<!--QuoteBegin-Bodhi+Oct 5 2007, 08:28 PM-->QUOTE(Bodhi @ Oct 5 2007, 08:28 PM)<!--QuoteEBegin-->So what we do want to fight against is the christoterrorism as you rightly say, but certainly we can not generalize the whole Indian Christian community into being a supporter of it - which it is not.
[right][snapback]73920[/snapback][/right]<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->I was indulging in some wishful thinking - it's all tangentially related to something Raju Thomas had threatened with: I was hoping US would give free visas to all those in India who had converted to christianity. But as I said, that wouldn't solve the problem of christianity trying to convert India. Besides, it was entirely unrealistic.
Christianity the religion is the problem, just like islam is the problem. There are many good people of the christian religion - but, like with muslims, it is only because these individuals are guided by their conscience (instead of their religion) which makes them tolerant of others. But when their religion guides its followers, you cannot distinguish between a christian and a muslim anymore: the faithful of both are the same, because they are then guided by the same intolerant principles.
In the Indian christian population - again, same as with muslims - the parents may be good, but the children may start following their religion properly. At which point they become True Christians, like:
- Europe Middle-Ages:
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->"Unbelievers deserve not only to be separated from the Church, but also... to be exterminated from the World by death."
-- Saint Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, 1271<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->Cue the tortures and burnings of people.
- Korea, our times (in the wake of the christian vandalism of S Korean Buddhist treasures):<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->"If I acted on what I believed I, too, could have vandalized temples. When I consider those who commit such acts I think to myself that they have a much stronger faith than me."
-- Deacon Lee Bahn-Sung "a former Buddhist turned Christian", BBC-World (TV), Asia Today, May 21, 1999. [Link]<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->This is inexcusable. We can't afford to be blinded so much that we do not identify the ideology that incites these people to become so inhumane.
So long as they are a minority, large numbers of christians may still continue to think as individuals, and significant numbers of them will or may try to get along. But when they are in the majority it will be like the NE. And the same is true when they are in power (as they are now): the unconverted always feel it when christians are in charge in non-christian lands. (Example, Vietnam during the Vietnam war period.)
To ignore the real terror of <i>christianity</i> - by excusing it by pointing to some good individuals as 'examples' of how the religion in itself *cannot* be bad - is a fallacy and is not going to stop the same old consequences that befell every other people overtaken by the scary ideology.
Christians who have befriended you ('the Hindu heathen') are not christian at all (but that's wholly to their credit): "Do not be unequally yoked" is something that keeps even christian denominations apart, what to speak of friendship with an unsaved unsaveable?
Where do you think santa Thomas Aquinas - Doctor of the church (that is, considered a great theologian by the church itself) - got that "unbelievers deserve to be exterminated from the world by death" from? The bible. "Thou shalt have no Gods before me" (and not suffer any others to have them either - which you'll know if you read the gory genocides in that book which have long served as the terrible examples for those of the faithful who tolerated other religionists....).
BTW, perhaps I was not clear in my use of the term, but 'christoterrorism' is my name for the religion of christianity/christianism. It is not some imaginary subsection of christianity I have thus dubbed. It's like how I don't believe in some 'Radical/terrorist islam'. Islam <i>is</i> radical terrorism and christianity is too. People are not born terrorists. Their beliefs and principles make them so.
Throughout history and in every nation where it has spread, christianism (and islam) have hurt the indigenous cultures and committed unmentionable crimes against other humans. To excuse the religion while blaming the followers is too much (too much naivety and too great an insult to basic human decency), and it will mean the actual problem will be allowed to plague humanity forever. The unconverted's difficulty had generally been identifying the problem. But having identified it, one can't delude oneself into thinking the infected is at fault when the mind-virus is what's actually to blame. (But why care for the sensitivity of an ideology? It won't be offended. Though eluding identification-as-the-true-culprit is part of the clever defense-mechanism of intolerant ideologies. That's what keeps the mind-viruses/memes going strong.)
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->i do know many christians, probably minority, but still quite visible, who are very much against christian-ism.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->I don't know how christians can be against their own religion? Not sure what you mean. I know two <i>formerly</i> christian atheists who are anti-christian, one of them very much so.
These christians you know can be compared to the case of Abdul Kalam and others. That is, they are just good persons and see good and take what is good. I have no fears of good people and I am grateful for them.
I have fears - valid fears - of evil <i>ideologies</i>, especially when these ideologies start wielding influence over people who are not naturally conscientious but are always in need of external guidance. And most of the human population falls under that category. When the external guidance they accept is an evil ideology, the result is terrorism. People need to be shielded from christoislamism. And the only way they can be, is to know the truth about these religions.
As for my wishful thinking (on Indian christians emigrating to US shores) it was entirely in the hope that the intended future-splitting of India into various strife-ridden miniature 'Nagalands-for-christ' won't happen. But while we keep excusing christianity, ignoring the reality of that religion's record - including its current one in the NE and even closer to one's own home - it means we've learnt nothing and the same thing will happen everywhere else.
Ignorance would be bad in itself, but <i>knowing</i> christianity I can't afford to defend or ignore what it is merely because there are an X number of good people who <i>imagine</i> they are proper followers of that religion. Besides, that would mean I condone what that religion did to the native North Americans, Goans and others who died miserably at the hands of christianism. And that is in all ways unacceptable. It is dreadfully injuring to their memory when we allow their killer (christianity) to go scott-free (let alone be well-spoken of!). And if I were to do that, I deserve no better than their fate. While I was ignorant of the facts concerning the religion I could do that, but not now.
The only solution to christoislamism is education: educating Hindus and others on why it is to be avoided, and also leading christians and muslims to learn the truth about the religion they've somehow entered into.
[right][snapback]73920[/snapback][/right]<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->I was indulging in some wishful thinking - it's all tangentially related to something Raju Thomas had threatened with: I was hoping US would give free visas to all those in India who had converted to christianity. But as I said, that wouldn't solve the problem of christianity trying to convert India. Besides, it was entirely unrealistic.
Christianity the religion is the problem, just like islam is the problem. There are many good people of the christian religion - but, like with muslims, it is only because these individuals are guided by their conscience (instead of their religion) which makes them tolerant of others. But when their religion guides its followers, you cannot distinguish between a christian and a muslim anymore: the faithful of both are the same, because they are then guided by the same intolerant principles.
In the Indian christian population - again, same as with muslims - the parents may be good, but the children may start following their religion properly. At which point they become True Christians, like:
- Europe Middle-Ages:
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->"Unbelievers deserve not only to be separated from the Church, but also... to be exterminated from the World by death."
-- Saint Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, 1271<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->Cue the tortures and burnings of people.
- Korea, our times (in the wake of the christian vandalism of S Korean Buddhist treasures):<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->"If I acted on what I believed I, too, could have vandalized temples. When I consider those who commit such acts I think to myself that they have a much stronger faith than me."
-- Deacon Lee Bahn-Sung "a former Buddhist turned Christian", BBC-World (TV), Asia Today, May 21, 1999. [Link]<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->This is inexcusable. We can't afford to be blinded so much that we do not identify the ideology that incites these people to become so inhumane.
So long as they are a minority, large numbers of christians may still continue to think as individuals, and significant numbers of them will or may try to get along. But when they are in the majority it will be like the NE. And the same is true when they are in power (as they are now): the unconverted always feel it when christians are in charge in non-christian lands. (Example, Vietnam during the Vietnam war period.)
To ignore the real terror of <i>christianity</i> - by excusing it by pointing to some good individuals as 'examples' of how the religion in itself *cannot* be bad - is a fallacy and is not going to stop the same old consequences that befell every other people overtaken by the scary ideology.
Christians who have befriended you ('the Hindu heathen') are not christian at all (but that's wholly to their credit): "Do not be unequally yoked" is something that keeps even christian denominations apart, what to speak of friendship with an unsaved unsaveable?
Where do you think santa Thomas Aquinas - Doctor of the church (that is, considered a great theologian by the church itself) - got that "unbelievers deserve to be exterminated from the world by death" from? The bible. "Thou shalt have no Gods before me" (and not suffer any others to have them either - which you'll know if you read the gory genocides in that book which have long served as the terrible examples for those of the faithful who tolerated other religionists....).
BTW, perhaps I was not clear in my use of the term, but 'christoterrorism' is my name for the religion of christianity/christianism. It is not some imaginary subsection of christianity I have thus dubbed. It's like how I don't believe in some 'Radical/terrorist islam'. Islam <i>is</i> radical terrorism and christianity is too. People are not born terrorists. Their beliefs and principles make them so.
Throughout history and in every nation where it has spread, christianism (and islam) have hurt the indigenous cultures and committed unmentionable crimes against other humans. To excuse the religion while blaming the followers is too much (too much naivety and too great an insult to basic human decency), and it will mean the actual problem will be allowed to plague humanity forever. The unconverted's difficulty had generally been identifying the problem. But having identified it, one can't delude oneself into thinking the infected is at fault when the mind-virus is what's actually to blame. (But why care for the sensitivity of an ideology? It won't be offended. Though eluding identification-as-the-true-culprit is part of the clever defense-mechanism of intolerant ideologies. That's what keeps the mind-viruses/memes going strong.)
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->i do know many christians, probably minority, but still quite visible, who are very much against christian-ism.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->I don't know how christians can be against their own religion? Not sure what you mean. I know two <i>formerly</i> christian atheists who are anti-christian, one of them very much so.
These christians you know can be compared to the case of Abdul Kalam and others. That is, they are just good persons and see good and take what is good. I have no fears of good people and I am grateful for them.
I have fears - valid fears - of evil <i>ideologies</i>, especially when these ideologies start wielding influence over people who are not naturally conscientious but are always in need of external guidance. And most of the human population falls under that category. When the external guidance they accept is an evil ideology, the result is terrorism. People need to be shielded from christoislamism. And the only way they can be, is to know the truth about these religions.
As for my wishful thinking (on Indian christians emigrating to US shores) it was entirely in the hope that the intended future-splitting of India into various strife-ridden miniature 'Nagalands-for-christ' won't happen. But while we keep excusing christianity, ignoring the reality of that religion's record - including its current one in the NE and even closer to one's own home - it means we've learnt nothing and the same thing will happen everywhere else.
Ignorance would be bad in itself, but <i>knowing</i> christianity I can't afford to defend or ignore what it is merely because there are an X number of good people who <i>imagine</i> they are proper followers of that religion. Besides, that would mean I condone what that religion did to the native North Americans, Goans and others who died miserably at the hands of christianism. And that is in all ways unacceptable. It is dreadfully injuring to their memory when we allow their killer (christianity) to go scott-free (let alone be well-spoken of!). And if I were to do that, I deserve no better than their fate. While I was ignorant of the facts concerning the religion I could do that, but not now.
The only solution to christoislamism is education: educating Hindus and others on why it is to be avoided, and also leading christians and muslims to learn the truth about the religion they've somehow entered into.