Vatican Mobilizing to Oppose Hindu Fanaticism in India

Thousands of victims of the anti-Christian pogroms are still sheltering in the woods.

ROMA (Chiesa) - In the areas of Orissa that have been the theater of anti-Christian attacks, celebrations were held this Christmas without significant incidents. Unlike what happened at Christmas of 2007, when more than a hundred churches and a thousand homes were devastated and burned.

But about 20,000 Christians from the district of Kandhamal, the epicenter of the attacks, continue to stay away from their villages, which they fled in August and September. Their homes have been destroyed, and above all they do not feel sufficiently protected. They are living in tents on the edges of the forest, in a dozen refugee camps. The police are closing the camps one by one, forcing the refugees to go back home in exchange for 10,000 rupees (about 150 euros), 50 kilos of rice, and a roll of plastic to use as a shelter.

On January 4, the supreme court of India - after giving a hearing to the attorney of the archbishop of Bhubaneswar, Raphael Cheenath - criticized the government of Orissa for its late and feeble reaction to the anti-Christian pogrom last summer, and told it to "resign if it is incapable of protecting the minorities." The government of Orissa is headed by the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Biju Janata Dal, the two parties of reference for the Hindu groups that committed the violence.

At the same time as the supreme court was making its pronouncement, at the police station in Cuttack Sister Mena Barwa, the young religious who was raped on August 25 in the village of Nonagon by a group of fanatics, identified two of her rapists, among the ten men under arrest.

But John Dayal, president of the All India Christian Council and of the United Christian Forum for Human Rights, warns that, four months after the pogrom, the danger of a resumption of the violence remains high. Especially after the end of January, when the 6,000 federal agents sent by the central authorities of Delhi will leave Orissa.

Benedict XVI, in the state of the world address that he delivered on January 8 to the diplomatic corps, dedicated just a few brief comments to India, the first alluding to the terrorist attack at the end of November in Mumbai, and the second to the anti-Christian pogroms in Orissa. But both of these events seriously worry Vatican authorities.

As for Hindu extremism, Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, president of the pontifical council for interreligious dialogue, spoke out in an interview with "L'Osservatore Romano" on January 4:

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"In order to understand the dynamics of these events, one must go back to 1989, when the Hindu nationalist party came to power in the state of Orissa. More than a conflict of a religious nature, this is a problem of a social and political character. Catholics are criticized for paying attention to the lower castes, which provide the manual labor for the upper castes. It is objected that Christianity is also a factor of social emancipation.

"Obviously, we Catholics will continue with dialogue. A dialogue, it is worth emphasizing, that is carried forward above all by the local Church, under the attentive guidance of the bishops, with the help of the apostolic nuncio. I myself intend to visit India in the next few months for a meeting with the bishops and Hindu religious leaders, to get a grasp of the situation. Whatever the case, we will continue to call for respect for religious freedom, which presupposes the respect for freedom of conscience, meaning the possibility to choose one's own religion or to change it, to practice it in private and in public.

"But at the same time, another dialogue must be carried forward with the public authorities, whose responsibility it is to guarantee the conditions for real and effective religious freedom, without discrimination or segregation, in free adherence to an organized religious community. All of this is nothing other than what is requested by international law and international conventions, to which India adheres.

"And finally, it is the responsibility of every government to guarantee the physical safety of its citizens, especially when some of them are the victims of physical violence, as in the case that we are talking about. I think, from a practical point of view, that everyone has an interest in effective respect for religious freedom: believers who feel that they are respected and defended in the profession of their faith will be even more willing to collaborate in the material, social, and spiritual well-being of the society in which they are full-fledged members.

"I would like to recall that the unjustifiable violence of which we are speaking does not concern the majority of Hindus and their leaders, who are traditionally peaceful. This is why, in my message on the occasion of the recent celebration of the Diwali, I wanted to reaffirm the necessity of Christians and Hindus working together in the light of the common principle of nonviolence."

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Chiesa is a wonderful source on all things Catholic in Europe. It is skillfully edited by Sandro Magister. SANDRO MAGISTER was born on the feast of the Guardian Angels in 1943, in the town of Busto Arsizio in the archdiocese of Milan. The following day he was baptized into the Catholic Church. His wife’s name is Anna, and he has two daughters, Sara and Marta. He lives in Rome.