance of the RSS resolutions.
The following is the text of the RSS resolution against rights for Dalit Christians]
The Akhil Bharatiya Karyakari Mandal takes strong exception to the recommendation of the National Commission for Religious and Linguistic Minorities (NCRLM) popularly known as Justice Rangnath Mishra Commission that the Scheduled Caste status must be “completely delinked from religion” and “all those groups and classes among the Muslims and Christians should also be covered by the Scheduled Castes net”. What is more intriguing is the Commission’s effort to project its recommendations as consistent with the “letter and spirit of the constitutional provisions”.
The ABKM is of the view that, in reality, these recommendations are against the basic spirit of the Constitution and in negation of all the efforts of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar who struggled relentlessly in his personal and public life to reform the Hindu society. Besides, these recommendations are also an aggression on the welfare of the Scheduled Castes and a major impediment to their uplift.
The ABKM feels that the Commission has failed to take note of the fact that the framers of our Constitution, after prolonged deliberations, concluded that caste system is a part only of Hindu society and hence the reservations offered to the Scheduled Castes must be confined to Hindus only. The ABKM also wants to remind that the Church leadership, with an eye to increasing their numbers, has been vigorously campaigning for the inclusion of the converts into the Scheduled Castes purview which was steadfastly resisted by all the right-thinking leaders during the making of the Constitution as well as in the last six decades.
The ABKM decries the brazenness of the petitioners, who have gone to the Supreme Court with the demand of inclusion of the Christian converts in the Scheduled Castes category, with the contention that “the Dalits remain Dalits even after converting to Christianity”. Christianity claims that there is no caste system in it. It is a matter of shame that the Church leaders, in their greed for harvesting a few more souls, have no qualms in endorsing the petitioners’ contention which is against the proclaimed basic tenets of Christianity.
The ABKM reiterates that the demand for the converts to be treated on par with the Scheduled Castes is against the provisions of the Constitution since only castes, races or tribes can be deemed to be Scheduled Castes under Article 341 of the Constitution.
The ABKM cautions the government that any effort to implement the recommendations of the NCRLM, which are against the Constitution, is fraught with serious consequences. It calls upon the government not to succumb to the pressure tactics of the Church lobby in politics and outside and to stand steadfast on the path carved out by the leaders of the country in the last several decades by rejecting outright the demand for inclusion of such converts into the Scheduled Castes category.
The ABKM is of the considered opinion that the Church leadership is indulging in this duplicitous contention with the conspiracy to encourage mass conversions from the Scheduled Castes. It is clear that the reservations, if extended to the converts, would be considerably eaten up by the converts thus pushing the already backward Scheduled Castes into further backwardness.
The ABKM appeals to the countrymen in general and the Scheduled Caste brethren in particular to resist any move by the vote-hungry politicians in that direction which is going to be detrimental to the welfare of the Scheduled Castes. The ABKM calls upon all the swayamsevaks to work shoulder-to-shoulder with our Scheduled Caste brethren in their efforts to safeguard the interests of the community.
Dr. John Dayal
Member: National Integration Council
Government of India
National President: All India Catholic Union (Founded 1919)
Secretary General: All India Christian Council (Founded 1999)
President: United Christian Action, Delhi (Founded 1992)
505 Link, 18 IP Extension, Delhi 110092 India
Email: johndayal@vsnl.com
http://groups.google.com/group/JohnDayal
Phone: 91-11-22722262 Mobile 09811021072
15 NOVEMBER 2007
In democratic India, even the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the bigoted, xenophobic and hyper nationalist founder of the Bharatiya Janata Party, has the right to take a political position on various issues, but the Supreme Court of India, the Union Government and the Election commission must take note of the threatening tone of resolutions recently adopted by its executive committee in their annual meeting.
These resolutions not only challenge Constitutional guarantees to the minorities, but are specially targeted at Christians and Muslims to instill fear and terror in the two communities.
The resolution also seeks to blackmail and coerce the Government of India by saying there will be “serious consequences” if the rights of the Dalit Christians and Muslims, taken away the nefarious Presidential Order of 1950, are restored.
The RSS also threads on thin legal ice when it charges the minorities with “brazenness” in moving the Supreme Court of India for the restoration of their rights, a demand which have been supported by the National Commission for Religious and Linguistics Minorities headed by former Chief justice of India Rangnath Misra. The Supreme Court is hearing a bunch of writ petitions by Dalit groups on the issue. The next hearing is scheduled for later in November.
Every law abiding citizen and organisation, including the Government, must condemn this arrogant attack on the right of aggrieved people to seek redress in the highest court in the land.
Not content with its vitriolic against the minority communities and their leadership, the RSS goes further in creating a confrontation between Dalits espousing various faith.
The BJP is contesting elections in Gujarat and Himachal and its resolutions go against the letter and spirit of the Code imposed by the Election Commission.
I hope the Chief Election Commissioner and other Commissioners will take Suo Moto cognisance of the RSS resolutions.
The following is the text of the RSS resolution against rights for Dalit Christians]
The Akhil Bharatiya Karyakari Mandal takes strong exception to the recommendation of the National Commission for Religious and Linguistic Minorities (NCRLM) popularly known as Justice Rangnath Mishra Commission that the Scheduled Caste status must be “completely delinked from religion” and “all those groups and classes among the Muslims and Christians should also be covered by the Scheduled Castes net”. What is more intriguing is the Commission’s effort to project its recommendations as consistent with the “letter and spirit of the constitutional provisions”.
The ABKM is of the view that, in reality, these recommendations are against the basic spirit of the Constitution and in negation of all the efforts of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar who struggled relentlessly in his personal and public life to reform the Hindu society. Besides, these recommendations are also an aggression on the welfare of the Scheduled Castes and a major impediment to their uplift.
The ABKM feels that the Commission has failed to take note of the fact that the framers of our Constitution, after prolonged deliberations, concluded that caste system is a part only of Hindu society and hence the reservations offered to the Scheduled Castes must be confined to Hindus only. The ABKM also wants to remind that the Church leadership, with an eye to increasing their numbers, has been vigorously campaigning for the inclusion of the converts into the Scheduled Castes purview which was steadfastly resisted by all the right-thinking leaders during the making of the Constitution as well as in the last six decades.
The ABKM decries the brazenness of the petitioners, who have gone to the Supreme Court with the demand of inclusion of the Christian converts in the Scheduled Castes category, with the contention that “the Dalits remain Dalits even after converting to Christianity”. Christianity claims that there is no caste system in it. It is a matter of shame that the Church leaders, in their greed for harvesting a few more souls, have no qualms in endorsing the petitioners’ contention which is against the proclaimed basic tenets of Christianity.
The ABKM reiterates that the demand for the converts to be treated on par with the Scheduled Castes is against the provisions of the Constitution since only castes, races or tribes can be deemed to be Scheduled Castes under Article 341 of the Constitution.
The ABKM cautions the government that any effort to implement the recommendations of the NCRLM, which are against the Constitution, is fraught with serious consequences. It calls upon the government not to succumb to the pressure tactics of the Church lobby in politics and outside and to stand steadfast on the path carved out by the leaders of the country in the last several decades by rejecting outright the demand for inclusion of such converts into the Scheduled Castes category.
The ABKM is of the considered opinion that the Church leadership is indulging in this duplicitous contention with the conspiracy to encourage mass conversions from the Scheduled Castes. It is clear that the reservations, if extended to the converts, would be considerably eaten up by the converts thus pushing the already backward Scheduled Castes into further backwardness.
The ABKM appeals to the countrymen in general and the Scheduled Caste brethren in particular to resist any move by the vote-hungry politicians in that direction which is going to be detrimental to the welfare of the Scheduled Castes. The ABKM calls upon all the swayamsevaks to work shoulder-to-shoulder with our Scheduled Caste brethren in their efforts to safeguard the interests of the community.
Dr. John Dayal
Member: National Integration Council
Government of India
National President: All India Catholic Union (Founded 1919)
Secretary General: All India Christian Council (Founded 1999)
President: United Christian Action, Delhi (Founded 1992)
505 Link, 18 IP Extension, Delhi 110092 India
Email: johndayal@vsnl.com
http://groups.google.com/group/JohnDayal
Phone: 91-11-22722262 Mobile 09811021072
Thursday, November 8, 2007
The real truth
The Asian Age, New Delhi, India
08 November 2007
Opinion
The Great Truth
By Justice V.R. Krishna Iyer
[Former Judge, Supreme Court of India]
The unity, integrity and fraternity of Indian society are fundamental to the structure of our secular democratic republic. To sustain the security and stability of the polity it is important to enlighten the people about India’s creative and cultural pluralism, and the unifying quality of Swaraj. This is no idle intellectual exercise that narrates the multi-religious story of Bharat, but a dynamic drive which fuels the diverse faiths and agnostic movements.
In this setting, I want to present my thoughts objectively on the higher temporal and spiritual values which illuminate our profound culture. This is best spelt out in Jawaharlal Nehru’s great Autobiography, where he wrote, "…many souls who are or who believe they are free from all religious belief … in reality live immersed in a state of super-rational consciousness, which they term Socialism, Communism, Humanitarianism, Nationalism and even Rationalism. It is the quality of thought and not its object which determines its source and allows us to decide whether or not it emanates from religion. If it turns fearlessly towards the search for truth at all costs with single-minded sincerity prepared for any sacrifice, I should call it religious; for it presupposes faith in an end to human effort higher than the life of existing society, and even higher than the life of humanity as a whole. Scepticism itself, when it proceeds from vigorous natures true to the core, when it is an expression of strength and not of weakness, joins in the march of the Grand Army of the religious Soul.
"I cannot presume to fulfil the conditions laid down by Romain Rolland, but on these terms I am prepared to be a humble camp-follower of the Grand Army."
In this sense I too am a happy camp-follower.
Gautam Buddha, the enlightened one, gave the human race the rare value of compassion for all living creatures. Lord Krishna, the avatar of the Bhagavad Gita, battled for human rights and upheld the divinity and dignity of the deprived. He bargained for social and political justice through diplomacy, and followed it up with war to gain a victory for righteousness. Prophet Muhammad, the founder of Islam, was inspired by a spiritual revelation and transformed a delinquent society to a revolutionary and progressive one that stood for equality, generosity, universal brotherhood and peace. Mahatma Gandhi launched a do-or-die struggle for the liberation of millions of people from the thraldom of the British empire. His also struggled to liberate them from a caste-bound, feudal and communal society. He lived and died as a symbol of non-violence, secularism, simplicity and truth.
The legendary names who have glorified our cultural heritage deserve to be cherished and followed as a fundamental duty (Article 51A b of the Constitution).
Jesus Christ was a cosmic human marvel who taught the world values like compassion, fraternity, equality and love. He combined in him the highest principles of the noble Upanishads, the selfless teachings of Lord Buddha, the moving message of Lord Mahavir, the spectacular fight for dharma launched by Lord Krishna, the astonishing transformation achieved by Prophet Muhammad and the anti-imperialist commitments of Mahatma Gandhi. Jesus resisted injustice, untruth and obscurantism which prevailed under the authority of the Roman Empire. He resisted the sanctimonious religiosity propagated by the high priests of the Jewish faith. Jesus belonged to a lowly family but rose to influence the mind and spirit of the human race. He deliberately broke the Sabbath and said that the Sabbath was for man and not the other way round. He challenged superstitions and propounded a culture of humanism and egalitarianism. Through his message, he was able to change human thought and faith. Indeed, this noblest son of God never desired to be adored or worshipped as "Christ" or "Messiah." The following sentence is most inspirational: "then he charged his disciples that they should tell no man that he was Jesus the Christ" (Matthew XVI).
He saw universal brotherhood as the divine bond that bound people everywhere. That his philosophy was real is evident from a reply he gave to a person who told him that, "Behold, thy mother and thy brethren stand without, desiring to speak with thee. But he answered and said unto him that told him: who is my mother, and who are my brethren? And he stretched forth his hand towards his disciple and said, behold my mother and my brethren! For whosoever shall do the will of God which is in Heaven the same is my brother and…"
God’s universal fatherhood and the brotherhood of all mankind were a reality for him. He denounced private wealth. He told the world that the wealthy had no more chance of going to heaven than a camel trying to pass through the eye of the needle. When Pontius Pilate asked about Jesus’ God in Heaven (above the Roman Emperor) he asserted that He was the truth. This anti-imperial statement was a daring assertion against the emperor.
The greatest of all men of his time, Jesus was found not guilty by the imperial judge, but was awarded the death sentence. He was crucified by a terrible process of torture, while Barabbas, the robber, was set free. Similarly, today robbers roam around freely, plundering as they please. This is because a materialist rule of law punishes the just and acquits the anti-social criminals.
It is true that our system of justice is not able to suppress crime and discover the innocence of those who stand by truth. God is Truth and Truth is God said Gandhiji. Jesus proved by his extraordinary passion the need for a finer revolution of our moral order and authoritarian system of justice. Jesus’ admonition is of burning relevance to those in public power who are the trustees of the people: "Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted?"
US President George W. Bush said that God told him to attack Iraq. Napoleon Bonaparte said something that has kept society mesmerised even today: "There is only one thing in this world, and that is to keep acquiring money and more money, power and more power. All the rest is meaningless."
Contrast this with the Gandhian concept of development that rejected the idea that life’s aim was primarily the creation of material wealth.
Comrade Jesus, the martyr who redeemed humanism, belongs to mankind. He is not the monopoly of any particular community. Jesus championed proletarian values and gender justice as opposed to privilege and exploitation. So did Lord Krishna who battled for eternal dharma in the Mahabharata. So too did Lord Buddha who renounced royalty and made compassion his cosmic creed. And Prophet Muhammad, the finest humanist of his age in the Arab world, upheld the noble ideals of universal brotherhood and sharing as opposed to the greedy and promiscuous pleasures of a vicious society.
In our time, Mahatma Gandhi abdicated every form of affluence and political privilege, identified truth and non-violence as absolute creeds, and abolition of human privation as integral to Swaraj. Karl Marx raged against capitalist exploitation and made liberation his life’s mission. He lived and died in poverty.
The Great Truth is more than dialectical materialism. It is a spiritual vision and manifests universal love.
Jesus Christ, whose passion and crucifixion were too sublime to find a parallel, was the noblest revolutionary of history. He was an avatar of truth, justice and spiritual redemption. Today, imperial terrorism, ubiquitous corruption, crazy greed and quasi-colonial culture comprise the rule of law. Capitalist economists and phoney political philosophers have interpreted the wealth and development of nations in various ways. Our task is to transform society to guarantee that everyone has the right to live in dignity.
08 November 2007
Opinion
The Great Truth
By Justice V.R. Krishna Iyer
[Former Judge, Supreme Court of India]
The unity, integrity and fraternity of Indian society are fundamental to the structure of our secular democratic republic. To sustain the security and stability of the polity it is important to enlighten the people about India’s creative and cultural pluralism, and the unifying quality of Swaraj. This is no idle intellectual exercise that narrates the multi-religious story of Bharat, but a dynamic drive which fuels the diverse faiths and agnostic movements.
In this setting, I want to present my thoughts objectively on the higher temporal and spiritual values which illuminate our profound culture. This is best spelt out in Jawaharlal Nehru’s great Autobiography, where he wrote, "…many souls who are or who believe they are free from all religious belief … in reality live immersed in a state of super-rational consciousness, which they term Socialism, Communism, Humanitarianism, Nationalism and even Rationalism. It is the quality of thought and not its object which determines its source and allows us to decide whether or not it emanates from religion. If it turns fearlessly towards the search for truth at all costs with single-minded sincerity prepared for any sacrifice, I should call it religious; for it presupposes faith in an end to human effort higher than the life of existing society, and even higher than the life of humanity as a whole. Scepticism itself, when it proceeds from vigorous natures true to the core, when it is an expression of strength and not of weakness, joins in the march of the Grand Army of the religious Soul.
"I cannot presume to fulfil the conditions laid down by Romain Rolland, but on these terms I am prepared to be a humble camp-follower of the Grand Army."
In this sense I too am a happy camp-follower.
Gautam Buddha, the enlightened one, gave the human race the rare value of compassion for all living creatures. Lord Krishna, the avatar of the Bhagavad Gita, battled for human rights and upheld the divinity and dignity of the deprived. He bargained for social and political justice through diplomacy, and followed it up with war to gain a victory for righteousness. Prophet Muhammad, the founder of Islam, was inspired by a spiritual revelation and transformed a delinquent society to a revolutionary and progressive one that stood for equality, generosity, universal brotherhood and peace. Mahatma Gandhi launched a do-or-die struggle for the liberation of millions of people from the thraldom of the British empire. His also struggled to liberate them from a caste-bound, feudal and communal society. He lived and died as a symbol of non-violence, secularism, simplicity and truth.
The legendary names who have glorified our cultural heritage deserve to be cherished and followed as a fundamental duty (Article 51A b of the Constitution).
Jesus Christ was a cosmic human marvel who taught the world values like compassion, fraternity, equality and love. He combined in him the highest principles of the noble Upanishads, the selfless teachings of Lord Buddha, the moving message of Lord Mahavir, the spectacular fight for dharma launched by Lord Krishna, the astonishing transformation achieved by Prophet Muhammad and the anti-imperialist commitments of Mahatma Gandhi. Jesus resisted injustice, untruth and obscurantism which prevailed under the authority of the Roman Empire. He resisted the sanctimonious religiosity propagated by the high priests of the Jewish faith. Jesus belonged to a lowly family but rose to influence the mind and spirit of the human race. He deliberately broke the Sabbath and said that the Sabbath was for man and not the other way round. He challenged superstitions and propounded a culture of humanism and egalitarianism. Through his message, he was able to change human thought and faith. Indeed, this noblest son of God never desired to be adored or worshipped as "Christ" or "Messiah." The following sentence is most inspirational: "then he charged his disciples that they should tell no man that he was Jesus the Christ" (Matthew XVI).
He saw universal brotherhood as the divine bond that bound people everywhere. That his philosophy was real is evident from a reply he gave to a person who told him that, "Behold, thy mother and thy brethren stand without, desiring to speak with thee. But he answered and said unto him that told him: who is my mother, and who are my brethren? And he stretched forth his hand towards his disciple and said, behold my mother and my brethren! For whosoever shall do the will of God which is in Heaven the same is my brother and…"
God’s universal fatherhood and the brotherhood of all mankind were a reality for him. He denounced private wealth. He told the world that the wealthy had no more chance of going to heaven than a camel trying to pass through the eye of the needle. When Pontius Pilate asked about Jesus’ God in Heaven (above the Roman Emperor) he asserted that He was the truth. This anti-imperial statement was a daring assertion against the emperor.
The greatest of all men of his time, Jesus was found not guilty by the imperial judge, but was awarded the death sentence. He was crucified by a terrible process of torture, while Barabbas, the robber, was set free. Similarly, today robbers roam around freely, plundering as they please. This is because a materialist rule of law punishes the just and acquits the anti-social criminals.
It is true that our system of justice is not able to suppress crime and discover the innocence of those who stand by truth. God is Truth and Truth is God said Gandhiji. Jesus proved by his extraordinary passion the need for a finer revolution of our moral order and authoritarian system of justice. Jesus’ admonition is of burning relevance to those in public power who are the trustees of the people: "Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted?"
US President George W. Bush said that God told him to attack Iraq. Napoleon Bonaparte said something that has kept society mesmerised even today: "There is only one thing in this world, and that is to keep acquiring money and more money, power and more power. All the rest is meaningless."
Contrast this with the Gandhian concept of development that rejected the idea that life’s aim was primarily the creation of material wealth.
Comrade Jesus, the martyr who redeemed humanism, belongs to mankind. He is not the monopoly of any particular community. Jesus championed proletarian values and gender justice as opposed to privilege and exploitation. So did Lord Krishna who battled for eternal dharma in the Mahabharata. So too did Lord Buddha who renounced royalty and made compassion his cosmic creed. And Prophet Muhammad, the finest humanist of his age in the Arab world, upheld the noble ideals of universal brotherhood and sharing as opposed to the greedy and promiscuous pleasures of a vicious society.
In our time, Mahatma Gandhi abdicated every form of affluence and political privilege, identified truth and non-violence as absolute creeds, and abolition of human privation as integral to Swaraj. Karl Marx raged against capitalist exploitation and made liberation his life’s mission. He lived and died in poverty.
The Great Truth is more than dialectical materialism. It is a spiritual vision and manifests universal love.
Jesus Christ, whose passion and crucifixion were too sublime to find a parallel, was the noblest revolutionary of history. He was an avatar of truth, justice and spiritual redemption. Today, imperial terrorism, ubiquitous corruption, crazy greed and quasi-colonial culture comprise the rule of law. Capitalist economists and phoney political philosophers have interpreted the wealth and development of nations in various ways. Our task is to transform society to guarantee that everyone has the right to live in dignity.
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