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Sangath, www.sangath.com, is looking to build a centre for services, training and research and seeks to buy approx 1500 to 2000 sq mtrs land betweeen Mapusa and Bambolim and surrounding rural areas. Please contact: contac...@sangath.com or yvo...@sangath.com or ph+91-9881499458 http://lists.goanet.org/pipermail/goanet-goanet.org/2009-July/180028.html ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Catholics Seek Law To Govern Church Properties By SAR NEWS PANAJI, Goa (SAR NEWS) -- A section of the Catholic laity, including intellectuals from across the country, have demanded a government-enacted legislation to govern properties owned and managed by the Roman Catholic Church in India. The demand basically stems from an apprehension among the Christians of the lack of transparency in the management of assets owned by the Church. Delivering a lecture on ‘Should there be a law to protect the properties of the Church’, organised here July 29 by the All India Catholic Union (AICU), former Supreme Court Justice K.T. Thomas said the Catholic Church’s hesitation to accept enactment of a law for administering their properties was due a fear that a provision for judicial scrutiny would likely expose its expenses and the magnitude of wealth it possesses. “I would say that those who resist any such law could have the sinister motive of misusing the funds and wealth of the religious denominations,” he said, urging the different denominations of the Church to demand such a law. Former Union minister of State for External Affairs and commissioner of the Goa Non-Resident Indians (NRI) cell, Eduardo Faleiro, said that the Goa legislative Assembly was empowered to enact the much- needed legislation, which would enable greater transparency in the administrative and monetary matters of the Church. “The legislative Assembly is competent to enact a new law as it is within the legislative power granted to it by the concurrent list in the Seventh Schedule of the Indian Constitution,” Faleiro said, adding that the new law could be worked out in consultation with the Catholic Church in Goa. He said the existing law in Goa regulating the relations between the Church and the state should be modified for the same reasons and extent, as it was modified in Portugal. The present law, which regulates relations between the Church and the state as well as administration of the Church properties was created by the concordata or a treaty signed between the Holy See (Vatican) and the Portuguese government in 1940, Faleiro said. He said this law was enacted during the Salazar dictatorship and had been repealed in Portugal on the ground that it was unconstitutional and violated the democratic Constitution that came into force in Portugal in 1974 after the Salazar regime. Remy Denis, president of the AICU, which represents the Catholic laity through the 120 dioceses nationwide, said questions were being raised about the Church’s management of its properties. “We all revere the bishop as our guide on matters of faith and morals, but not in matters of property,” he said, adding that his views were not representative of the AICU. He said the Roman Catholic Church in India presently had five times the number of priests as compared to the rest of the world, its budget equivalent to that of the Indian Navy. “It is the second largest employer after the government of India,” Denis said. Meanwhile, an AICU press release said that there were laws governing other major religions in the country such as the Hindu Endowments Act, the Wafk Board Act and the Sikh Gurudwara Act. * * * SAR NEWS COMMENTARY ‘I Disagree’ By John Dayal, SAR NEWS I am responding as the Immediate Past President of the All India Catholic Union. The comments made by various persons at the AICU seminar in Goa – a judge, politician or the mathematician-president of AICU, seem to have been made out of the speakers’ individual areas of knowledge or ignorance of the much larger reality of the state of Christianity in India and the background of the Wakf phenomenon in Islam. This is not surprising because of the cocooned Christianity in Goa – leading from its history under the Portuguese and the class distinctions in that state. Let me take up the issues one by one. I entirely disagree with the statement that the people of the church, the laity, have no faith in the bishops when it comes to property. I have some expertise in this area as once, after leaving journalism, I worked for the Baptist Mission Society of London and came across both incidents of honesty and rank corruption in the church in India where property was concerned – and lay persons were often more guilty than church leaders, though a handful of bishops, Protestant and Catholic, were prima facie guilty of corruption. Prof. Remy Denis’ statement must come out of his experience, and is not based on the larger situation in India, nor is his opinion of bishops shared by the larger membership of the AICU. Laity-bishop relationships are government by the Canon Law and the decisions of the Second Vatican Council. The issue of Church property is complex. Church buildings are one set of properties, institutions are another. In recent years, both are essentially owned by Church trusts, societies or companies registered under the laws of the land. Most of the properties after 1947 have been bought by these societies out of their own money or monies collected from the people in India or abroad through donations coming via the FCRA and Indian Income tax law checkpoints. My own experience is that the Catholic Church and some Pentecostal and Evangelical Churches are buying property and not selling it, as is the case in some CSI and CNI Churches. Churches sell a part of the property sometimes to start institutions, or make use of rising prices of urban property to exchange it for larger acres at lower rates in the suburbs to run bigger institutions. The matter of Wakf has nothing to do with Christianity, or even with Hinduism. Wakf comes out of Islamic theological premises which impose religious pressure on individuals to donate money and property to the faith, and people who die intestate or without a will ensure that the property goes to the community through the institution of the Wakf. In the olden days, this ensured large mosques and serais, orphanages and educational institutions. The Indian government brought them under government control, posted administrative officers and introduced massive corruption. Now, Wakf is known for government-sponsored corruption and red tape. One of Delhi’s biggest private sectors’, Hindu-controlled hotel is built on a Wakf property. Well-minded but ignorant Christians have in the past often tried to impose some sort of a Wakf on the Church properties. One attempt was when an Anglo-Indian member introduced a bill in Andhra Pradesh. The other was in Madhya Pradesh. A vigilant Church, including laity, ensured that these steps were not taken to fruition. What the Indian Church needs is a vigilant laity and committed clergy. All Incidents of Corruption or illegal land transactions can be handled through existing laws. This will leave the Church to manage its landed heritage for the welfare of the community and the Indians at large. SOURCE: SAR News. Editor-in-Chief & Managing Director: Adolf Washington. Barrett Bhavan, SAR News, 2/5, 4th Cross, Vivekananda Nagar, M.S Nagar P.O Bangalore – 560 033, INDIA. Tel : 91-08-25482480. Fax : 91-80-25476706
