The Hindu : Catholic Bishops' meet to discuss conversions

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Thursday, Jan 08, 2004

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Catholic Bishops' meet to discuss conversions

By Our Staff Reporter

THRISSUR JAN. 7. The debate over religious conversions, including what are sometimes referred to as "forced conversions," have come into focus at the 26th biennial general body meeting of the Catholic Bishops Conference of India (CBCI) that began at the Marymatha Major Seminary at Mulayam near here today.

The CBCI is the apex body of the Catholic hierarchy in India, comprising the three rites of Syro-Malabar, Syro-Malankara and Latin. It has taken up "Church and Social Communications" as the theme of this General Assembly, which will continue till January 14.

In the run-up to the meeting, the CBCI office-bearers had made known their eagerness to address and settle debates over conversion. Here the CBCI office-bearers, including its president, Archbishop Cyril Mar Baselions, made it clear that the Church was not opposed to the introduction of any law against forced conversion after ensuring that they do not have the potential for misuse.

Emphasising that such laws would not affect the Catholic Church because forced conversion was not on its agenda, the Archbishop said it believed that conversion was only a transformation to the "Path of God" and that it need not mean uprooting from the religious and social backgrounds of the converted.

He criticised some of the fundamental groups within Christianity for creating a bad name for the Church by insisting on religious conversion.

He said that nobody could deny the right of an individual to convert to the "Path of God" because it was an assertion of the freedom of the conscience of that person, and some of the Hindu groups were unwilling to accept it. In such a context, if a law is brought against forced conversion, it could be misused, and the help or assistance rendered to the people in distress could be misinterpreted to mean exertion of pressure.

The Archbishop said he was willing to discuss the issue with organisations such as the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, the Bajrang Dal and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh to ensure that "there is not even an insinuation that the Catholic Church is trying to indulge in forced conversion."

The CBCI said the lack of understanding of the changes in mass communication had crippled its efforts in communicating to the people about the yeomen services it had been rendering.

However, the Church wanted to ensure that it was not carried away by the technological changes and the onslaught of consumerist values in the media. This was emphasised by the president of the congregation for the Eastern Churches, Cardinal Daoud Moussa, in his inaugural address.

He said even though the technological changes had made communication an instant process and brought the world together, it should be recognised that "such immediate and direct connection did not always guarantee true and genuine communication. No sophisticated equipment or technological progress can connect people, if their hearts and minds are far from each other. For, social communication is not simply transmission of facts and figures; it is not propaganda, it is not marketing of ideas."

Another issue the Church wanted to discuss was the challenges it was facing in its interventions in the educational field. The CBCI office-bearers felt that one of their future conferences would discuss this issue.

The conference is likely to elect new office-bearers. As per the custom, the next president can be either from the Syro-Malabar or Latin since the existing president is from the Syro-Malankara Church.

The Church leadership wants to bring in greater unity between the three rites through inner-Church dialogues. "If we can deepen our spirituality of communion and become solidly one, the Catholic community in India is bound to make a yet greater impact on the building up of a better India," was the message of the Church leadership.

About 150 Bishops, 26 Archbishops and three Cardinals are attending the conference, which is being held in the State after a gap of seven years.

The Apostolic Nuncio, Archbishop Pedro Lopez Quintana, the Secretary General of the CBCI, Bishop Percival J. Fernandez, the vice president of CBCI, Archbishop Vincent Concessao, and the Archbishop of Thrissur, Mar Jacob Thumkuzhy, were among those who spoke.

Media personalities, including the Editor-in-Chief of The Hindu, N. Ram, the Chief of Bureau of NDTV in Chennai, Jennifer Arul, and the General Editor of the Mangalam group of publications, K.M. Roy, are among those who are participating in closed-door sessions at the CBCI event.

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