The Ghar Vapasimission has spread panic among the religious minorities. As an Indian community that shuns violence, Christians are apparently soft targets. So, Christian communities are apprehensive that the instrumentalities of Ghar Vapasi would wipe out their already miniscule existence in this secular nation.  But I believe that such fears are bereft of any rational basis. Those speaking on behalf of the Christians seem to overlook the truth that Christianity is a faith founded on the blood and gore of its martyrs. They should know that a thing born in fire cannot wilt in the heat of the sun. If it indeed wilts, it only signals the need for some serious introspections…

Let the prophets of doom recall that there were times when Christians were crucified, beheaded, burned at stakes, thrown to beasts, stoned or killed in inhuman ways for their refusal to forsake their faith. But, the flash of the executioners’ sword or the hungry fires of the blazing stakes could not scare them into recanting their faith since it was founded on the solid rock of spiritual convictions.  But when people convert to escape hunger, to marry sweethearts, to marry more than once, or to seek better social status or living conditions etc., faith affiliations would be determined by the degree of comparative comforts of the camps rather than by the merits of convictions. If people would move out on the promise of BPL card or a caste certificate, then the credibility of their moving in too would come under the scanner. 

It is apparent that most people opting for conversions and reconversions belongs to the lowest strata of the society.  It is difficult to believe that these people have been quitting or embracing faiths because of their discernments and convictions. It is more likely that their predominant concerns were connected to their earthly existence – food, clothing, shelter and security. In other words, conversions and reconversions have become issues of survival rather than salvation to most. Ignorance, illiteracy and poverty are often fertile grounds for harvesting conversions. The question is whether it is right or ethical for anyone to exploit the ignorance and helplessness of people for the furtherance of selfish communal agenda. 

Jesus exhorted his followers to “…love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back…” (Luke 6:35). Christians should learn to love and serve others ‘without expecting to get anything back’. When we help people with the motive of making them members of a formal Christian sect, we are being charitable with the ulterior motive of denominational expansion. Jesus said, “Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven” (Luke 5:16). Conversion must arise in the heart. And that change of heart has to be triggered by the light of the followers of Gospel shining before all. It is difficult to agree that plucking people out of their comfort zones of culture, traditions and community under the guise of saving their souls is an act of love and compassion.

I recently met a young professional who was converted to Christianity. His family comprised of his well-educated parents and a school-going sister. Although his parents were against their only son quitting their ancestral faith, they suffered the pain and humiliations in silence so that their child would stay happy. And they did not drive their delinquent son out of their home. As a parent, I tried to picture a situation of my own child leaving his Christian faith. We would have been damned and devastated. My own proselytising Church would have thrown us out. Obviously, the loving family of that young man was suffering. It was impossible for me to be happy about it. So, I told him that in my view his parents were more Christian than he was, although they did not convert. “Loving those who hurt is the Gospel. Hurting those who love is iniquity”, I told him.

Perhaps, the protagonists of proselytization should consider whether it would be better in the circumstances to bring people to the path of the Gospel without forcing them forsake their existing religious affiliations. I believe that the life of Mahatma Gandhiji was a shining example in this context. “Gandhiji talked like a Christian, acted like a Christian, and responded to evil like a Christian”. This was when many who carried the Christian label seldom practiced what they preached. There were several attempts to convert Gandhiji to Christianity. But he refused. At the same time, much of what he did was based on the insight and inspiration he gained from the Gospel (and other scriptures like the Holy Gita).  E. Stanley Jones, the American missionary who worked in India was a close friend of Gandhiji. Jones thought that Gandhiji was more like Christ than most Christian leaders were. 

Those supporting the idea of  salvation through conversion to Christianity (meaning the membership of a Christian denomination) seem to forget that Jesus was born a Jew and continued so. He did not found Christianity. He lived for thirty-three odd years and was engaged in active preaching of the Gospel (the Good News) for around three years. He participated in the religious services held in the Jewish places of worship. The Gospel of Jesus did not challenge Judaism. Jesus had repeatedly made it clear that he had not come to replace the Jewish Law but to fulfil it. He did not preach a different god or a different faith distinct from Judaism.  He only spoke against the rotten and ritualistic traditions and practices of the Jewish establishment. As a messenger of love and compassion, Jesus could not stand the sight of the Jewish leaders fattening themselves on the sweat and blood of the poor shepherds and peasants on whom they exercised their authority. He spoke against the corruption, exploitation, insensitivity and hypocrisy of the Jewish leaders. Jesus was tried and punished under the Jewish law for the alleged crime of blasphemy.   

It is not certain whether Jesus had even considered the need for an exclusive and independent community existence for his followers. The objective of his preaching was to guide people towards a better personal and social life filled with love, peace and harmony. His message was to make people more unselfish and compassionate irrespective of caste, creed or community. He wanted everyone to be ‘born again’ with a new heart carrying the innocence of a new-born infant. Jesus never focused on rituals or literal adherence to the law.  He taught that the application of the law should be rooted in love, understanding and compassion, and not on hatred, persecution and vengeance. Jesus preached the Gospel of love  for he said, “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13: 34-35).

The followers of the teachings of Christ came to be called Christian much after the departure of Christ from this world. Thus, it is difficult to accept that Jesus wanted the followers of his path of love, endurance and sacrifice to be a gated community to which entry would be based on a licence (often awarded by authorities who seldom practice what they preach) in the form of conversion (not necessarily in the form of a change of heart but compulsorily in the form of a change of formal faith affiliations).

A non-Christian friend once told me that the one thing he appreciated in ‘Christian faith’ was its teachings against idol worship.  “Which Christian faith?”, I asked him.  An estimated 33,000 Christian denominations operate in the world today. Every one of these denominations swears by the Bible. But each has its own unique and irreconcilable understanding or interpretation of the Biblical truth. Each differs in practices too. I belong to a Christian sect that does not keep or worship idols, images or statues. But the strength of my sect is just under 10 lakh members, which is as good as a drop in the ocean considering the global (nominal) Christian population.  (For instance, the size of the global Catholic community is 1.2 billion – more or less equal to the entire Indian population). But some of the predominant Christian sects have statues and images, not only of Biblical characters, but also of people outside the Bible who were canonized or declared as saints by people here on earth*.  The faithful light candles, give offerings and pray before these images in an attempt to seek their intercession in getting their mundane desires fulfilled. This is in spite of the Bible strictly forbidding the making and worshiping of images. “So when we say the Christian faith, it may be any one of the 33,000 odd mutually incompatible interpretations of that faith”, I told him. 

Fragmentation of the Christian faith is not a recent development. The Christian missionaries who came to India during the colonial rule belonged to different Christian sects and brought their sectarian differences and rivalries too along with the Gospel. Gandhiji told these missionaries to go back to their own countries and return to India after settling their own denominational quarrels. Stanley Jones believed that what Gandhiji said was right.  He knew that a “divided Church could never have a redemptive influence in this troubled land”.

But variety in itself is not necessarily malefic. Diversities in the perceptions on the same subjective truth (truth, the understanding of which is influenced by individual beliefs and biases, unlike objective truths) are nothing unusual or alarming. This was understood by Indian thinkers who brilliantly explained the idea through the popular parable of the elephant and the six blind men (appearing in Buddhism, Jainism and Hinduism). The six blind men went to ‘see’ an elephant. They were later asked to describe the elephant. The man who felt the leg said an elephant resembled a pillar, the one who felt the trunk said the elephant was like a water sprout and so on. The sum of it was that the understanding of each blind man depended on the part of the elephant he had felt or experienced.  The blind men who said that an elephant was like a pillar or a water sprout or a huge fan or a broom were not lying. They were thoroughly honest in their perceptions. Yet, none of them discovered the real elephant.  The partial view concept is valid Biblically too, which says,“For we know in part and we prophesy in part; but when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away” (1 Corinthians 13:9).

All diverse views can coexist in harmony as long each refrain from stepping on to the toes of others.The right to propagate each view shall remain. Everyone shall also have the right to participate in other views as he or she thinks fit. Tensions arise when the ‘pillar’ group or the ‘water sprout’ group tries to claim they alone are the sole holders of the truthful view. The scenario turns vitiated when, say, the ‘pillar’ group uses force, fraud, coercion or allurement to get others jump camps. It turns violent when, any one group starts condemning those in the other groups to everlasting hellfire. Things would turn bloody when one group starts killing those who do not endorse or accept its claims of monopoly over the whole truth. This is the  reality whether it is between the sects within a faith or between different faiths.

If those speaking in the name of Jesus and the Gospel cannot find peace, love and reconciliation within themselves, how can they expect those outside it to trust and follow them? This, perhaps, is the question that leaders of the Christian denominations should ask themselves before pointing fingers at others.

As conversions from other faiths are drying up, there is now a scramble for inter-denominational conversions within the Christian fold itself. Each sect is attempting to poach people from other sects by donning the mantle of the sole seller of salvation. Instead of loving our enemies and praying for those persecute, as Jesus taught, each sect is condemning the others to eternal damnation. They conveniently ignore the words of Jesus who said, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.” (Mathew 7:21). Preaching bereft of practice is the malady of present day Christianity. Evangelism is mostly a media show and theatrics to marvel and impress. It is all silly games and wild claims to entrap the gullible. I am afraid that faith has no relevance to the current games of competitive faith marketing. It is more a battle for space and clout than a mission to save souls.  It is to these people that Jesus said, “Woe to you….you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean” (Mathew 23:27).

We are living in a time when the communal cauldron is simmering. Conversion is at the root of much of the tensions in India now. Let the Christians (also others) ask themselves whether they want people to become a mere entries in the Church register of a sect or better human beings practising love, peace, compassion and companionship in everyday life. Can we bury our differences and work towards the goal of guiding more people to the path of the Gospel rather than that of stamping more people with a Christian denominational seal. If Christian ways are more important than denominational strength, let us feed, clothe and house the poor and needy. Let us set up educational institutions and healthcare facilities to help them (Not the glossy five star institutions created to pamper oversized egos or to mint money). Let us impart skills to enable them become self-reliant. Let us be compassionate to them and teach them to be compassionate to others. Let us share what we have with them so that they will learn to share what they have, among themselves and others. Let us wean them away from self-annihilating habits like alcoholism and drug abuse. Let us endeavour to turn them into responsible citizens leading tidy lives. Let us love, serve and make sacrifices for them so that they would emulate it in their own lives. But let us not preach to them. Let our actions do the preaching. Let our lives be our message.  Let us not convert them to the membership of any Christian denomination. Let us convert them the innocence of infants.  

Let me close with the words of Jesus, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” (John 8:31-32). 

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*Contrast this with the response of Jesus when someone addressed him as the “Good Teacher”, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone”. But many Christian sects address the heads of their denominations as ‘His Holiness’!