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A dozen or so people straggled onto the stage. ‘Now close your eyes’, the man said, ‘and I shall pray in the name of our Lord’. He placed his hands on their heads in turn, muttering to himself, and shortly after asked them to open their eyes. He turned to the first person in the row, an old man, who, by the look of it, was an impoverished Tamil Dalit, and asked him what his problem was. The old man told him, through a translator, that he could hardly see. The evangelist asked him if he had been cured, but before the man could answer, he declared, much to the mirth of the audience below, ‘Hallelujah! This old man has been cured! And all in the name of Jesus, the God of power’. The other people on the stage stood there, presumably all as ailing as before, and they, along with the old man, were then escorted down from the stage. Meanwhile, the evangelist congratulated himself for supposedly curing the old man of his blindness through the power of his prayer, much to the amazement of the wonder-struck audience.
Having read about the ‘miraculous cures’ and other such hoax performances of Benny Hinn and his ilk, I decided to investigate matters for myself. I walked up to the old man as he settled in his seat and sat down next to him. He told me that he was a Hindu, not a Christian, and that he had come to the meeting on hearing that the visiting white evangelists apparently had the miraculous capacity of curing ailments. He was half-blind in his left eye, he said, and had no money to go to a hospital. He looked plainly worried. He did not know what to do now, he said, as the prayers of the evangelist had had no effect and his vision was as blurred as before.
Why, then, I asked him, did he not protest when the evangelist claimed that he had cured him on stage?
'No, sir, I didn’t know what the Sahib was saying, so how could I answer him’, he pathetically replied, his eyes filling with tears.
He handed me a card that he had been given while coming down the stage. It bore the name of a certain Pentecostal church, and, he told me, he had been instructed to come to the church later if he wanted to be cured.
Shortly after this display of miraculous hoaxes, the event gave over. The evangelist team walked down the stage, heartily welcomed by the crowd below. By their looks, almost all of them seemed to be impoverished Tamil Dalits. They related to the evangelists their various sicknesses and ailments, and begged them to pray for them to be cured. An old Dalit woman, tears rolling down her cheeks, explained to one of the German women that her left foot had been paralysed for many years. The evangelist fell at her feet and gently massaged it, and muttered a prayer in guttural German. She then clutched the old woman’s face in her arms, planted a kiss on her forehead and loudly announced for the benefit of the crowd that had gathered around her, ‘You will be cured, don’t worry, in the name of Jesus. Take Jesus’ name and you will be okay. Remember, the name is Jesus, Jesus, Jesus’. The old woman appeared to understand nothing of what the white woman told her, except for the name of Jesus, which, as far as the evangelist was concerned, was probably good and adequate enough. The woman’s foot, of course, remained unhealed, but she was assured that if she reposed her faith in Jesus, all would be well one day.
The three other Germans, I noticed, were busying themselves in precisely the same way with the people who had gathered around them in the hope of being healed. Then, when their task was over—announcing the name of Jesus—and leaving the crowd without, of course, performing any miraculous cure, they packed themselves into their fancy air-conditioned vehicles and sped away, while the crowd made its way into the slum outside.
As I write these lines, I think of the enormous clout of Western Christian evangelicals, who, like these Germans I had encountered, worship what they call the ‘God of power’, a god that brooks no rivals. Their militaristic, indeed fascist, form of Christianity alone, they are convinced, is the only way to salvation. As they see it, all other religions are bad, if not Satanic, and their adherents are doomed to eternal perdition in hell. Today, Christian evangelicals are well ensconced in power in the United States, and, patronized by Bush, have a well-organised agenda of world conquest. They are among the fiercest backers of Bush’s imperialist wars, and, as numerous scholars have uncovered, have had a long history of serving Western imperialist designs and combating progressive movements that seek to challenge Western domination in the so-called ‘Third World’. They represent a dangerous form of contemporary white Western racism, carrying on in the colonial missionary tradition that brought together the Bible and the gun in an unholy pact to win the world for Christ and Empire.
Fundamentalist Christian evangelical organizations are now increasingly active in India, and, with their aggressive rhetoric and fierce intolerance of other religions, pose a grave danger to inter-communal relations. While freedom to propagate religion is a fundamental right of all Indian citizens, surely this right does not extend to foreign nationals, especially to those who have no regard at all for the religious sensitivities and beliefs of the vast majority of the people of this country. This calls for an immediate ban on foreign evangelists, no matter what their religious affiliations, who would probably better serve the cause of the religion they champion in their own countries, where churches are empty and religion is almost extinct.
Allah Knows Best,Peace Yall.... |
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Imperialism era is coming back.....watch out for those who disguising under religions name!!!
http://www.christianaggression.o ... S&id=1110917956
The Evangelical Challenge: A New Face of Western Imperialism
Posted March 15, 2005
Yoginder Sikand
Some months ago I wrote an article on western Christian evangelical groups active in various Muslim countries, pointing out how many of them were actively working for promoting the strategic interests of Western governments, particularly the United States. I had been careful to buttress my arguments with ample quotations from Christian sources themselves so as not to appear to be making any unsubstantiated claims. I sent the article to several Muslim magazines, websites and Internet discussion groups, expecting it to raise some discussion of the issue in Muslim circles. To my surprise, while almost no Muslim readers got back to me about the article, I received several letters and emails from angry Christian evangelicals, almost all of them American and working among Muslim communities in South Asia, protesting that I had unfairly tarnished their image. Yes, they admitted, they did believe that the way to heaven was through Jesus alone. Without accepting him as ‘personal saviour’, they stressed, no one could hope to escape eternal damnation in hell. But, they protested, despite their firm faith in the exclusiveness of Christianity, they were engaged in doing ‘good’ for the Muslims they were working among. They were supplying them free education, and medical help, they said. They were running scores of economic development project to help ‘uplift’ the poor, they argued. Hence, they insisted, I had presented a completely one-sided picture of Christian evangelism among Muslims, ignoring the many ‘positive’ contributions that the missionaries were apparently making.
The angry response from evangelical Christians to my article prompted me to delve further into the history and broader agenda of European and American Christian missionaries working among non-Christian, particularly Muslim, peoples. A random search on the Internet revealed to me the existence of a vast, well-organised network of institutions I never knew existed, devoted specifically to missionary work among Muslims. These include academic institutes, publishing houses, radio and television stations, medical missions, centres for training missionaries and so on, all seemingly generously funded and, for the most part, located in western Europe and the United States. As they described themselves and their mission, they all seemed to be fired by a passionate belief in Christianity as the only road to salvation, and Islam, as well as other faiths, as paths to perdition in hell. Some of them described Islam as nothing less than a Satanic invention.
As many critics, including several Christians themselves, have pointed out, the fiery zeal that drives white Christian evangelicals to swarm to the ‘Third World’, including Muslim countries, in a desperate bid to save ‘lost’ souls reflects the continuing hold of the nineteenth century European imperialist discourse that saw ‘natives’ as beyond the pale of civilization. Today, when Christianity is almost dead in the West, how does one explain the rush of American and European evangelicals to the ‘Third World’? Quite obviously this has little or nothing to do with mere pious intentions, for the decline of religion is far from apparent in the West than in the rest of the world, making it more of an urgent imperative for missionaries to work in the West than elsewhere. Thus, one has to turn to other factors to explain this seeming paradox. From a close examination of the agenda of evangelical groups in the ‘Third World’ it appears that, as a whole, Christian fundamentalism in our part of the world is no simple religious mission. As is widely believed, many evangelical groups working in the ‘Third World’ are simply fronts for Western agencies and governments, helping to promote their vested interests and strategic goals. This is most readily apparent from the cozy relationship between Christian fundamentalists and the current Bush administration. Right-wing American Christian groups are known to be sources of immense financial support to Israel. They are also vociferous backers of America’s imperialist designs on the Muslim world, seeing these as a divinely mandated crusade against the forces of ‘evil’.
My own discomfort about western Christian evangelicals were further confirmed when, recently, I came across a fascinating book titled ‘Mission, Myth and Money in a Multicoloured World’, authored by a certain Jules Gomes. Gomes is apparently a leading Indian Christian scholar, a member of the teaching faculty at one of the largest Protestant seminaries in India, the United Theological College at Bangalore. Author of several books, he is presently a research scholar at the University of Cambridge. In this insightful book Gomes describes in detail the dark and little-known world of Western evangelicals who see themselves as entrusted with the burdensome task of bringing the ‘light’ of Christianity to the ‘benighted’ non-white world.
Gomes tells us that many white right-wing Christian evangelicals whom he has interacted with closely for many years see America as God’s chosen nation, capitalism as ‘sacrosanct’, globalisation (a euphemism for American imperialism) as a ‘blessing’, the carpet bombing of Afghanistan as ‘necessary’, the war on Iraq as a ‘crusade’ and the American flag as a ‘quasi-religious icon’. In short, he says, he has discovered, much to his dismay, that ‘the western church [is] replicating the imperialistic behaviour of the western world’. The only difference now is, he writes, that the centre of imperialism, economic, cultural and political, has shifted from Europe to America. Today, America leads the world in sending out missionaries to other lands. In 2002, America is said to have sent out 60,200 missionaries to 220 countries in 2001. ‘Coca-Colonisation’, as Gomes describes American imperialism, thus goes hand in hand with Christianisation.
Gomes writes that the close alliance between the Christian rightwing and American imperialism is not a new phenomenon, although the bond seems to have become even closer in recent times. As early as 1854, he tells us, a book appeared in America under the revealing, though clumsy, title of ‘Armageddon: Or, The Existence […] of the United States Foretold in the Bible, Its […] Expansion into the Millennial Republic, and Its Dominion Over the Whole World’. Two decades later, in 1885 another tract, ‘Our Country’, was published, that claimed that America had attained the ‘highest degree of Anglo-Saxonism and true Christianity’ and that God had bestowed upon it the task of Christianising and ‘civilising’ the whole world. |
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While white racism, American imperialism and evangelical Christianity thus have a long history of mutual collaboration, Gomes writes that the rise of America as the global centre of right-wing Christian evangelism is largely a post-Cold War phenomenon. He argues that in the aftermath of World War II, America deliberately sought to promote right-wing Christian missionary groups in other countries, particularly in the ‘Third World’, in order to combat the ideological challenge of communism and anti-imperialist nationalism. These Christian groups also served to promote American interests abroad. Several of them received generous funding from far-right American government lobbies, CIA front organizations, American big business and right-wing think tanks. Many missionaries were appointed as sources of vital information for the CIA, and were used to bolster American hegemony by indoctrination and spreading American propaganda. As Sara Diamond writes in her ‘Spiritual Warfare: The Politics of the Christian Right’, these Christian groups eagerly sought to promote ‘dependence on the world leadership […] of the United States’. For them, missionary work was simply a means ‘to organize social movements and development programs favourable to US political and economic priorities’.
Contrary to the image of evangelical missionaries as pious, God-fearing do-gooders that they are so concerned to portray, Gomes shows how many of them have been involved in murky deals, working closely with American imperialist organizations. In 1975, the journal ‘Christianity Today’ admitted that large numbers of both Protestant and Catholic missionaries had provided information to the American intelligence authorities. In 1996, the ‘Washington Post’ reported that CIA officials admitted the existence of a ‘controversial loophole’ that permits the CIA to recruit ‘American journalists as agents, use newsgathering organizations as cover and [employ] clerics or missionaries for clandestine work overseas’. Gomes provides several examples of the active role of missionaries working in
Gomes contends that American evangelicals today are one of the fiercest supporters of Israel, seeing Islam as their greatest ideological enemy. Several Christian fundamentalist groups send huge sums of money to Israel, including to various fiercely Zionist Jewish organizations. The close collaboration between right-wing Christian groups in America and world Zionism, Gomes says, is clearly suggested by the fact that when the Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited Washington in January 1998, his first meeting was not with the American President, but, instead, with the leading Christian evangelist Jerry Falwell and more than a thousand Christian fundamentalists. At the meeting he was hailed as ‘the Ronald Reagan of Israel’, and Falwell promised to contact more than 200,000 Christian pastors, asking them to ‘tell President Clinton to refrain from putting pressure on Israel’. The unrelenting hostility of many American Christian groups towards Islam and Muslims is clearly apparent in their passionate endorsement of recent America’s military strikes against Muslim countries. Thus, Gomes writes, let alone the Protestant fundamentalists, even the apparently somewhat less extreme US Catholic bishops blessed the American invasion of Afghanistan. The evangelicals are now among the most fervent supporters of the American invasion and occupation of Iraq.
To come back to where I started, I do not wish to tar all evangelicals with the same brush, for surely there must be noble souls among them as well. However, taken as a whole, the evangelical project, I would still insist, constitutes a major menace, a thinly veiled guise for western imperialism, and a powerful threat to religious and cultural communities in the ‘Third World’.
Allah Knows Best,Peace Yall.... |
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Evangelist embedded with the so called "American War on terrorism"....hmmmm, wasn't that spreading with swords????
http://www.christianaggression.o ... S&id=1110874306
Evangelicals on the War Path
Posted March 15, 2005
Yoginder Sikand
Among the most vociferous supporters of the American invasion of Iraq and its so-called global ‘war on terror’ are large sections of America’s powerful Christian evangelical right wing. American Christian evangelicals have probably never had it so good for themselves in the recent past—what with a fellow Christian fundamentalist as President of their country, who is on record as having declared that he sees his country’s present imperialist offensive as nothing less than a holy crusade.
Most right-wing Christian groups in America see America’s war on Iraq, and on Muslim peoples more generally, as nothing less than a cosmic battle between Christianity and Islam, between God and the Devil, between good and evil. For them, the global imperialist offensive led by America is actually part of ‘God’s plan’ to help plant the Gospel in ‘heathen’ lands, to win ‘benighted’ Muslims to the Christian fold. Not surprisingly, many well-funded right-wing western Christian groups have rushed to Iraq (as they sought to do earlier in Afghanistan), following closely in the heels of American troops. The troops rain down bombs on civilians, massacring them in their thousands, while seemingly do-gooder evangelists make a pretence of ‘cleaning up the mess’ of ‘their’ soldiers, offering the hapless victims of American terror a few sops—a mid-day meal or a sack of grain—and a free Bible in addition, hoping in this way to win their foes to what they see as the only available way to ultimate salvation.
This nexus between right-wing evangelicals and the American political-military establishment serves the purposes of both partners admirably. For the American establishment, the presence of evangelical ‘charity’ groups on the battlefield seemingly engaged in doing some amount of ‘good’ for the suffering helps diffuse opposition to America’s occupying armies among the locals. It is also of immense propaganda value, seeking to convince the world that America’s imperialist offensives are actually stem from a spirit of unbounded ‘Christian’ ‘generosity’ and ‘charity’. For the evangelicals, the presence of American occupying armies provides them the security they need to carry on with their missionary depredations. Despite their protestations of ‘love’ for suffering and dying Muslims, they seem to actually relish the prospects of war, for it enables them to gain entry into areas where they would ordinarily would never had dared to tread, being protected by the force of American arms. In addition, the mass misery that imperialist military offensives unleash on millions of people—as in Iraq—appear to create just the right climate that evangelical groups so desperately need to get their ‘Good News’ fall on receptive soil—through the medical missions, makeshift schools and food distribution centres that they set up to take the place of regular hospitals, schools and farms that the imperialist armies go about pounding to utter ruin. In the present American offensive against Iraq, do-gooder western, particularly American, Christian evangelical outfits are playing a major role, many of them working within Iraq itself as well as in neighbouring countries among the streams of Iraqis who have fled the fighting. While apparently involved in providing ‘relief’, this is simply a cover for missionary work.
Frontiers is one of the several American-based right-wing Christian evangelical groups heavily involved in missionary work among Muslims in several countries. Its website describes its formidable range of activities. It has a number of overseas missions, packaged and priced like commercial adventure holidays. They are designed to combine the pleasure of a holiday, a burning sense of adventure and a passionately held belief in Christian mission. To cite some examples: Its North Africa Trekking Team package deal (priced at $2650) promises missionaries with a love for the wild the possibility of a mule trek in the mountains, while also giving them the opportunity of conveying Christianity to Muslim villagers. Its North African Prayer Team package ($2850) includes visits to archaeological sites and the prospects of ‘proclaim[ing] God’s Word over the land and join[ing] Him in tearing down strongholds keeping Muslims blinded to the truth about Christ’. Its Southeast Asia Bike Ministry Team ($3900), playing on deeply cherished orientalist fantasies associated with classical imperialism and its racist project, promises the thrill of biking through the mountains of a south-east Asian island, offering ‘strategic prayers over the land and the people’, engaging in ‘low-key evangelism’ and ‘build[ing] relationships with hospitable Muslims who’ll want to serve you endlessly’. Some of the packages involve a limited form of social work (teaching English and computers to Muslim youth, or caring for Muslim refugee children), intended, of course, simply as a means for beguiling unsuspecting Muslims into abandoning Islam for Christianity.
Frontiers is a classic case of a Christian fundamentalist outfit. In what it calls a ‘statement of faith’, Frontiers insists in the ‘full, verbal inspiration of the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament: as authoritative, sufficient, infallible and without error in the original manuscripts, not only as containing but as being in themselves the only written Word of God’. Accordingly, it declares that acknowledging Jesus as the Son of God and his death on the cross for atoning for the sins of all humankind is the only way to salvation. Consequently, it says, Christians are assured of ‘eternal blessedness’ in Heaven, while all others would be summarily consigned to ‘everlasting, conscious punishment’ in Hell.
From this belief stems Frontier’s global imperialist missionary agenda. It acknowledges that Muslims (and other non-Christians) are fellow human beings and creatures of God, and that, in that capacity, God ‘loves’ them. This love, however, is, it is suggested, strictly conditional, for they would be dispatched to hell if they fail to accept Jesus as Son of God—that is, if they continue being Muslim. In other words, while God may love Muslims, he seems to detest their religion. This sets out the missionary mandate for Frontiers, of ‘rescuing’ Muslims from Islam. It describes the task that it has established for itself thus: ‘Our passion is to glorify God by planting reproducing churches among unreached Muslim peoples’. As it sees it, Muslims can ‘avert eternal destruction’ only if they accept Christianity.
Frontier’s international director, Rick Love, is said to be a missionary with 20 years experience working among Muslims to abandon their faith and accept Christianity. He holds a Ph.D. from the ultra-right wing Fuller Theological Seminary, where he is presently adjunct professor of ‘Islamics’ (a curious Christian missionary term for Islamic Studies). In a recent interview, titled ‘A Christian Perspective of Islam and Terrorism’, he dwells at length on what he sees as his organisation’s mandate, linking it with America’s current so-called ‘war on global terror’, a euphemism for its invasion of one Muslim country after another. |
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As a true fundamentalist, Love sees the ‘war on terror’ as reflecting, in essence, a spiritual conflict between God and the Devil. And in this grand battle there is no doubt as to whom he sees Islam siding with. In his view, the attacks of 11 September (which he appears to employ as a justification for America’s consequent ‘war on terror’) have little or nothing to do with American imperialism (he mentions what he terms as ‘Muslim perceptions’ of America that have given rise to a wave of anti-Americanism all over the Muslim world, but then argues that, being a superpower, America is a ‘lightning rod for criticism’, and hurriedly adds, ‘Sadly, it is human nature to want to take people down a notch). Rather, the attacks, he suggests, were a natural corollary of Islam itself. In his mind, terror and Islam are inseparable. He categorically denies that Islam is a peace-loving religion, although he does admits the existence of peace-loving Muslims (suggesting, therefore, that their love for peace is despite, rather than because of, their belief in Islam). On the other hand, Christianity is presented as the very epitome of love and peace, while, of course, the long history of Christian-inspired wars and genocidal campaigns, including the current invasion of Iraq, which many evangelicals bless as a crusade, are conveniently glossed over. Love sums up his argument thus:
[…] Muhammad rode into Mecca on a stallion with a sword in hand to conquer by force. By contrast, Jesus saddled up a donkey to ride into Jerusalem to humbly suffer and die for the sins of the world. Herein lies the difference. Jesus founded a religion based on moral persuasion. From the beginning, Islam has condoned the use of the sword […] Islam is a religion which sanctions force, if necessary, to advance its purposes.
This said, the task before Christians, Love suggests, should be to ‘wage peace’ on Muslims—in other words, to wean Muslims away from Islam that is seen as sanctioning violence. He sees Muslims being divided into two broad camps: ‘non-violent moderates’ versus ‘violent fundamentalists and terrorists’. Since he sees violence as somehow intrinsic to Islam itself, presumably the former would be Muslim just in name. ‘Moderate’ Muslims would, he says, help promote ‘a greater respect for human rights and a recognition of common values between us’, which in turn, would help stamp out Islamic ‘terror’. It is as if ‘terror’ is solely a Muslim monopoly—Love says nothing here America’s historical record of bloody war, or of Christian-inspired colonial wars, for instance. Love advises Christians and western governments to cultivate ‘moderate’ Muslim countries, arguing that this is vital for the success on the ‘war on terror’ (no mention here of the complex economic, political and cultural roots of widespread anti-American sentiments among many Muslims and other ‘Third Worlders’, factors that are essential to understanding the phenomenon of much of the violence in Muslim lands today).
At the same time, Love appeals to Christian missionaries to launch major efforts to spread their faith among Muslim peoples, or what he calls ‘the advance of God’s kingdom in Muslim countries’. This must, however, he says, be done with love and concern, so as to win over Muslims rather than alienate them further and make the missionary task that much more difficult. As he suggests, ‘building bridges of love’ with Muslims at this point would ‘make much easier the job of every Christian who is involved in evangelism among Muslims […] for a long time to come’.
As Love sees it, the events of 11 September, 2001, and the wars that have followed in its wake are possibly cosmic signs of what Christian fundamentalists believe would be Christ’s return to earth before the Day of Judgement. This adds even greater urgency to what Love regards as the missionary task of winning Muslims to Christianity before Christ comes back to the world and heralds the Last Days. The impending arrival of Christ must be preceded by ‘world evangelization’ says Love, suggesting a global plan of Christian imperialist domination.
Love is not alone in his imperialist Christian designs, for he echoes the views of many, if not most, powerful, well-heeled western Christian evangelical fundamentalists. One wishes one could dismiss Love (and the organisation that he heads) as simply a harmless babbling bigot, but there are enough of people like him around (not to forget the president of America who appears to share many of his views) around to make talk of resurrecting the crusades a very real and menacing possibility.
Allah Knows Best,Peace Yall..... |
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Evangelist tactic in Asia....
http://www.christianaggression.o ... S&id=1105341298
In Asia, some Christian groups spread supplies - and the word
Posted January 10, 2005
BY JIM REMSEN
Knight Ridder Newspapers
PHILADELPHIA - (KRT)
Kansas City Star
Posted on Sun, Jan. 09, 2005
As Western humanitarian organizations unleash an armada of relief supplies and workers into Asia's crisis zone, some evangelical Christian groups aim to bring the Gospel to the victims, as well.
Religious groups promise to be a major presence in the massive relief and reconstruction effort. InterAction, the largest alliance of U.S.-based nongovernment organizations, reports that of its 55 member agencies providing tsunami aid, 22 are faith-based.
Most of the religious players, including the Red Cross, the American Jewish World Service, and Lutheran World Relief, have rules against proselytizing.
But some evangelical groups active in Asia, including the Southern Baptists' International Mission Board, Gospel for Asia, and the Christian and Missionary Alliance, say the Bible always impels them to create converts to the faith.
"This (disaster) is one of the greatest opportunities God has given us to share his love with people," said K.P. Yohannan, president of the Texas-based Gospel for Asia. In an interview, Yohannan said his 14,500 "native missionaries" in India, Sri Lanka and the Andaman Islands are giving survivors Bibles and booklets about "how to find hope in this time through the word of God."
In Krabi, Thailand, a Southern Baptist church had been "praying for a way to make inroads" with a particular ethnic group of fishermen, according to Southern Baptist relief coordinator Pat Julian. Then came the tsunami, "a phenomenal opportunity" to provide ministry and care, Julian told the Baptist Press news service.
In Andhra Pradesh, India, a plan is developing to build "Christian communities" to replace destroyed seashore villages. In a dispatch that the evangelical group Focus on the Family posted on its Family.org Web site, James Rebbavarapu of India Christian Ministries said a team of U.S. engineers had agreed to help design villages of up to 400 homes each, "with a church building in the center of them."
Not all evangelicals agree with these tactics.
"It's not appropriate in a crisis like this to take advantage of people who are hurting and suffering," said the Rev. Franklin Graham, head of Samaritan's Purse and son of evangelist Billy Graham.
Samaritan's Purse is rushing $4 million in sanitation, food, medical and housing supplies to its teams in Sri Lanka and Indonesia. But Graham, in a phone interview from his North Carolina headquarters, said there were no plans to hand out Christian literature with the relief.
"Maybe another day, if they ask why I come, I'd say, `I'm a Christian and I believe the Bible tells me to do this,'" Graham said. "But now isn't the time. We have to save lives."
As Graham knows, laws and customs in non-Christian lands also can inhibit proselytizing. Plans by Samaritan's Purse and other evangelical groups to join postwar reconstruction efforts in Iraq in 2003 raised concerns that they would violate Muslim bans on proselytizing and undercut U.S. efforts to improve ties with the Islamic world.
Yohannan said Sri Lankan officials are "extremely angry" with Christian missionary work and want to outlaw proselytizing. Some states in southern India have anti-conversion laws that bar "fraudulent manipulation," he said, adding: "I cannot tell you there is a hell awaiting you because it can be interpreted as a fear tactic." But one of the states, Tamil Nadu, recently repealed its law, and others don't enforce theirs, Yohannan said.
Indonesia, a major arena of relief work, does not ban evangelizing, said Riaz Saehu, spokesman for the Indonesian Embassy in Washington.
Though the country has a Muslim majority, Saehu said, it accords official status to Catholicism, Protestantism, Hinduism and Buddhism, and "people can do whatever to try to influence others."
Grass-roots resistance may be a greater impediment to evangelists. Saehu said residents of the hard-hit Aceh province are strict Muslims who "couldn't accept (missionary) activities regardless of the law." Yohannan said Hindu and Muslim extremists have burned Bibles and beaten pastors from his churches in the past.
"It's a very sensitive issue," Saehu said.
The U.S. government has said it hopes American tsunami aid improves its image abroad, particularly with Muslims. At the same time, it has not tried to impede evangelical efforts, nor has it received complaints about them, State Department spokesman Edgar Vasquez said.
"We can't control them," Vasquez said. "They are free to do what they're going to do."
Meanwhile, other religious relief groups eschew evangelizing. Many are signatories of a Red Cross-Red Crescent code of conduct that requires, among other things, that aid "not be used to further a particular political or religious standpoint."
Church World Service, the humanitarian arm of the National Council of Churches, is among the signatories.
"We carry out our work as a calling as Christians, but it's not carried out based on any form of proselytization," said Rick Augsberger, director of the agency's emergency-response program. Faith issues might be shared informally, he said, "but not as an objective."
Allah Knows Best,Peace Yall..... |
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Hmmmmm this is something to be think off.....:hmm:
http://www.christianaggression.o ... S&id=1097365503
On The CIA And Christian Missionaries
Posted October 9, 2004
The Final Call
5-15-2001
The recent emergence of the relationship between the mainstream media, elected officials, White conservatives, Black civil rights leaders, a Sudanese opposition group (SPLA/M), and a Christian human rights organization, Christian Solidarity International (CSI), caused us to reflect over a long history of covert relationships between US and foreign intelligence agencies and Christian missionaries. One of the best examples of such was the relationship between the famous Wycliffe Bible Translators and the CIA. The relationship was documented in a book, Thy Will Be Done, written in the 1990s.
According to Gerard Colby and Charlotte Dennett, the association between the intelligence community and Christian missionaries predates the public emergence of the CIA. In Thy Will Be Done, they write of the Wycliffe Bible Translator's (also known as the Summer Institute of Linguistic -SIL) and its founder William Cameron Townsend's (also known as "Cam") association with the intelligence community.
"This was not the first time that SIL had served U.S. government intelligence purposes during the war. In 1942, after discussions in Washington with "some men who are interested in furthering good will between our countries", Cam specifically requested SIL's Mexico City office to solicit reports from "any of our workers who may have observed efforts on the part of anyone to make the Indians think that Americans are not their friends." Cam's directive ended with a message, " lease give my regards to Mr. Lockett in case you should see him in this connection." Thomas Lockett, commercial attach |
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What a looser......:hmm:
http://www.christianaggression.o ... S&id=1110825796
Missionary Arrested for Demanding Sexual Favours
Posted March 14, 2005
PTI
newkerala.com
[India News]: Ahmedabad, Mar 8 2005
A Christian missionary was arrested for allegedly demanding sexual favours from a woman , police said here today.
Fr Prasad Gonsalves, head of the Catholic mission in Radhanpura town, was arrested yesterday on the basis of the victim's complaint that he had demanded sexual favours from her, Patan police superintendent A V Vasava told PTI.
The victim alleged in her FIR that the Jesuit priest had promised to give her a house if she converted and also made obscene demands around three months ago.
Gonsalves has been remanded to police custody by a local court, the official added.
Allah Knows Best,Peace Yall.... |
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:hmm: :hmm: :hmm:
http://www.christianaggression.o ... S&id=1112122481
Nazism and the Christian Heritage: Uncomfortable Parallels
Posted March 29, 2005
Robert Carr (Robert Carr lectures in history at Spelthorne College and is a Research supervisor in international relations at the American University in London.)
At first sight, the very idea that Nazism bears any relation to Christianity seems absurd. Yet before dismissing such an idea, we have we consider certain similarities. Certainly there were marked Christian influences on Nazism. This article will look specifically at the expression of Nazi anti-Semitism.
Christian Anti-Semitism
Nazi Germany was both a product of, and established in, Christian Europe. The Fuhrer himself was educated in the strictest of Catholic institutions-a Benedictine monastery in Bavaria. More than that, he'd been a church chorister. Without doubt, childhood experiences help to mould adulthood. Christian influences certainly remained important in Hitler's life: his favourite bed-time reading was Martin Luther.
Luther had particular advice to offer concerning those who had failed to follow Christ-the Jews. Luther urged Christian action against them, including concentrating them in certain areas, drowning Jewish individuals and even wholesale murder:
We are at fault in not avenging all this innocent blood of our Lord and the blood of the children they have shed since then (which still shines forth from their eyes and their skin). We are at fault in not slaying them.
Christian protagonists and texts have levelled spiteful accusations at Jews since the advent of Christianity. Part of the very foundations of the faith are ideas of Jewish betrayal, hard- heartedness and deicide. New Testament characters such as Judas, Herod, Saul, the Pharisees and the Jerusalem crowd (baying 'Crucify him!') have shaped, over centuries, European attitudes towards Jews. Such accusations and the demonisation of Jewry are based on the Christian idea that it has, as a faith and a civilisation, superseded Judaism. For Christians, God transferred his covenant and favour to them; rather than being the chosen people, Jews simply became stubborn unbelievers. Antagonism between the new faith and Judaism has characterised aspects of Christian history including the Crusades, the Spanish Inquisition and the blood libel. Indeed, before Nazism even, Theodor Fritsch argued, 'Surely Christian teaching arose as a protest of the Aryan spirit against the inhumane Jew spirit.'
Out with the Old, In with the New
There is an interesting parallel in terms of both Christianity and Nazism regarding themselves as usurping Jewish culture. Christianity had to throw off the shackles of its Jewish heritage, i.e. the laws of Deuteronomy, besides dietary, Sabbath and other rituals: 'Beware of those dogs and their malpractices. Beware of those who insist on mutilation-circumcision' (Philippians 3).
Similar to Christianity, Nazism offered salvation of a sort--a new and perfect Aryan order to replace the old. Indeed the 'debased' culture the Nazis hated so virulently was much shaped by Jews, including Einstein, Freud, Marx and Mahler.
Both movements sought to end Jewish culture, albeit in different ways. How though can it be possible to regard Nazism in religious terms?
Nazism and Religion
Fundamentally, religion is a means of binding and supporting society.
The overlap of nationhood and religious practice is evident, for example in Japanese Shintoism, Judaism and the Church of England.
Nazi faith was in the same mould and, likewise, relied on indoctrination, preaching, mass gatherings, rituals and shrines.
More than advocating supposed Aryan spiritual superiority, Nazism, like Christian institutions, introduced laws and measures against Jews. All aspects of 1935's Nuremberg Laws had been previously exercised in Medieval Christendom as a way of isolating Jews in society. Interestingly, Hitler even framed Jew-hatred in religious terms: 'This was the time of the greatest spiritual upheaval I have ever gone through. I had ceased to be a weak-kneed cosmopolitan and become an anti-Semite.'
Regardless of proclamations and violence against Jewry, Hitler's regime was legitimised by various Christian churches from the start. The Vatican state was the very first to recognise Nazi Germany diplomatically. In 1933 the Deutsche Christen (the German Church) declared its support for the unity of cross and swastika. More ominously, 1941 's joint declaration of German Protestant Evangelical leaders urged that the 'severest measures against the Jews be adopted and that they be banished from German lands'.
Ultimately, the Nazi regime did pursue abominable measures against the Jews. Just as Christian mythology relied on the red-haired Judas race for vilification, so Nazism relied on its Jewish scapegoat. Anti- Semitism was the very lifeblood of Nazism. Jews were demonised and, like the devil, their treachery came in many guises. Following World War I, accusations levelled at Jewry included the 'stab in the back' and the 'November traitors' ideas; further myths saw Jews acting as international capitalists seeking unreasonable reparations and also as Bolshevik conspirators working against Germany.
For such supposed transgressions, Jews were the target of the Endlosungsprojekt (Final Solution). The Nazi regime put into motion modernised genocide. The transportation, mechanisation and practice of Jew-murder relied on the knowledge and assistance of Christian Europe--from Vichy France to the Baltic states. The phenomenal effectiveness of death pits, gas vans and extermination camps relied on Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox Christians alike. More specifically, consider Rudolf Hoess who was a committed Catholic: 'My father had taken a vow that I should be a priest, and my future profession was therefore already firmly laid down. I was educated entirely with this end in view.' interestingly, Hoess swapped the idea of the priesthood for employment as camp commandant of Auschwitz- -the centre of Jewish Slaughter.
Lower down the state hierarchy, Ernst Biberstein, as commander of SS Einsatzgruppen C, was responsible for the murder of 75,000 Jews in late 1941. Biberstein could somehow reconcile such work with his profession as a Protestant pastor and theologian. German clergy also served as Nazi Jew-hunters in their role as Sippenforscher, i.e. tracing Jewish heritage through parish records.
Conclusion
Without doubt it is difficult to Measure individuals' religious credentials. However, Nazism was advantaged by the Christian mind-set of Europeans which included myths of Jewish treachery and deicide. The Nazi movement exploited its apparent Christian agenda. As Julius Streicher wrote in 1936:
We have dedicated our lives to the fight against the murderers of Christ ... if we always think of Adolf Hitler then we cannot fail to receive strength and benediction from heaven.
What is certain is that both Christianity and Nazi-Aryanism defined themselves in opposition to Jewry and promoted their own 'chosen people'. The Christian text Revelation indicates that punishment by tortuous death is set aside for 'the synagogue of Satan'. Nazism almost delivered what Christianity threatened, i.e. the elimination of Judaism. Ironically, even the Nazi-led slaughter of Jews has a spiritual dimension: the term 'Holocaust' usually describes the burning of a religious sacrifice. While Nazism took inspiration and succour from Church documents and protagonists, this article indicates how Nazism can even be regarded as a racialised and deformed brand of Christianity.
Allah Knows Best,Peace Yall..... |
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Interesting!!!!.....
http://www.christianaggression.o ... S&id=1059601552
Beware of False Healers
Posted July 30, 2003
Author: The Maha Sabha of Trinidad &Tobago
Source: Trinidad Express, March 18, 1999
BENNY HINN and all who claim the power to heal are instructed in Luke 4:23 "Physician, heal thyself." On his Trinity Broadcasting Network in the United States, Hinn has been highlighting his two-day visit to Trinidad (February 27/28), not only stating that he had cast more devils out in Trinidad than he had in a long time but using the TV clip of a Hindu man from Moruga whom Benny Hinn claims to have cured.
But Marcano Siewkumar, speaking from his bed at Ward 11 of the San Fernando General, totally disclaims Benny Hinn's healing. In the Express of Saturday, March 13, Siewkumar, said in an interview with Camille Boodoo: "No man can heal. Healing comes from the Creator." And asked if he was temporarily healed at the crusade, Siewkumar said: "Would I be in hospital if I was healed?"
Siewkumar's wife, Molly, is reported to have told the Express reporter, "Benny Hinn never healed my husband." She went on to explain that the entire family fasted for six days before a Gita puja was performed for her husband and he felt better. Yet this poor, sick man was being wrongly used by Benny Hinn and some locals to publicise their claim to cure the sick.
Newsday of March 13 in a story by Azard Ali states: "But yesterday it was a severely ill Siewkumar lying at the San Fernando hospital who described himself as a staunch Hindu, condemned Hinn and his healing power. 'Benny Hinn healed me? Look where I am,' sobbed Siewkumar, fearing that he may never walk again." The same article further stated: "Contending that his worsened heart condition and the consequences of not being able to move brought about by paying homage to Benny Hinn instead of the Hindu deities he was accustomed to, Siewkumar sobbed: "I am going to be here a long time. I know that and I want to tell Benny Hinn something -he knows nothing about healing because I feel that something bad happened to me since."
The Maha Sabha would like to know what follow-up action has been taken by Benny Hinn and his followers in Trinidad to meet with Siewkumar and others whom they claim to have healed. There is silence over these stories, yet extravagant claims continue to be made by Hinn and his local collaborators.
One pastor in central Trinidad has in the past published pictures of Indian women in orhanis whom he claimed to have converted. Why is there no paid advertisements proclaiming the cure and conversion of Marcano Siewkumar or any other verifiably cured person? Benny Hinn himself presides over a multi-million dollar US enterprise based in Miami. In two recent television programmes CNN dealt with Hinn whom they described as the outlandish charismatic who delights "in slaying" people with the spirit. CNN revealed that when travelling abroad Hinn stays in presidential suites at as much as US$2,000 per night. The international TV Network also stated: "A trip to Europe by Benny Hinn and his entourage (flying on the Concorde and staying in luxury hotels) cost US$9000 return for each of them."
During an appearance on the Larry King programme on CNN Benny Hinn, referring to himself said, "I face devils as the Son of God." The message seems quite clear. Benny Hinn sees himself as the Arisen Christ. This man seems not to have read his own Prov. 16:19: "Better it is to be of an humble spirit with the lowly than to divide the spoils with the proud."
It was well anticipated that just as the sick will move from doctor to doctor for diagnosis and healing, so too would they move to those who possess the "Sidhi" or gift from God to bring physical and emotional relief. In the Hindu tradition there are many blessed with this gift and hundreds from Trinidad, even people in prominent positions, travel to India for audiences with one of its most renowned healers and teachers. When, however, the God given gift is misused for commercial, or other purposes, then that gift is lost.
Since there is no locally recorded verifiable healing, what then was the purpose of Benny Hinn's visit to Trinidad? Those who keep close watch on so-called miracle churches have observed a steady drop in attendance. Where once some boasted of full audiences that necessitated multiple daily services with bulging coffers, decline has stepped in and international support has become necessary. The Roman Catholic Church which is one of the main targets has now put its Pope on the International Religious Circuit. While speaking to millions in Mexico, the Pope made a call to arms. According to an Associated Press report, he summoned the faithful "to take to the streets and confront the challenges of protestant evangelism".
Hindus worldwide, including Trinidad and Tobago, are also responding in an aggressive manner to "Hindu-bashing" and the false healing claims. This new self-defense posture has thwarted well-laid-out international plans to subvert and destroy Hinduism and other traditional religions across the world.
Because of poor harvest of converts and shrinking coffers, Trinidad and Tobago can expect over the next few years a flood of high profile tele-evangelists flying down to prop up their local religious collaborators.
Allah Knows Best,Peace Yall..... |
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Beware!!!!!.....
http://www.christianaggression.o ... S&id=1112886644
The Big Business of Evangelizing
Posted April 7, 2005
February 1989
Hinduism Today
Christians Spend U.S. $165 Million Every Year to Convert India's Hindus
"One hundred thousand children die every month in India! We must rescue them. There are thousands sleeping in the streets in total destitution," exhorts Spiros Zodhiates to the American donors of his Christian missionary organization. Advancing the Ministries of the Gospel. And rescue them he does, taking in thousands of Hindu orphans and placing them with Christian foster parents or in Christian orphanages, Hindu faith, nearly all will become Christians. It's an example of what Dr. S.M. Ponniah, Advisor to the Malaysia Hindu Sangam, meant when he acidly noted, "Christian missionaries pray on their knees on Sunday and prey on Hindus the rest of the week."
One billion US dollars, that's how much American Protestant Christian organizations spent last year trying to gain converts from other religions, and the Catholics spent an equal amount. According to official Indian government reports US $165 million is sent to Christian missions in India each year. The bewildering variety of programs it goes to include preaching, relief work, orphanages, leper colonies, foster homes, radio shows, literature distribution, Bible translation, rallies, medical work and more.
HINDUISM TODAY has conducted years of research on the missionary organizations based in America. These US organizations account for 80% of all money raised worldwide for missions. In this report we'll summarize that research, explaining: 1) the various approaches to missions; 2) the methods of fund-raising and the programs supported in India; 3) the theology behind the missions; 4) the degree of success; 5) the problems caused for Hindu society; and 6) the rethinking of proselytization ethics now occurring among the western religions.
Conservative vs. Liberal Missionaries
Not all Christians think alike about missions. In particular, there is a wide range of opinion on two subjects: how aggressive should an evangelist be, and what is the place of social service in a missionary program? To better understand this range, HINDUISM TODAY interviewed Dr. Dean Gillilant, Professor of Contextual Theology at California's Fuller Theological Seminary.
Dr. Gillilant explained that there are four positions on aggressiveness and social service, usually described as:
1) Extremely Conservative: In this view, social work is unnecessary, even undesirable, in missionary work. The missionary's entire focus should be on teaching the Gospel only.
2) Conservative: The conservative position. Dr. Gillilant said, considers social service programs "a wedge, a foot in the door." In this view, he said, one should "have medical patients in one end [of a mission hospital] and Christians out the other." The conservative missionary will aggressively work to convert anyone who comes under his social service programs.
3) Middle-Road: The middle-road position according to Dr. Gillilant is that "Social work is not enough without verbalization of the call to Christianity." These missionaries will run extensive social service programs, make sure that everyone in their care hears the Christian teachings, but will not proselytize as aggressively as the conservative missionary.
4) Liberal: The liberal position is that the mission should limit itself to social work as a demonstration of Christianity charity and accept what converts come naturally.
Over the last twenty years, there has been much rethinking among Christian missions, with most organizations now falling, according to Dr. Gillilant, in the middle-road to liberal positions.
Six Mission Organization Profiles
Mission organizations tend to specialize. Some operate enormous social programs and relief efforts. Others run schools and orphanages. Others hire itinerant preachers and yet others distribute literature to millions of people. Based on its particular programs, each mission will formulate a campaign in America to raise money. These appeals often contain highly selective, distorted or false descriptions of Hinduism. Here are brief profiles and samples of fund-raising appeals of six Protestant organizations.
1) With a 1984 income of $136.5 million dollars, the Southern Baptist Convention is the largest single missionary group in the world. Their fund raising appeal is theological in nature: "The evidence of the power of Satan in these masses [in South Asia] adds to the anger and frustration of a missionary under the mandate to 'turn them from the darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God' (Acts 26:18)."They go on, "Each of the major world religions, offering futile and unsatisfying alternatives to knowledge of the true God, dominates in one or more of the countries of South and Southeast Asia. This power of Satan is a living, palpable and visible reality in everyday life. If one can make a distinction between religions, surely Hindus would be next to the animists in the darkness in which they dwell."
Following the middle-road approach to missions, the Baptists run schools and medical services. They also fund local churches and individual missionaries. The charitable services thus provided to Hindus are, according to brochures, "highly effective instruments of evangelism."
2) Advancing the Ministries of the Gospels (AMG) is typical of the conservative organizations which are not directly associated with a major church. Their monthly newsletter pleads, "Pray for the children of India. [When I was in India], my heart broke as I saw some we have been unable to admit into our Abode of Love [a 1,000-child orphanage] pick up the rice kernel by kernel from the banana tree leaves on which the children of our institution had eaten. How I long to take them all in." AMG also cares for lepers: "Can you imagine yourself suffering from leprosy, being blind at the same time, and yet knowing that your eyesight can be restored for just $35?" With such appeals AMG raises $3,000,000 each year.
AMG's India programs, all directed at the Hindu population, include nine leper colonies with a total of 10,000 lepers, 8,000 sponsored children either in orphanages or placed with Christian foster parents, two homes for crippled children, a 2,000-student school and Bible correspondence courses. They claim 95% of the children in their care become Christians.
3) Some Indian organizations have discovered they can set up fund-raising institutions in America which are tax-exempt for American donors. The American Council of the Ramabai Mukti Mission of Kedgaon, Poona, is one such example. This hundred-year-old organization not only has an American Council raising $200,000 a year; it has councils in Holland, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Scotland and England raising money, too. With this support they run an orphanage and foster-parent homes for mainly Hindu girls, and modest social, medical work, agricultural and evangelistic programs.
4) The Christian Nationals Evangelism Commission. Rather than send missionaries from America to India, CNEC recruits Indian nationals as missionaries. Not only is this vastly cheaper - $1400 a year to pay and equip a national against $25,000-$65,000 for an American sent overseas with his family - it alleviates the shortage caused by India's reluctance to grant visas for any more foreign missionaries. In addition to supporting missionaries, CNEC supports a spectrum of indigenous programs run by nationals. In 1984, CNEC raised $2.9 million.
"India - land of 330 million Gods" is spread in large letters across CNEC's India brochure. In addition to the 24 evangelists under the direction of Rev. Thomas Cherian in Cochin, Kerala, they're proud of "several Christian kindergartens where Hindu children have the opportunity of hearing the Gospel." Besides CNEC, many other organizations support nationals, at prices ranging from $300 to $1400 a year. For example, Gospel For Asia in Dallas, Texas, supports 700 nationals on a budget of $700,000 a year.
5) New Tribes Mission is an "extremely conservative" group. Neo-Dr. Livingstons, they work in remote tribal areas of the world under the most difficult of conditions. Their missionaries are trained in jungle survival and enough linguistics to reduce the Gospel to writing in an unknown language. |
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A New Tribes Mission brochure describes the experience of one of their missionaries who had just arrived at a remote tribe. A tribesmen had died the day before and this missionary attended the funeral. He wrote, "While I stood there, something gripped my heart. This man they were burying never had a chance to accept or reject Christ...Shocking was the realization - a Christ-less grave before my very eyes. And far too often this was happening the world over because the message of salvation came too late."
7) For real economy in spreading the word, Every Home Crusade (also known as World Literature Crusade) cannot be beaten. "Do you know that for $15/month you can reach a village in India where 1,500 people live! Can you think of a more economical way to reach that many people with the Gospel?" asks their brochure. Each paid EVC worker visits 200 homes a day, six days a week with gospel messages for adults, and children. Their most ambitious plan is to produce 450 million New Testaments (in the appropriate language) and mail one to every postal address in the world at a cost of $2.00 each.
What you've read above is a sample of what HINDUISM TODAY has on file from 33 of the 155 organizations. It is likely that the descriptions of Hinduism in these fund-raising materials (which are sent out by the millions) are an unrecognized but major factor in the American Christian's often negative image of Hinduism and India.
Motive for Missions
The New Tribes Institute gives their understanding of the Christian's purpose: "There is only one reason why we as Christians are not taken immediately home to be with Christ. We have been left here for a purpose - namely to finish the work that Christ has given to us to do. Before God's purpose for this age can be completed, the Gospel must be preached among all nations." Christians call this the "Great Commission." It appears in Matthew 24:14: "And this gospel of the Kingdom of God shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come."
According to the World Christian Encyclopedia, there are 9,000 such "nations" to witness. They define a nation as a people group bound by a common culture, language, race, etc. The WCE estimates that 7,000 have been adequately evangelized, leaving 2,000 to go. Dr. Gillilant said there is a massive effort underway right now to reach these 2,000 by the year 2000.
Some Christians, however, believe the gospel must be carried to every single individual to fulfill the Great Commission - hence such organizations as the Every Home Crusade. Fulfilling the Great Commission does not require converting everyone, only giving each the opportunity to accept or reject Christ.
Depending upon the line of thinking, as soon as the last nation is evangelized or everyone hears the gospel, "The end comes." The "end" is the Second Coming, the return of Jesus Christ, when the elect shall be taken to heaven and the rest shall perish. To the fervent Christian, his personal salvation and entrance to heaven is dependent upon the successful fulfillment of the Great Commission. Hence the energy and urgency which goes into missionary work.
Not all Christians, possibly not even most, accept this interpretation of the Great Commission. Many will say that their only duty is to demonstrate their Christian charity through relief work, the "liberal" position on missions.
How Successful a Campaign?
P.J. Johnstone in his book on evangelism. Operation World, states that "There are only about 200,000 converts out of Hinduism [1 in 3,000] in India living today [1980]." The World Christian Encyclopedia, considered even by Christians as very optimistic in its estimates, says there were 177,000 converts to Christianity in India between 1970 and 1980. Whichever figure is correct, careful reading of the missionary literature confirms that the evangelism programs in India generally are dismal failures. For example, the Mission Handbook laments, "How are we to explain the pitifully small dent that has been made on the 600 million Hindus of India?"
Such programs are not examples of fiscal efficiency. If the missionary investment for 19701980 was, say $100 million a year, the WCE's estimated 177,000 converts cost nearly S6,000 each to acquire - the price of funding one national worker for six years or, for the average Indian, 50 years of wages! |
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Why Evangelism is a Problem
The small number of converts doesn't mean the missionaries don't cause difficulties for Hindu society. There are a litany of complaints, but six major problems may be singled out:
1) Evangelists denigrate Hinduism, for example, by calling it the "work of Satan."
2) The use of social work in conjunction with evangelism creates converts by bribery.
3) New converts are taught to convert the rest of their family, usually by a constant disruption and onslaught against all of the family's Hindu practices.
4) Hindu children are adopted for the purpose of converting them.
5) Political upheaval has come in the wake of missionary activity. The ongoing revolts in Nagaland and Mizoram are just two examples in India. In South America, Protestants and Catholics alike are involved in instigating and helping various insurrections.
6) Also in the wake of successful conversion of remote tribes comes what a New York Times 1983 investigative report called "the sudden exposure of formerly inaccessible areas to the exploitation and mercenary attitudes of the outside world [bringing] alcoholism, corruption and debt to the region."
A Beacon of Hope
These problems, which occur in many non-Christian societies, are not being ignored by all Christians. The Interfaith Conference of Washington, D.C., comprised of leaders of the Islamic, Jewish, Mormon, Protestant and Roman Catholic faiths, issued a "Statement on Proselytism" in 1987. It reads in part, "We support the right of all religions to share their message in the spirit of good will. It is inappropriate, however, for one faith group openly to demean or disparage the philosophies or practices of another faith group as part of its proselytizing...Deceptive proselytizing efforts are practiced on the most vulnerable of populations - residents of hospitals, old age homes, confused youth, college students away from home. These proselytizing techniques are tantamount to coerced conversions and should be condemned."
The Hindu teaching that "Truth is one, paths are many" has touched many in the world, causing a needed rethinking of the ethics and side effects of attempts to gain converts to a religion.
1984 World Mission Expenditure for the Top Twenty US Missionary Organizations With Operations in India
Southern Baptist Convention US $136,43,351
World Vision $83,647,492
General Conference of Seventh-Day Adventists $70,155,000
Assemblies of God, Foreign Missions $56,799,964
Churches of Christ $52,000,000
Wycliffe Bible Translators $36,815,000
United Methodist Church World Program Division $23,155,592
Campus Crusade for Christ International $20,000,000
Church of the Nazarene World Mission Division $17,589,000
The Evangelical Alliance Mission $16,597,341
Christian Churches/Churches of Christ $15,598,000
Map International $14,180,651
Trans World Radio $13,600,000
Compassion International $13,417,125
Presbyterian Church USA Program Agency $13,104,468
Christian and Missionary Alliance $12,416,451
Baptist Bible Fellowship International $12,407,803
Conservative Baptist Foreign Mission Society $12,307,902
Lutheran World Relief, Inc. $11,170,396
Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod Mission Services $10,801,563
Note: The US dollar amounts are for their total 1984 world programs, not just for India. The above information is from the 13th edition of Mission Handbook, published by MARC, Monrovia, California.
Allah Knows Best,Peace Yall..... |
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Hmmmmmm....whats this???:hmm:
http://www.christianaggression.o ... S&id=1113453908
Africa cries for revenge
Posted April 13, 2005
Organiser
April 17, 2005
By M.S.N. Menon
Revenge and reparation梩his is what Africa wants from the West. And it has an account to settle with the Christian church.
On the wall of the Elmina Castle in Ghana is a plaque. It proclaims: 揑n everlasting memory of the anguish of our ancestors. May those who died rest in peace. May those who return find their roots. May humanity never again perpetrate such injustices. |
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With all due respect, sir moderator, this thread serve no purpose but to slander christianity.
I recommend this thread to be closed.
Thank you. |
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This thread tells what have the missionaries done outside there, it's a guide to tackle all the missionaries lies and dirty tactic!!! as a muslim i cannot just sit and do nothing, it's about time to revealed the reality that happens in India,Indonesia,African region,South America regarding the missionaries activities there....
This thread serves as an info and a shield to counter the missionaries tactics....we also have right to defend our religion from the zionist western media!
Allah Knows Best,Peace Yall..... |
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There are other ways to defend your religion aenemy7.
Not by slandering christianity by anti christian propaganda website.
We can do the same thing to islam, but we choose not to cause its a cheap tactic.
Again i urge the moderator to close this thread. |
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This thing have to be revealed to all muslims so in the future we can tackle all their tactic efficiently..... the christianaggression.org websites was an Indian websites, the Hindus overthere are the victim of force conversion,conversion with food,money and shelter and even theres a christian millitant overthere(this is something malaysian should know), India already suffer in the past under British ruled embedded with their missionaries and they will not going have to through that once more as a slave to the "orang puteh".....
all i can say about the websites was "kalau tiada angin tak kan pokok bergoyang", that's all...... so this is the best way for Muslims in Malaysia to planned and prepare strategy to tackle all their tactics! bare in mind, the evangelist already labelled south east asia as something like "window...,i think motherjones.com have that info...:lol)
so it's better to prepare right before it's to late! "sediakan payung sebelum hujan".......
Allah Knows Best,Peace Yall..... |
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There's no intention to defend islam in your heart, but to insult christianity.
You set the hindus againts christians. A very dangerous act here in malaysia if i must say.
Another reason to close the thread.
You're nothin but "batu api". |
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This already happen there in India, they have right to protest the missionaries dirty tactic overthere.....what if this thing happens here??? did the CNN report about christian militant over there??? the CNN and the rest Zionist media insult Islam freely and why not we defend Islam as well and revealed something which never reported by the zionist media about the missionaries dirty tactic over there!!!! in Acheh, the missionaries trying hard to convert children via education,food and shelter!!!imagine that! how could the missionaries done something like that, if they want to help just help laaa don't go and confused them,they have enough problem to think about!
At least we take knowledge about the tactic used there in India by the missionaries..... so what u do if u in their shoes???offcourse u will have to defend urself right????
Keep in touch!!!
Allah Knows Best,Peace Yall..... |
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Author
Post time 17-4-2005 02:01 PM
