29. August 2010 by admin.

THE RAPE OF INDIA

David Kostinchuk <dkost@mb.sympatico.ca>

 “THE RAPE OF INDIA”In the article ” The Jungle Of Christ” I discussed the plans of the television evangelists and their assault on India. In this article I will deal with this subject in a more detailed perspective.The Concise Oxford Dictionary defines rape as: 1. take by force. 2. commit rape on. fig. forcible interference with institutions, country, etc.The rape of India is done in a model similar to a military model used to invade, occupy, control, or subjugate a population of a given country. Intelligence is considered essential to invading a country; language, religion, culture, etc. are some of the variables considered. Division among the given population is considered essential to gain political control once inside the country. Religion can be the key variable to accomplish this. Division of wealth, social status, ethnic diversity, etc. are also variables that influence division of the population of a given country.At the present time North India is considered the core target of evangelists in their effort of world evangelism. They justify this to Christians by using derogatory remarks like ” 900 million Hindus are spiritual bondage” (Baptist Press 10/99) or “900 million people lost in the hopeless darkness of Hinduism” (Baptist Press 11/99)North India is a major population and political center. It is also considered the religious hub of India, the most socially deprived, has the lowest literacy rate, having the smallest percentage of Christians in its population as well as having immense research done on the population. The evangelists consider Hindus in North India as being the most accessible target in their plan for world wide evangelism. In addition there is the added incentive of having a Muslim population of 140 million.The AD2000 movement uses terms such as “spy out the land and its inhabitants” to get an accurate complete picture of opportunities and challenges of India. They have coined the terms PLUG, PREM and NICE to describe their goals and methodology. PLUG refers to the target group. People in every language, urban center and geographic division. PREM refers to the techniques to use. Offering prayer, research must be done and utilized effectively on the target group, an evangelist must be the catalyst to provoke change and action and to encourage ministries and their efforts to convert non Christians. NICE refers to how the work is to be done. Networking, taking initiative when the movement is slowing down, using an evangelist to speed action in evangelizing and to encourage existing groups and cohorts in their efforts to convert people to Christianity. ( http://www.ad2000.org/uters3.htm )The Gospel For Christ and The Indian Missionary Association have put together books to help evangelists evangelize India. The evangelists are also using information from The Anthropological Society of India’s work on ethno-graphic studies which has been considered essential in facilitating the evangelism efforts. This has been used to such a degree that the diverse language groups of India have been divided into PIN codes. ( These are similar to ZIP codes in the USA that divide the country into mailing districts.) The ability to send evangelists that are familiar to language, culture, etc. greatly facilitates the speed at which evangelism is able to develop and is cost effective since tactics can be formed at the home base which saves costly mistakes in the field.ad2000 ( http://www.ad2000.org/uters2.htm ) The Christian Broadcasting Network has a splinter group that is called The Joshua Project. Their target is 2.2 billion people in 1685 groups that are divided into Affinity Blocks and Gateway Clusters. Affinity groups are groups of people who have bonding of language, religion, politics and culture. Usually there is one culture that is dominate in the block. People clusters are people that are closely related in name or culture so they are clustered together. These groups usually consist of populations of over one million. There goal is to have at least one hundred Christians or more in every group of over 10,000 people. Joshua Project ( http://www.ad2000.org/ )There are too many evangelist groups in India to cover in this article however; I will discuss a few of them to give a picture of how they proliferate.The Indian Prayer + Fellowship Association has a goal to reach all non Christians to start cell groups. They have contacted over 16,000 houses, made almost 900 home contacts and over 1700 personal contacts. Their goal is to start cell groups than attach a full gospel group or plant a church if needed.They also supply tracts, literature etc. Indian Prayer And Fellowship Association ( http://www.geocities.com/athens/troy )Partners International has the goal of training indigenous people to evangelize others. They are training a Christian who has converted to Christianity every 13 minutes. They claim planting a church every ten hours in Asia and Africa. ( http://www.partnersintl.org/aboutpi/welcome.html )The southern Baptists plan to have 4,700 southern Baptists working with millions of international partners. Their goal is to have 15,000 career missionaries, 50,000 volunteers, and 1,000 southern Baptist college grads every year. The length of service for the college grads is to be two years. ( Baptist Press 11/22/99)The evangelists strategy for North India includes treating Indian missions and Indian evangelists as equal considering that India has a strong GNP and a growing middle class. Due to the large population base the evangelists strategy includes dividing up the population base into smaller target groups such as women estimated to number 487 million or girls under 15 which is estimated to number 158 million. They plan to use literacy programs o target the illiterate which is estimated to be 48% of the population. They also plan to supply the Indian church with tools such as translators, humanitarian relief, etc. so the churches can become self sustaining and would not need outside assistance. ( http://www.gem-werc.org/mmrc9812.htm)The evangelists India outreach teams -hbi ministries international India provide schools, orphanages, medical centers etc. In a six week period outreach teams ministered to 19,000 children and taught Hindu and Muslim students in Christian schools. ( http://www.gospel.net/hbi/iot/ )Dr. Houtsma of World Outreach Ministries stated that he has helped train 160,000 national ministers to continue his work when he leaves. He is targeting Jammu, Vyara, Ludhiana, etc. ( http://www.wo.org/ )One of the variables in training indigenous missionaries is the decreased cost to support missionaries. A foreign missionary cost at least $66,000 a year to support. Native missionaries cost approximately $600 a year. This greatly decreases the cost of evangelizing. Christian Aid. ( http://www.christianaid.org/ )Native missionaries now do 90% of the work in starting churches. These people are more effective in converting people because They understand the language, customs, culture, etc. In addition recent converts are often more zealous in their efforts to convert people to their way of thinking. Hundreds of thousands of zealous converts can also have a sever profound influences on the political system that is in effect.The reader of this article should be aware of the fact that these students could be influenced toward Christianity by their teachers. In addition orphanages can be the breeding ground for future evangelists. In an orphanage children could be brainwashed and conditioned during school and after school. The children in an orphanage can have their social life controlled after school so they only socialize with evangelists. These children have no family or other people outside of the evangelists to look after their welfare so they can easily be programmed.It is interesting though sad to see the results that might occur as the evangelists enter their last stage of evangelism in India. You can see considerable backlash against evangelism as stated in the newspapers. Evangelists cry to the politicians, civil right groups and newspapers in the West.Some questions must be asked though. Do evangelists have the right to disrupt society, culture, religion, and the family of people in other countries? Do people have the right to combat the attack on the culture, etc. of their country?I would welcome any comments or feedback on this article.David KostinchukVISIT MY WEBSITE: PEOPLE UNITED FOR RELIGIOUS FREEDOMhttp://www3.mb.sympatico.ca/~dkost/index.htm

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26. August 2010 by admin.

Why Christian Concept of Secularism is meaningless in India?

The very idea of a secular form of government- with priestly authority separated from the affairs of the state- is relatively a recent development in Europe. But it is a practice of extremely long standing in India- going back to Vedic times. 

Brahmins in India have long been classified as Vaidika and Laukika. Vaidika Brahmins are those that are engaged in priestly duties, while Laukika Brahmins are those that are active in the secular professions like medicine, engineering, law, teaching and others.

More importantly, the texts used as guides for religious and secular activities have always been different. This is not the case in Islam in which the Quran is not only the prayer book, but also the law book. It is claimed to be the basis for Shariat - or Islamic Law.

We can see this distinction more clearly when we look at Hindu religious texts. Many devout hindus use the Vishnusahasranama or some other prayer book in the religious functions. But it has never been Dharmashastra and others authored by sages like Brihaspati, Manu, Gautama. Kautilya’s Arthshastra was a standard manual on adminsitration. None of these is considered a religious text, or ever used in religious ceremonies. We find a clear separation the religious and the secular.

This was even true in vedic times. The vedas and the Brahmanas are religious texts, but they were never used as law books. The guidelines for legal and adminsitrative duties were laid down in sutra works like Dharmasutras, Nyayasutras and others. Even among sutra works, there was separation into Grihya (household) and srauta (sacred).

This was so even in practice as we learn from from ancient literature. The famous vedic sage Vishwamitra was born into a royal family but wanted to be known as a vedic seer. He has to give up his kingdom and perform a long penancebefore he could gain recognition as one. The reverse was also true. In the case of emperor Bharata (son of Dusyant and Shakuntala) it was the opposite. Finding his owns sons unfit to rule, he adopted a son of vedi priestly family of Bharadvaja as his heir. It was this Bharadvaja’s son Vitatha who succeeded Bharat as King. But he was no longer recognized as a sage or priest.

This remained true even in historical times. The famous Madhava seer Jayatirtha (1440-88) was born into royal Deshpande family. But he had to give up his claim to royalty before being accepted as the head of the Madhava sect. The message is simple: one could not be both ruler and priest. Theocracy was out of the question - both in theory and in practice. It is well know that Gautama Buddha was born into a hindu royal family, but gave up his claims when he founded his religion. Same is the case with Vardhman Mahavir, who was also born into a hindu royal family but gave up his kingdom and later founded Jainism. 

Madhavachaerya, better known as Vidyaranya inspired the founding of the Vijayanagar Empire when Hinduism was facing its greatest crisis. Similarly, Ramdas inspired Shivaji. But neither Vidyaranya nor Ramdas sought any political power. 

Contrast this with the record of Ayatollah Khomeini, the spiritual leader of Iran.

This record of Hinduism should be compared to the history of Christianity (of medieval Europe) and Islam, and the ideology that underlies them. Both these religions are also theocracies. In Islam, Quran is not only the prayer book, it is also the law book. For the same reason, there is no clear separation between priestly and secular duties as there has been in Hinduism since time immemorial. The Islamic code of law - the so called Shariat- is based on the Quran which is also the prayerbook of Islam. Muslim clergy claim the right to interfere in the affairs of the stae in the name of religious duty.

The same was true of Medieval Christianity. Government as the secular arm of the church and therefore subject to priestly authority was a claim that was fully broken only by the disestablishment of religion in Europe following the French Revolution. In the United States, the First Amedment to the Constitution removed all influence of religion upon the government.

Seven hundred years ago Pope Boniface VIII has assereted his secular authority in the following words:

”Both swords, the spiritual and the material (or secular), are in the power of the Church. The Spiritual is wielded by the Church; the material for the Chruch. The one by the hand of the priest; the other by the hands of kings and knights at the will and sufferance of the priest.”

This is a clear statement of how the Church regarded the state as the “secular arm” of the Church. West broke the power of Church through secularization of the state. In Islamic countries this has still not happened. For this to happen these countries have to completely remove the influence of clergy - the mullahs- from the affairs of the state. Even in India, muslims have not let that happen, organizations like Muslim Personal Law Board are insisting on separate laws - laws that would be administered by the clergy. The same phenomenon is raising its head in Britain. Even in United States, there has been one at least one case of forced marriages of under-age Muslim girls against the law of the land. Blasphemy law has also been exercised by assassinating an Egyptian scholar living in Texas for expressing his dissenting views. In India, in the name of “Secularism” and “religious rights”, muslim religious leaders are demanding the right to function as a theocratic State with a State administered according to Islamic Law.

The reality is: as with Medieval Christianity, Islam even today regards secular authority as far more important than the spiritual content. More often than not the Muslim clergy have no spiritual vision to offer, being simply politicians in religious garb. God is simply the pretext used to extend and strengthen its power and influence in the temporal world. This is the characteristic of a theocracy rather than a true spiritual tradition. 

The question is what is the source of this theocratic ideology?

The simple answer is Monotheism/Exclusivism is the foundation of Theocracy.

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29. March 2010 by admin.

Catholicism in Peril

Courtsey: www.theatlanticwire.com

As Germany–the pope’s own homeland–continues to be rocked by allegations of priestly abuse, many are wondering how high the scandal will go–after all, Pope Benedict XVI himself, as archbishop of Munich, approved an abuser’s therapy treatment without reporting it to authorities, though he claims not to have known about the abuse. Meanwhile, the pope’s attempt to put out a similar fire in Ireland with a letter this past weekend is stirring mixed reactions.

All this has convinced some commentators that this controversy is different from the American abuse scandal. In fact, some have begun to ask whether the Vatican–and even Catholicism itself–will pass through unscathed. If so, will it still resemble the Catholic Church of old?

• Of Course It Will  In the National Review, George Weigel argues that those looking “to cripple the Catholic Church” have had that long-wielded “card of ‘cover-up’” taken away from them by the pope’s recent strongly-worded letter regarding the Irish abuse cases. He thinks it did the trick. But he’s not entirely free from worry: “Those who care for the Church, on the other hand, must now hope and pray that the follow-up from the Vatican is as vigorous and unsparing as the Pope’s letter.”

• Will the Pope Lose Ireland?  The editors of The Independent disagree somewhat with Weigel, noting that the pope didn’t apologize for the coverup. “But even at the level of apology the Pope has chosen, this pastoral letter may turn out to be the first of many he will have to write,” given the way abuse cases seem to be multiplying across different countries. “As the sex abuse scandal continues to unfold and tolerance is stretched to breaking, it is surely not fanciful to ask whether Ireland will still define itself as a Roman Catholic country within a generation.”

• ‘The Current Vatican’s Death Throes’  The Atlantic’s own Andrew Sullivan has been all over this one. He, too, finds spread of the scandal to Ireland–”Yes: Ireland“–noteworthy. He points out, as well, that if the German case follows the usual pattern, “the number of victims will grow,” and despite the Church blaming the stories on “anti-Catholic media … at some point, the whole grisly truth will come out.” The difference, he thinks, is that this time the current Pope is directly and personally implicated through his actions while a German bishop. And, frankly, Sullivan–a Catholic himself–is just fine with that:

Please: raping children is not a hard call for a Christian. Today or at any time in history. Covering it up is evil. If defending the perpetrators, rather than saving the victims, is not immoral, what is?So when will this Pope resign? And what happens to the church hierarchy’s moral authority if he doesn’t?

• It All Depends on the Coverup  National Catholic Reporter’s John Allen Jr. notes that “relatively few people know or care how far the Vatican, or the pope, have come over the past eight years”; while Benedict has revolutionized the Church’s response to priestly abuse, he has not similarly revolutionized the Church’s response to concealment of priestly abuse. To many, that’s “a job half done,” and “that … is what makes the revelations in Germany [about Benedict’s own actions with regard to abusers] so potentially damaging.” To wit:

if other cases of abusers who were reassigned emerge, even fair-minded people with no axe to grind may be tempted to ask: Can Benedict XVI credibly ride herd on bishops for failing to manage the crisis, if his own record as a diocesan leader isn’t any better?Much about the church’s capacity to craft an “exit strategy” from the crisis–and, perhaps, much about Benedict’s own legacy–may hinge on his ability to offer a convincing answer.

• The Fall of Catholicism in Europe?  “The Church has survived many, many dreadful things,” admits Newser’s Michael Wolff. “But not like this.” With Pope Benedict himself implicated, and his competence in crisis management in question, Wolff thinks history may begin to erode Catholicism’s remaining support structure. His point is that crisis in Europe is radically different from crisis in America:

The historical argument with Catholicism, an argument that has been going on for so many centuries, which the wily Church has defeated or circumvented or stonewalled or built mighty barricades against, is back on the table again.This time, the Church could very well lose it.

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