[Talisker]

So long as missionary work is peacful, it is part of the fabric of democratic traditions that allow for freedom of worship and freedom of belief. If India’s Hindu communities cannot abide by this, then as an aspect of comity they ought not to be allowed the reciprocal benefits of practising their faith without interruption in western democracies. ...In short what you seek, is that for the Catholics to practice their faith, they must shed their core belief. This is a fallacy exposed by its own internal contradiction.

Many peoples and traditions of the world consider proselytizing to be essentially non-peaceful. Hindus do not proselytize, and simply want to abide in their own villages without their children or their faith subject to proselytization. And though it is against Hinduism, some Hindus feel so threatened by Catholic proselytizing that they feel their violence is a response to what they perceive as a relentless and generationally unending Catholic violence towards their minds, faith and culture. In short, they just want to be left alone to practice their own religion, in their own villages, in their own country.

As far as this desire to simply be left alone somehow violating Catholic core beliefs, and amounting to a violation of "comity," an unfair "exploitation" of "western democracy" and an imitation of Muslim religion-sanctioned murder, such contentions are utterly bigoted in favor of a Catholic-centric application of definitions and rule of law for the entire planet, as well as a slander against Hinduism specifically, and thus are dismissable on their face. And as you are well aware, they also absolutely do not represent the official positions of the Catholic Church towards Hindus, Hinduism, or India.

A belief system that accepts Christ as the incarnation of God and then allows for gods incarnated as monkeys and baboons makes a mockery of Catholicism and its central tenets. ...We do not believe the simplistic notion that “there are many paths to Heaven” because this would make the birth, death, and resurrection of the Christ meaningless. Why add one more path?

Your simplistic interpretation makes a mockery of Hinduism and it's central tenets. As well, Hindu beliefs existed thousands of years before the coming of Jesus Christ, and therefore hardly represent any reaction whatever towards Christianity. However, for a Hindu, once Jesus came He was hardly meaningless, but seen as a genuine incarnation of God who was and is utterly crucial to the saving of the human race, and deserving of the highest and most solemn veneration and worship. What other religion on the planet so absolutely accepts the stature of Jesus Christ as God, besides Christianity? You know not of what you speak.

[Cronos]

Hindus do not proselytize, and simply want to abide in their own villages without their children or their faith subject to proselytization

They don't proselytize because they believe their religion to be of the earth itself, so if you are indian you are part of the fabric, if you aren't, then tough luck. It's true of any non-reveled faith.

In contrast, Sikhism, Buddhism and Jainism, all offshoots of Hinduism do proselytize. Also, Hinduism does preach outside -- haven't you met any Hare Krishna's?

[Cronos]

And though it is against Hinduism, some Hindus feel so threatened by Catholic proselytizing that they feel their violence is a response to what they perceive as a relentless and generationally unending Catholic violence towards their minds, faith and culture

Also, this is not due to Catholic missionaries who generally imbibe local cultures -- what's wrong with doing an aarti to worship Jesus? The fundamentalist evangelicals are the ones who consider hindu culture verboten.

[Cronos]

As well, Hindu beliefs existed thousands of years before the coming of Jesus Christ, and therefore hardly represent any reaction whatever towards Christianity

Not quite. Modern day Hinduism bears little to no resemblance to Vedic Hinduism with it's worshipping of Aryanic gods like Mithra, Varuna and especially Indra (the god of thunder and war, analogous to Thor or, in the form of Dyaus Pitr, to Zeus).

Hinduism reacted to the philosophy of Jainism and Buddhism by incorporating ahimsa and vegetarianism (remember that the Rig Veda does talk about eating meat too).

It then absorbed many of the Greek religious thoughts (which, since ancient Greek religion was another sister religion of the pan-Aryan religion)

Then, it was influenced by Christianity in the early centuries of the common era.

how? A very clear one is the gradual "decay" of the status of the Asuras. In the Rig Vedas, the Asuras are just another family of supernatural beings, like the Daevas. Slowly, in the Christian era under the influence of Christian and Zoroastrian ideas of demons, the Asuras are now purely considered demonic figures.


Remember that the ancient Indo-European/Aryan religion had TWO families of gods -- most clearly depicted in the Germanic religion (the most primitive) which retained these as the Aesir and Vanir families of gods.

In India, as we saw, the Devas got the upper hand and the Asuras were relegated to demons

in the sister land of Iran, the opposite happened -- the Ahuras (in Avestani and Persian, the "s" of Sanskrit becomes "h", hence to the Persians, the people of the Sindhu river were Hindus) got supremacy and the daevas become minor spirits. Then Zoroaster came along and acknowledged ONE spirit AHURA Mazda as the one God.

We mustn't forget of course that ZOroastrianism under the Persians influenced the Hebrew religion in 400 BC when the Israelites were freed by the Persians.

The Zoroastrians gave the concept of angels and a messiah to the Hebrews.

And Christianity, in it's turn came back to India to give the Hindu culture the concept of a trinity (Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva).