On 10/12/2007, Sachin Phadte <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Miguel Braganza says: "Most RSS fanatics are atheists ...." Can I please > have the source of this gem of information? > And in what context was it necessary to bring in the RSS in this > discussion? I may have missed reading some of the messages in this thread. > Sachin Phadte
Interesting query from Sachin... To take the debate forward, how does the RSS compare and contrast with the Catholic Church? I know that religious institutions can be pretty fanatical too (though sometimes, the same religious groupings can turn tolerant, liberal or even progressive). Like the contrasts between an Archbishop Romero and a Cardinal Ratzinger. Or the Hinduism of L.K.Advani and that of Swami Agnivesh. Needless to say, one must concede that the RSS is not a "religious" organisation, even though it speaks in the name of religion (for instance, its choice of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad brand). Likewise, the Church is not an overtly political organisation, though it has played a political role at many points of history (both positive and negative). Apart from the agnosticism/atheism of people like M.A.Jinnah and Advani, if I recall right, I don't think "most" of the RSS leaders were non-religious people. Of course, the religious (or lack of religious) views of the RSS matters little here, they being basically and primarily a political movement (their protestations about being a "cultural" group notwithstanding). One very religious Hindu of the century most of us have lived in (Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi) was also a very tolerant Hindu, even more so when it came to understanding The Other, and coping with diversity in a region like South Asia. Of course, the hardline Hindutva (not Hindu!) supporter felt threatened by Gandhi's stance, felt he was selling-out to the Muslims, and simply shot him after a prayer session. (The issue of who was responsible for Gandhi's assassination has also been hotly fought over. The killers' links with the Hindutva supremist organisation was never in doubt; but the RSS never did and does not keep membership records, even though it has been subtly or otherwise lionising the assassins of Gandhi.) The politics-religion link is an interesting if intriguing one. The Christian-Democrats of Western Europe had their own role to play, post World War II. And, not with a small touch of irony, the current-day BJP's ideology of "integral humanism" (a play-on-words probably, cashing in on radical concepts without any intention of accepting the same, like the "Gandhian Socialism" of another era) comes to the saffronites from the ideologues of the Christian-Democrats themselves! FN -- Frederick Noronha http://fn.goa-india.org Ph +91-832-2409490 12000+ downloadable, sharable hi-res photos http://www.flickr.com/photos/fn-goa/
