From: Himal, February 1999, VOL 12, No 2
COMMENTARY
[India] Theocratic Threat
by Yoginder Sikand
With the BJP having come to power at the centre, and having emerged as a
formidable force all over North India, Christians are now fast joining
Muslims and Dalits as one of the principal victims of Hindutva terror.
Recent months have witnessed a sharp escalation of attacks on Christian
priests and nuns, and the destruction of churches, particularly in Gujarat
and Madhya Pradesh. More recently, in Orissa, an Australian missionary and
his two sons were set ablaze by a mob reportedly shouting ìBajrang Dal
Zindabadî.
Christians account for a little less than 3 percent of Indiaís population,
but their contribution to the development of the country, in the field of
social service, education and health care, has been quite out of proportion
to their numbers. Traditionally, Indian Christians have kept a low profile,
preferring constructive social engagement to agitational politics. Their
relations with other religious communities too have, by and large, been
peaceful and relatively free of controversy.
What, then, accounts for the growing Hindutva fury against Christians?
While it is true that Hindu communalists have always been stiffly opposed
to Christians, preferring to see them as ëanti-nationalsí and agents of
Western powers, that does not explain the rapid spread of anti-Christian
violence from the mid-90s onwards. There are many factors at work, one of
the most significant being the changing orientation of the Church in India
in recent years, due to which vested interests are feeling increasingly
threatened.
Barring the Syrian Christians of Kerala, who trace their conversion to the
first century AD and to St Thomas, one of the apostles of Jesus, almost all
of Indiaís Christians owe their conversion to European missionariesñfirst,
the Portuguese and the Dutch and then the Englishñwho arrived in India in
the wake of the establishment of European colonial rule in the region. Till
1947, the church in India was modelled completely on the European pattern,
and missionaries saw the dissemination of European culture as inseparable
from their task of spreading the Christian gospel.
After 1947, however, demands began to be made by Indian Christian leaders
to make the church in India more authentically ëIndianí. Not only were
European missionaries and clergymen replaced by Indians, the Indian church
also embarked, although for some, rather too hesitatingly, on what it
called the process of ìinculturationî. This meant making a clear
distinction between the message of Christ, on the one hand, and its
European expression on the other. Consequently, the Indian church
increasingly turned its attention to addressing and responding to the
Indian social context within which it was placed.
This shift in orientation manifested itself in two principal ways: firstly,
in what was termed as the ìIndianisationî of the Church, represented
essentially by the use of art forms, architectural styles and ritual
practices generally associated with the Brahminic Hindu tradition, and
secondly, in a growing concern for assisting the process of the countryís
economic development, by setting up a vast network of schools, hospitals
and charitable institutions.
The late 1980s was the period which saw the dramatic upsurge of the dalit,
backward-caste and tribal struggles all over India. However, this upsurge
was accompanied by the rapidly growing strength of Hindutva, or Brahminism
in a new garb. Meanwhile, there was the failure of the developmentalist
ideology to effectively tackle the problems of mass poverty, unemployment
and widening inequalities. That was when important sections within the
Indian church began questioning its role in promoting, whether
inadvertently or otherwise, the twin structures of Brahminism and
capitalism.
Christian dalit ideologues, inspired by the Ambedkarite movement, called
into question the continued discrimination against the dalits within the
church, although they form almost 80 percent of the total Indian Christian
population. Radical Dalit theologians, such as the late Rev Arvind Nirmal
of Aurangabad, Rev M. Azariah of Madras, and Rev James Massey of Delhi,
even accused the largely ëhighí caste Indian church leadership of
ëBrahminisingí Christianity in the name of ëIndianisingí the church. At the
same time, influenced by Latin American ëliberation theologyí, many Indian
Christian theologians also began critiquing the churchís conservatism and
its connivance with the ruling elitesñmanifested most strikingly in its
chain of English-medium schools that cater largely to the children of
wealthy families, most of whom happen to be ëhighí caste Hindus.
The emerging dalit and liberation theologies are today propelling
significant sections within the Indian Church towards the path of radical
social activism by challenging structures of oppressionñreligious,
cultural, economic and political. Contemporary dalit and liberation
theologians see Jesus himself as a revolutionary, a central concern of
whose mission was to oppose the hegemony of the ruling establishment and to
crusade for a radically new social order.
This new commitment to a socially engaged, radical Christianity is today
inspiring many Christian priests, more so Catholics than Protestants, to
engage themselves in the struggles of the poor, particularly the dalits and
the tribals. It is this that has earned them the wrath of the vested
interests and dominant elitesñlandlords, money-lenders, merchants and
othersñwho see the growing assertion of the marginalised as threatening to
them. As Father Cedric Prakash, coordinator of the Gujarat chapter of the
United Christian Forum for Human Rights, explained in a recent interview,
the continuing attacks on Christians in Gujarat owes directly to the fact
that the Christian priests had helped ìempower the Dalits and Adivasis [so
that] they can stand for their rights and fight backî.
It is these ëhighí castes, who have for centuries sought to legitimise
their cruel oppression of the ëlowí castes in the name of Hinduism, that
also provide the backbone of support for groups such as the RSS, VHP, BJP
and the Bajrang Dal. Attacks by Hindutva activists and their supporters
against Christian priests and nuns working in various parts of India,
sought to be legitimised in the name of ëprotecting Hinduismí and
ëpreventing conversionsí, are thus nothing less than a declaration of war
by vested interests on those who would help the oppressed.
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