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My hypocrisy and a little more

 


Some days have begun to look utterly washed out. When the current pandemic broke out, there was the hope that it would be brought under control soon. Our medical science is so advanced, isn’t it? When the first wave gave way to the second, I hoped it was sort of an anticlimax, one of those many cruel jokes that life loves to play and jokes don’t last long. But it hasn’t ended with the second wave either.

Life is slipping out like the effluence from a drab industry.

The weekend travels came to an end long ago. Too many books and too much TV have begun to taste sour. The online classes are threatening to get into a mundane rut. The mind refuses to think sometimes. Dreams died a pretty while ago without even leaving traces.

It’s then someone from the parish church called on Sunday, as part of a survey, to ask what my opinion was about rebuilding the chapel [kurisupalli] of the parish. I didn’t want to be asked such opinions since I hardly associate myself with religions. I told the caller that I had nothing to do with it and added that I didn’t know why the chapel required to be reconstructed now in the time of a pandemic and what purpose it really served even otherwise.

When the road was rebuilt recently the chapel got on the wrong side. Now its back faces the road. So the parish wants to reconstruct it facing the road.

Maggie was listening to the phone conversation and requested me to agree to make a contribution and leave the discussion. I thought that wise too and the conversation came to an abrupt end.

A lot of things come to such compromising ends in my life because I don’t want to look like a gargoyle on the edifices built by the people around me. It’s better to surrender certain of your convictions for the sake of peace of mind.

That may sound cowardly. It isn’t, however, if you think beyond the bravado of the street bully. As a friend counselled me many years ago, in a world which couldn’t be bettered by god’s incarnations those who think differently from the majority are absolutely helpless. As long as the affairs don’t touch your personal life, leave them alone. The chapel had nothing to do with my personal life. I choose to leave it alone.

These days the entire Catholic church in Kerala is grappling with a new controversy. Some of the bishops want the priests to face the faithful during the Mass in the churches and some don’t. The final decision was taken by a Synod of the bishops and the faction that didn’t like the decision protested by preventing the decision being read out in churches as well as attacking certain priests and/or burning the concerned document outside the churches.

I was reminded of an apocryphal anecdote about the Russian Orthodox Church. When the Revolution was raging in the country, the Bishops of the Church were engaged in a drawn-out debate on the colour of the vestments to be used for religious ceremonies. The Church was not touched by the disquiet among its people.

Now when a pandemic is raging in the state of Kerala, the church here is fighting on the direction that the priest should face while celebrating the Mass. And my parish is asking from people contributions for constructing a chapel which is facing the wrong direction.

I’ll make a contribution too. It’s utter hypocrisy, I know. But I prefer peace of mind to taking up issues with certain groups of people.

What really worries me is not my hypocrisy but the inability of my blood to cool in spite of the grey hairs on my head.  

Comments

  1. Yamini MacLeanSeptember 7, 2021 at 7:49 PM

    Hari OM
    The inanity of the arguments you describe, does indeed smack of 'ivory towers' and a total lack of awareness of the social situation currently playing out. Then there is your own natural antipathy to stir the pot. The world thrives on compromise and we must not be angry about that - or ourselves for having to make it. This is not hypocrisy, which would indicate falsehood on your part. That was not the case. You stated your view, but agreed to contribute without commitment to anything further. Done.

    ...If approached myself to give to a project I knew to be run by a group of which I disapproved, (and this has happened), I quite simply state that I am unable to support them. No engagement in why's or wherefores. Unless I actually think I will be listened to and a proper debate can take place. But mostly such callers have no intention (or indeed, ability) to enter discourse. So a simple "No and please do not call again" is what such as these get from me. Then again, I have no social standing to protect... YAM xx

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalSeptember 8, 2021 at 7:40 AM

      You perceived it accurately. It's not hypocrisy. I know that too in the sense for me it's not hypocrisy. Others are likely to see it as such. That doesn't really matter. I can't make such people understand anything. That's the real problem. A desire to be understood better and the impossibility of fulfilling that desire.

      I can't make a blunt statement about certain things to certain people for various reasons. For one, I live in a village where everyone knows everyone else and compromises are inevitable for the social network to remain intact. Secondly, my wife is a devout Catholic for whom the church and its affairs matter much.

      Delete

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