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Who’s afraid of conversions?

No conversion, only posing


The New Year witnessed some attacks on Christian churches in Chhattisgarh’s Narayanpur district. Religious conversion is said to be the reason. I came to know from a personal source that the problem started as a family feud and burgeoned into communal violence. Many such attacks on religious places happened in the past in India and many more will take place in future too. Because religion in this country is not about spirituality but about power and manipulations.

The most fundamental question that arises is whether we need religion at all. The answer is quite obvious. Very obvious to those who think clearly. If it is the spiritual meaning of life that you are seeking, religion may help but it is not the best means. Your personal enquiries and spiritual exercises will help you much better. Spirituality is a personal affair in the first place. Unless it touches your heart, it is not spirituality at all. Religion and its institutions may help you in the process of discovering and refining your heart. But the effort is all yours, absolutely personal. The hard truth is you don’t any institution for that. You need the will to do it. You need the courage to face your heart. The courage to face the god that resides in your heart.  And the demons as well – more than the god, in fact.

Secondly, is one religion better than another for your spiritual journey? I believe religion should be a purely personal choice. Though people often say that every religion teaches more or less the same things (to cultivate virtues and shun evil), I think religions have fundamental differences. The Semitic religions, for example, are quite different from most oriental religions like Hinduism in their theology, rituals and outlooks. It is possible that one Kamala Das finds Islam more spiritually satisfying than Hinduism and hence becomes Kamala Surayya. [Whether Islam made her any happier is a question worth probing. But this post is not about her.] A Javed Akhtar may be disillusioned with the same Islam and become an atheist. Religion should be a personal choice. Why should anyone, including the government (especially the government), interfere with people’s relationships with their gods?

Ideally, Caesar and God should remain separate, as Jesus implied. They have nothing to do with each other except that both survive on taxes extracted from people. In practice, however, governments are forced to put some reins on religions because the latter are seldom about spirituality. If we check the material assets of certain religious institutions, we will be shocked to discover that some of them can give Mukesh Ambani or Gautam Adani a run for their money. Mata Amritanandamayi’s assets, for example, are estimated to be 19 billion rupees. Baba Ramdev and Sri Sri Ravi Shankar have 15 billion rupees each. There are Christian congregations with similar material assets in India. Where there is money, there will be government’s presence too. Gods are not beyond taxes. Jesus was not totally right.

Government interference is not about taxes alone, however. Where there is so much wealth at play, there will be all sorts of manipulations. This is where conversions become controversies. Most religious conversions are not about spirituality at all. Look at the kind of people who get converted. They are the people living on the margins of societies. The poor and the downtrodden. The social outcasts. People unwanted even by government’s welfare schemes. Governments are not even aware of their existence, in fact. Such people are easy prey for religious gurus. God is their daily bread. Give them a bag of rice and they sell their gods. Who do you blame now? The government could give them more than that bag of rice, couldn’t it?  And save their gods! But the government will do no such thing. For the government, the poor are just fodder for electoral politics. The government knows that missionaries of all sorts will cast their nets for trapping the poor. And the poor like to be caught in those nets too because they get their rice bags or whatever. And then the government can make that an issue for getting more votes from one particular religious community. This is what religious conversion is all about in India. Quite a silly but cruel game.

PS. Written for Indispire Edition 433: Who's afraid of religious conversion? #ReligiousConversion

 

Comments

  1. DawnanddewJanuary 8, 2023 at 11:27 PM

    It's really difficult for people to convert to the religion of truth. Hence, the problem of conversion.
    Spirituality is absolutely personal. One should be daring to face both the God and the demon inside or within oneself. True yet very challenging.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalJanuary 9, 2023 at 5:14 AM

      Religions should start doing their job seriously. There's a joke about a man who stood on his balcony blessing all passers-by. On being questioned he said, 'Since the bishop is in my bedroom doing what I should be doing, here I am doing what he should be doing.' Today religion is doing anything other than what it should be.

      Delete
    2. DawnanddewJanuary 9, 2023 at 5:19 PM

      Well said!

      Delete
  2. Yamini MacLeanJanuary 8, 2023 at 11:50 PM

    Hari OM
    Well said, sir! Making one's own way to a particular faith structure or philosophy is one thing, being actively 'hunted' and 'flipped' is quite another. Every religion, at its highest knowledge base, does teach essentially the same thing. The problems arise when those who hold the knowledge also seek to convert that into power and filter it down throught doctrine - the dos and dont's of practice, the punishiments and shames lain upon one for failing to follow the instruction; and in this each religion may differ - yet are also the same. And most certainly, as political as religion can become, it ought to keep itself out of Politics! YAM xx

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalJanuary 9, 2023 at 5:16 AM

      If religions actually do what they should be doing, the world be a Paradise.

      Delete

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