Posted on 12/30/2001 6:14:13 PM PST by Justin Raimondo
Edited on 09/03/2002 4:49:49 AM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
The mob arrived armed with knives and clubs while Rev. Joy Punnose addressed the 120 missionaries gathered in the small town of Dohad in northern Gujarat, an Indian state where Christians have become almost daily targets for Hindu mobs.
The kicks, punches and slaps that followed were not unusual in the northern part of this country, the so-called Hindu belt, where dozens of Christian churches went up in smoke this year, an Australian missionary and his two sons were burned alive, another priest was beaten to death, nuns have been gang-raped, congregations terrorized and priests made to walk naked through village streets.
(Excerpt) Read more at media-watch.org ...
Of course Christian missionaries should not be beaten or otherwise mistreated. Christianity does have a tendency to condemn all other religions as evil or satanic. This understandably makes non-Christians angry. And this is a trait which is unique to Christianity. Buddhists, Hindus, Moslems and Jews do not condemn all other religions as evil. Not even the fundamentalists in these religions do this. Not even in a holy war against people of another religion. They will say that the people are evil, or that the country they come from is evil, but not that their religion is evil. Only Christians do this.
What a lovely religion Hinduism must be.
So I guess all the violent rhetoric about "slaying the infidels" was just someones bad dream after too much pizza?
Right.
I began my message by saying that of course Christian missionaries should not be beaten or otherwise mistreated. So don't try to stick me with that.
I have no interest whatever in my "reputation" on this site. I do have an interest in telling the truth. Calm down and reread my post.
You point out that 'in India, if you convert to another religion other than Hindu, you have to "register" your conversion with the government...'
Right. It is also true that the Koran requires that Jews and Christians to pay a special tax. But this is very different from condemning other religions as "evil." Hindus see other religions, including Christianity, as alternate paths to religious truth. Some Hindus--especially fundamentalists--see Christianity and other forms of theism as inferior paths, but paths nonetheless.
Unfortunately, Christianity does not see other religions in this way. This is due, in part, to one of the remarks of its founder to the effect that "No one comes to the Father but by me." Christianity has wonderful ethical teachings, but this is not one of them.
Moslems say this when they are engaged in a holy war against people of another religion. They always see these wars as a defense of Islam against attack. This is how Bin Laden and the other Islamic fanatics misguidedly see things. But you will never find them--not even them-- condemning Christianity as an instrument of Satan or as an evil belief system.
You may think this is a distinction without a difference, but I think there is something very important here.
There are 40 million Christians in India and I have many Indian Christian friends who can attest to something quite different. At best this is an isolated incident in a country of 1 Billion people.
It doesn't compare to the church-massacre in Pakistan a few weeks ago. Keep digging - you'll find something!
There's a lot hiding there in that "virtually"! See post #18.
Besides, the BJP doesn't run the country anymore. There's a big coalition government which has pushed the BJP fundamentalist agenda off the table.
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