Sorry for taking it back to that topic Bodhi, but I have another remark:
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->with object of popularizing Vedant/Yog philosophy to the westerns, had adopted the similar technique, as we notice in the strategy of the Christian missions in India. That is: avoid cultural conflicts, instead, utilize the prevalant symbols, language, social outlook, even appearances. <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->I understand then. For non-Indians to do it this way and in a western setting it makes sense. Because 30s America was essentially very christian, and christian society (even today) has certain norms. To fit Hindu religion in, it would have made sense for them to have taken on the external appearances of a recognised religion. I wouldn't have approved if Indian Hindus did this though.
But for the Christian Church to do this in India, where pluralism has always been the case, where diversity of worship has been respected and given complete freedom - it points only in one direction. And it's not innocent. The Catholic Church under the Portuguese expressly forbade all Hindu forms. The church has now not just allowed it, but is active in using it. They are <i>not</i> doing it for the innocent purposes of making the religion 'Indian' (then why latch onto particularly Hindu and Buddhist forms). The average Hindu is not going to like this, whereas we never had a problem with a western christian church, their candles, their robes, or liturgy in Latin (as was the case in the past). It's a foreign religion, and if it had returned our respect, it could have kept foreign expressions (like the Parsees did, for instance). And if they had been respectful, I'd have considered them no less Indian for being christian and for practising a foreign religion.
<b>EDIT:</b> But the christian church's congregation never grows when it and its members go about worshipping their chosen deity (non-existent or no) <i>quietly</i>. No one will be interested. That's why the church thrives on controversy, creating friction, creating sob tales of persecution: it has to be in your face. If Hindus don't do anything back, they will just turn up their annoyance a notch each time, so that eventually we have to notice. Same thing all over the world. For instance, the Buddhists in 16th century China didn't mind about the growing christoterrorist population there, until it affected their own lives and undermined them. The Buddhists in Vietnam didn't protest christianity until the christoterrorist government started discriminating against Buddhism. In India, inculturation is only one of the strategies the church uses to get christianity noticed. And it's helped by the government which wants christoislamism (or communism) to be our only other option after it has brainwashed us out of Hinduism.
If the christians in India and their church minded its own business (and stopped proselytising) there'd have been no problems, but they first (and still) insult our religion, denounce Samskritam as a language imposed by tyrants that has supposedly done irreparable harm to the 'Dravidians, Dalits, lower castes, tribals', and then they steal Samskritam terms and other Vedic things for use in their conversion strategy.
They negate these Hindu things in our own possession, and then steal it to make it theirs. It's now supposedly merely 'Indian', therefore it can be appropriated to become 'christian', part of some 'Indian christian' culture that never existed and can only become when they take Hinduism out of existence. Oh, and we're communalist for telling them to keep their hands off.
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->with object of popularizing Vedant/Yog philosophy to the westerns, had adopted the similar technique, as we notice in the strategy of the Christian missions in India. That is: avoid cultural conflicts, instead, utilize the prevalant symbols, language, social outlook, even appearances. <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->I understand then. For non-Indians to do it this way and in a western setting it makes sense. Because 30s America was essentially very christian, and christian society (even today) has certain norms. To fit Hindu religion in, it would have made sense for them to have taken on the external appearances of a recognised religion. I wouldn't have approved if Indian Hindus did this though.
But for the Christian Church to do this in India, where pluralism has always been the case, where diversity of worship has been respected and given complete freedom - it points only in one direction. And it's not innocent. The Catholic Church under the Portuguese expressly forbade all Hindu forms. The church has now not just allowed it, but is active in using it. They are <i>not</i> doing it for the innocent purposes of making the religion 'Indian' (then why latch onto particularly Hindu and Buddhist forms). The average Hindu is not going to like this, whereas we never had a problem with a western christian church, their candles, their robes, or liturgy in Latin (as was the case in the past). It's a foreign religion, and if it had returned our respect, it could have kept foreign expressions (like the Parsees did, for instance). And if they had been respectful, I'd have considered them no less Indian for being christian and for practising a foreign religion.
<b>EDIT:</b> But the christian church's congregation never grows when it and its members go about worshipping their chosen deity (non-existent or no) <i>quietly</i>. No one will be interested. That's why the church thrives on controversy, creating friction, creating sob tales of persecution: it has to be in your face. If Hindus don't do anything back, they will just turn up their annoyance a notch each time, so that eventually we have to notice. Same thing all over the world. For instance, the Buddhists in 16th century China didn't mind about the growing christoterrorist population there, until it affected their own lives and undermined them. The Buddhists in Vietnam didn't protest christianity until the christoterrorist government started discriminating against Buddhism. In India, inculturation is only one of the strategies the church uses to get christianity noticed. And it's helped by the government which wants christoislamism (or communism) to be our only other option after it has brainwashed us out of Hinduism.
If the christians in India and their church minded its own business (and stopped proselytising) there'd have been no problems, but they first (and still) insult our religion, denounce Samskritam as a language imposed by tyrants that has supposedly done irreparable harm to the 'Dravidians, Dalits, lower castes, tribals', and then they steal Samskritam terms and other Vedic things for use in their conversion strategy.
They negate these Hindu things in our own possession, and then steal it to make it theirs. It's now supposedly merely 'Indian', therefore it can be appropriated to become 'christian', part of some 'Indian christian' culture that never existed and can only become when they take Hinduism out of existence. Oh, and we're communalist for telling them to keep their hands off.