Debate A conspiracy in the arrest?

At a recent closed-door seminar in Barcelona organised by the Vatican secret service, known as Opus Dei, participants concluded that “a parallel exists between the present situation in the Occident (Europe) and the fall of the Roman Empire.”

So here is the problem as Christianity sees it: The West, Europe in particular, sees Islam encroaching on all sides, but with declining populations and lack of will power to fight among its people, who are Christians in name only, it has to find others to fight for its survival.

With the return to power of the Congress with their favourite Sonia Gandhi at the helm, Christian organisations worldwide have become much bolder in their attempts to weaken Hinduism and gain Christian soldiers through conversion.

So Subramnian Swamy was probably not far off the mark when he claimed that the campaign against the Kanchi Shankaracharya was part of an international conspiracy working through Sonia Gandhi, except that it is not new. It has been going on for decades.

The idea to use Indian converts to fight Christianity’s war is also not new. The British could maintain their empire only because of their Indian soldiers. The only difference is that the British did not interfere in their soldiers’ religious feelings, especially after the 1857 mutiny, which was mainly due to missionary activity. As R.C. Majumdar wrote:

“The sensitiveness of the sepoys [soldiers] to their religious beliefs and practices and the dread of conversion to Christianity worked as a nightmare upon their minds… A vague dread that the government (with the missionaries) was determined, by hook or by crook, to convert Indians to Christianity pervaded all ranks of society, and the sepoys, fully shared these apprehensions with the rest…”

Here is a history lesson for everyone: Assaulting the religious sensitivities of people is a dangerous enterprise as the British learnt the hard way. But missionaries seem not to have learnt it. Reinhard Bonnke, regarded as the world’s foremost evangelist, stated at a press conference in Kochi that during 20 years of his activity in Africa, the Christian population rose from just 2 per cent to 40 per cent. He went on to add: “And now, India is at the top of my agenda.”

So Christianity’s plan is no secret: Indians are to be turned into pawns in its game for survival against Islam. It remains only to be seen if history repeats itself or fools repeat history.

(N.S. Rajaram has written extensively about Christianity including the book The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Crisis of Christianity.)