Skip to main content

Insanity of Religion

 

Catholics protesting Muslim protest (New Indian Express)

A century and a quarter ago, Swami Vivekananda described Kerala as a madhouse. The inhuman horrors perpetrated in the name of religious castes prompted the sage to use that analogy. The people of Kerala were openminded enough to listen to the verdict passed by a voice of sanity. Swami Vivekananda led Kerala to introspection and subsequent reformation. The brutalities of religion gave way to the humaneness of a new civilisation in Kerala.

It is this same Kerala that stands on the brink of a communal clash now because of a thoughtless statement made by a bishop. The Muslims took out a protest march to the Bishop’s House a day after the puerile statement was made by the bishop. The Muslim ire was understandable. No one will like to hear his entire community being labelled as terrorists and criminals because of a minority of such people in the community.

A day after the Muslim rally, the Catholics in the area took out a procession against the Muslims. There was even an order issued to the Catholics of Kottayam district to shun Muslim establishments like shops. How low has Kerala fallen!

Didn’t the bishop know that his statement would eventually lead to a conflagration in the state? He should have known. Otherwise he doesn’t deserve to be in that position. He knew. He is a scholarly person who knows this and a lot, lot more. Then why did he make such an utterance? Whose agenda is he promoting?

The only party that stands to gain by making the Christians and Muslims in Kerala fight each other is the BJP. Is the Catholic Church in Kerala playing into the hands of the BJP? If yes, for what?

There are many answers coming up from various sections of Kerala’s people. Kerala’s church is an abominably corrupt institution and it now faces the threat of being exposed by the dreamers of a Hindu Rashtra and hence it is of existential importance to keep the BJP in good humour. Then there are supplementary reasons galore. The Catholics in Kerala, like many Christians elsewhere, are jittery about the attacks on churches in some parts of the Muslim world by extremists. There is also a strong feeling in Kerala, not without reason, that a lot of the state’s beneficiary schemes favour the Muslims because of certain skewed policies which were made earlier by vote bank politics.

There are errors that need to be rectified, no doubt. But lighting a match near an ammunition heap is not a solution. And the bishop did just that. Maybe he stands to gain something from the BJP as knowledgeable people say. But he should have thought of the thousands of Keralites working in Muslim countries and sustaining the state’s economy. He should definitely have thought of the communal poison that his statement would sow in the soil of Kerala which for a long time now has been reputed for its communal harmony.

Let me conclude this with 15th-century poet Kabir’s lines:

What good is it if the scholar pores over words and point of this and that but his chest is not soaked dark with love?

What good is it if the ascetic clothes himself in saffron robes but is colourless within?

What good is it if you scrub your ethical behaviour till it shines, but there is no music inside?

Previous post: God’s Terrorists

 

Comments

  1. Yamini MacLeanSeptember 13, 2021 at 6:51 PM

    Hari OM
    an excellent addition to yesterday's post... those in power are rare indeed if they are not corrupted by it to some degree - this includes in the religious sense as much as the political. Kabir's words are so apt. YAM xx

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalSeptember 13, 2021 at 7:06 PM

      Thank you, Yamini. Sometimes you are the only consolation in this space...

      Delete
  2. parwatisingariSeptember 14, 2021 at 1:52 PM

    Tomichan you again bring it to the point. Yes BJP stands to gain. BJP is an association of traders. Their product one is "Hindutva" Product 2 Muslim bashing. So we do not know which product the Bishop bought. The Hadiya case was trying out the product2 which fell flat.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalSeptember 14, 2021 at 5:15 PM

      The bishop won't buy either Hindutva or Muslim-bashing. It's probably something else like saving the Church from raids.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Adventures of Toto as a comic strip

  'The Adventures of Toto' is an amusing story by Ruskin Bond. It is prescribed as a lesson in CBSE's English course for class 9. Maggie asked her students to do a project on some of the lessons and Femi George's work is what I would like to present here. Femi converted the story into a beautiful comic strip. Her work will speak for itself and let me present it below.  Femi George Student of Carmel Public School, Vazhakulam, Kerala Similar post: The Little Girl
47 comments
Read more

The Art of Subjugation: A Case Study

Two Pulaya women, 1926 [Courtesy Mathrubhumi ] The Pulaya and Paraya communities were the original landowners in Kerala until the Brahmins arrived from the North with their religion and gods. They did not own the land individually; the lands belonged to the tribes. Then in the 8 th – 10 th centuries CE, the Brahmins known as Namboothiris in Kerala arrived and deceived the Pulayas and Parayas lock, stock, and barrel. With the help of religion. The Namboothiris proclaimed themselves the custodians of all wealth by divine mandate. They possessed the Vedic and Sanskrit mantras and tantras to prove their claims. The aboriginal people of Kerala couldn’t make head or tail of concepts such as Brahmadeya (land donated to Brahmins becoming sacred land) or Manu’s injunctions such as: “Land given to a Brahmin should never be taken back” [8.410] or “A king who confiscates land from Brahmins incurs sin” [8.394]. The Brahmins came, claimed certain powers given by the gods, and started exploi...
16 comments
Read more

The music of an ageing man

Having entered the latter half of my sixties, I view each day as a bonus. People much younger become obituaries these days around me. That awareness helps me to sober down in spite of the youthful rush of blood in my indignant veins. Age hasn’t withered my indignation against injustice, fraudulence, and blatant human folly, much as I would like to withdraw from the ringside and watch the pugilism from a balcony seat with mellowed amusement. But my genes rage against my will. The one who warned me in my folly-ridden youth to be wary of my (anyone’s, for that matter) destiny-shaping character was farsighted. I failed to subdue the rages of my veins. I still fail. That’s how some people are, I console myself. So, at the crossroads of my sixties, I confess to a dismal lack of emotional maturity that should rightfully belong to my age. The problem is that the sociopolitical reality around me doesn’t help anyway to soothe my nerves. On the contrary, that reality is almost entirely re...
14 comments
Read more

Duryodhana Returns

Duryodhana was bored of his centuries-long exile in Mythland and decided to return to his former kingdom. Arnab Gau-Swami had declared Bihar the new Kurukshetra and so Duryodhana chose Bihar for his adventure. And Bihar did entertain him with its modern enactment of the Mahabharata. Alliances broke, cousins pulled down each other, kings switched sides without shame, and advisers looked like modern-day Shakunis with laptops. Duryodhana’s curiosity was more than piqued. There’s more masala here than in the old Hastinapura. He decided to make a deep study of this politics so that he could conclusively prove that he was not a villain but a misunderstood statesman ahead of his time. The first lesson he learns is that everyone should claim that they are the Pandavas, and portray everyone else as the Kauravas. Every party claims they stand for dharma, the people, and justice. And then plot to topple someone, eliminate someone else, distort history, fabricate expedient truths, manipulate...
14 comments
Read more

The Little Girl

The Little Girl is a short story by Katherine Mansfield given in the class 9 English course of NCERT. Maggie gave an assignment to her students based on the story and one of her students, Athena Baby Sabu, presented a brilliant job. She converted the story into a delightful comic strip. Mansfield tells the story of Kezia who is the eponymous little girl. Kezia is scared of her father who wields a lot of control on the entire family. She is punished severely for an unwitting mistake which makes her even more scared of her father. Her grandmother is fond of her and is her emotional succour. The grandmother is away from home one day with Kezia's mother who is hospitalised. Kezia gets her usual nightmare and is terrified. There is no one at home to console her except her father from whom she does not expect any consolation. But the father rises to the occasion and lets the little girl sleep beside him that night. She rests her head on her father's chest and can feel his heart...
19 comments
Read more