The boyfriend and I were just hanging out on my couch and watching old TV episodes when there was a knock on my door.
Two young men were there to talk to me about their new hope church. They were friendly and polite and we chatted about my dog for a moment.
They had a survey to ask people about their beliefs. Maybe some days I would be in the mood to go through that, but this is a sunny, beautiful day and the boyfriend and I are enjoying our time together.
So I told the guys that I was Hindu and not interested in church.
"Oh," one said, undeterred, "That's important for us to know."
"Would you mind telling us about your beliefs?" The other asked.
Again, maybe sometimes I might have the energy for that. But really I don't feel like putting in a lot of effort to explain Hinduism to people who are strongly biased against it.
As friendly as they are, and as much as they like to tell themselves that they are open minded, they aren't. They already know the answer and the only reason they want to hear my beliefs is so they can find ways to tear holes in them.
I'm not much of a debater and these conversations always leave me feeling drained and discouraged and they go back to being the same Christians they were before the discussion and I go back to being the same Hindu I was. No convincing is going to take place here.
The only thing that telling them my beliefs would change is that it would give them knowledge about Hinduism that they could use to develop ammunition to try to convert other Hindus.
I knew a Christian girl in college who encouraged her Christian group to attend a dinner that the Muslim Student Association was holding (they were doing the dinner as a way for people to get to know more about Islam, in a spirit of peace, so we could all get along). This girl told people to go to learn about Islam so that they could learn how to better proselytize them to Christianity. She was a sweet girl, but what a disgusting thing to do!
Watch this incredibly irritating video of two ignorant Christian girls trying to convince their "friend" Saraswati that she's going to hell:
I don't know why Saraswati continued to talk with these girls, but I have no interest in subjecting myself to this kind of thing :)
Hi, Aamba
ReplyDeleteWow...This video wants to make me choke those girls.
I am a Christian, but these girls are the exact people who put a bad name to our faith. From Kindergarten-12th grade I went to a very conservative church school and this exactly how they acted. I love my faith but I have also come to realize that I love people too. I realized that I could not go through life preaching and trying to convert people or else I would miss out on some really great relationships. Although I am not Hindu, I have come to love and respect what I do know about it. Don't let ignorant people like that bother you because in the end you are better then them.
Hope you are enjoying the rest of your weekend
overzealous proselytization (read mass conversion) - mainly by some christian churches (and unfortunately funded mostly by their american counterpart) is creating a lot of problems in some parts of india , directly and indirectly.
ReplyDeleteif one believes the mainstream indian media (which is not at all anti-christian or pro-hindu) proletarianization often involves in a kind of blackmail, bribing and abusing other religions, mostly hindusim.
and this led to riots by extremist hindus ,where poor christians faced the burnt.
- basu
ps: your story reminds me of "letting go of god " by julia sweeney.
I don't think this video is real. It seems to be a parody. Its hard to tell from this video alone, but judging from the other videos on the original uploader's channel, they seem to be going for comedy.
ReplyDeleteI hope the video isn't real, but it seems all too real to me. I've seen this sort of thing. I think I also got it from a third party, as the girl herself who made the video didn't label it "two dumb Christian girls.."! This video is all over YouTube.
ReplyDeleteI read a new story once about Christian conversion efforts in India. A Christian woman was taking a bunch of kids on a sort-of field trip and she rigged the bus to break down. When it did, she told the kids to pray to their gods to fix it. Then she had her co-hort secretly fix the bus and told the kids to pray again to Jesus. Oh look, that fixed the bus. Jesus is the only real god, blah, blah, blah. Why people who have "the truth" would resort to trickery like that I can't even imagine.
And I hate to criticize Christians because I have Christian friends and I know nice Christian people. The trouble is, the narrow-minded ones are giving everyone a bad name.
I said recently on my Facebook that I think evangelical Christians could really benefit from taking a break from the converting and focusing on repairing their image. I think the people who really wanted to convert and want Christianity would then feel comfortable going to them and no one would be forced.
The Himalayan Academy has the somewhat elaborate conversion process I recently highlighted specifically so that people are not coerced into changing religions. It would be awesome if all religions adopted this "ethical conversion" model.
I'm sorry to my Christian friends, but to me Christianity is like a plague. It spreads, infects, and makes the world a less tolerant and pleasant place to be.
The video was amusing...if true, let's just say that the overwhelming ignorance leaking out of uninformed brains was probably bigger than the BP oil spill.
ReplyDeleteHere's a real story, a firsthand account, in which I was involved. I was traveling in a train in India and got drawn into a conversation with a fellow passenger who happened to be Pentecostal Christian. After the obligatory pleasantries on how non-believers would dry-roast in hell, he urged me to educate myself on the true path and he handed me some pamphlets. It was past lunch and since I had already had mine, I asked him if he had. He answered that he hadn't and added, "God will provide". I waited for another 15 minutes to see if I would be a witness to a miracle. No dice. He pulled out a lunch box from his bag and started eating something. When he saw the bemused look on my face, he said, “God works in mysterious ways”.
Great story, Arvind! Hilarious!
ReplyDeleteThe video is faked. The original version is by a user called "youlovemolly" and all those videos are what amounted to an effective troll on Hindus and Christians alike.
ReplyDeleteI hope you're right. Maybe it isn't to this extent, but things like this are happening.
ReplyDeleteI just got ANOTHER knock on my door from some Jesus freak from Peru who doesn't speak English. Had a really hard time getting rid of him.
I'm seriously irritated now. I really want to put a huge sign on my door saying "Not interested in your religion, leave me alone."
It's stuff like this that makes me Hate Christianity.