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General Forum: Current 'Affairs' | | mataprachaara saBalu nirvahiMchuTapai.... | |
| Law, Order & Religious Conversions
Author: Subhash Agrawal
Publication: The Financial Express
Date: September 25, 2003
Introduction: The impact of the Staines judgement
The recent court judgement in the Staines murder trial has brought welcome relief to most people and a closure of sorts to a sordid and brutal event that shocked the nation, but the ongoing battle over religious rights in India is by no means settled. And even though pro-Hindutva forces have wallowed in their antipathy towards Christian clerics in recent years, the fact is that the controversy over religious conversion is a wider and intense global issue, a debate that predates the Sangh Parivar.
The genesis of the problem between Hindus and Christians perhaps lies in India's colonial history. Towards the turn of the 19th century, British rule in India had already become a contest between two elite rather than an armed clash between the oppressor and the oppressed. In fact, the independence movement was closely tied to the Hindu social reform movement and was waged more through symbolic means than anything else. Songs and odes on India's ancient glory were composed, foreign products were boycotted, English education was seen as a ploy to separate Indians from their social institutions and many Hindu political leaders, who were normally at ease with western clothes, reverted back to local dress. Many things associated with British values came to be shunned or viewed with suspicion, including Christianity.
At independence, conversion was already a burning issue. During the drafting of the constitution, many leaders, including a respectable array of liberals who were otherwise opposed to RSS ideology, supported restrictions on conversions or at least spoke in moral terms against it. These included not just the Mahatma himself, but also Vinobha Bhave, KN Katju and Rajaji. In subsequent years, Hindu-Christian armed clashes occurred regularly in both Madhya Pradesh and Orissa, both Congress-ruled states at the time, and in 1954, a committee set up by the Congress government in Madhya Pradesh accused Christian missionaries of creating "a state within a state" and observed that "the philanthropic activities of Christian missionaries are a mask for proselytization." These events were local and overshadowed by Hindu-Muslim animosity in the aftermath of partition, and consequently went largely unnoticed by national and foreign observers, but public sentiment was genuine and strong enough at the time to force both states to pass a law regulating conversions.
Going beyond India, evangelical activity in many countries, even if innocuously conducted under the most humane garb, has evoked strident reaction from locals. In the past two years, a major public and intellectual debate has raged in both America and Canada regarding the targeting of Jews by evangelical groups. This past summer, a major controversy erupted when the Samaritan's Purse, a major US Christian relief agency run by the son of Billy Graham, disclosed its plans to enter Iraq with aid. Not just the leadership of the Islamic community in America but also a large number of liberal writers denounced the agency for what one commentator called its "barely-concealed attempt to spread the Bible via band-aids and beans."
Just last week, after thousands protested in the streets against the dilution of the importance of Orthodox traditions in the country, the government in Georgia scrapped an accord with the Vatican that would have obliged the country to guarantee Catholics the freedom to perform rites, open schools and study church history. And in neighbouring Russia, the Orthodox Church has openly accused the Vatican of stealing members of its flock and has effectively blocked the pope from visiting the country for many years.
None of these facts justifies acts of violence or intimidation against any church or any religion in India, or to deny them equal rights. In fact, what we need in India is to come down brutally, publicly and quickly against those who threaten the property, life and even lifestyle of anybody else. But what these instances do show is that religious conversion is not simply a legalistic issue or one created by the RSS, as is made out by many spokespeople of various church groups or writers in the national press. It is also, very crucially so, one of social harmony, especially in the context of our unique sociological and historical factors, not all which become false or fake just because the wrong guy spouts them or cynically manipulates.
Meanwhile, the biggest legalistic issue in any liberal country, whatever its version of secularism, ought to be the paramountcy of law and order. This is precisely what has been upheld by the recent judgement.
The author is an analyst of Indian political and business trends and the editor of India Focus, a political risk report for international investors.
Posted by: Mr. Hasya Brahma At: 18, May 2006 10:57:29 AM IST
Still Untouchable: The Politics of Religious Conversion
by Vatsala Vedantam
In their long struggle for equality, India’s dalits, or "untouchables," have often exchanged their Hinduism for Islam, Christianity, Sikhism or Buddhism, believing that they will better their lives by doing so. They have been persuaded that Hinduism, with its varna ashramas (caste distinctions), has been solely responsible for all their ills. But when they switch to other religious faiths and experience the same distinctions -- albeit in different forms – they realize that such a change neither improves their social status nor remedies their economic problems of unemployment and poverty -- the real source of their social discrimination.
A letter written by M. Mary John, president of the Dalit Christian Liberation Movement, to Pope John Paul II during his 1999 visit to India speaks volumes about the treatment meted out to dalit Christians within the churches of India. The dalits are oppressed and persecuted by "the hierarchy, the congregation, the authorities and the institutions of the Catholic Church." Despite the condemnation of such practices by the Catholic Bishops Conference of India, casteism still persists among Christian communities. A state commission on dalits has pointed out that they are "twice discriminated against" -- in society and within the church. At the time of conversion, they are assured that they are being inducted into a religious fold that is egalitarian and free from the twin curses of caste and untouchability. But the reality is altogether different.
Sikh places of worship have separate quarters for dalit Sikhs. High-caste Muslims do not marry dalit Muslims. Dalit Christians can hardly hope to reach any high position within the church. (They are not even allowed to occupy the pews meant for higher-caste Christians.) And Buddhist monasteries have not been able to prevent their converts from continuing their earlier casteist practices.
At the same time, in breaking away from Hinduism, dalits lose out on the basic safeguards provided to them in the Indian Constitution. In 1981, thousands of dalits in southern India converted to Islam to escape social victimization -- only to find that they had forfeited whatever state privileges they enjoyed earlier as Scheduled Caste Hindus. Converted dalits are now fighting for these privileges, having perceived the age-old caste system still dogging their footsteps. The very fact that they still have to label themselves as "dalits" even after conversion in order to seek special privileges exposes the futility of that exercise. Today, India’s dalits are 82 per cent Hindu, 12 per cent Muslims and less than 3 per cent Christian.
A mass conversions of dalits to Buddhism in recent months in India poses the question once again whether religious conversion alone can improve the social and economic status of people who have been marginalized for centuries. Some 50,00 dalits assembled in New Delhi in November to embrace Buddhism. In January another 25,000 followed suit in the southern state of Kerala. Such conversions expose the hypocrisy of the religious and political leaders who exploit the socially and economically backward groups for their own ends.
In the November mass conversion, participants from both northern and southern states converged on India’s capital city. They were led by Ram Raj, an official working for the Indian Revenue Service, who also heads the All India Confederation of Scheduled Caste/Schedule Tribes Organizations. Giving himself a new name and identity after his own conversion, he used the occasion to lash out at the Bharatiya Janata Party -- led Government at the Center, claiming that it had denied opportunities to the dalits.
Subsequently, the converts recited the 22 vows taken by Baba Saheb Ambedkar, founder of the dalit movement in India, who in a similar exercise in 1956 had embraced Buddhism, along with half a million other dalits, "to escape the tyrannies" of Hindu society. Senior monk Buddha Priya initiated the new converts into the Buddhist fold. Surprisingly, well-known Christian activists also participated in the conversion ceremony to provide "moral support" to the dalit movement. Although no Christian literature was circulated, a Syrian Christian bishop who had traveled all the way to New Delhi sat through the ceremony, offering to convert to Christianity anyone who desired it.
Dalits seem to prefer Buddhism to other religions unless they are enticed with gifts or other allurements. The reason is that Ambedkar, who was also one of the main architects of the Indian Constitution, stated that of all religions only Buddhism advocates equality of all human beings as a fundamental principle. Declaring that Lord Buddha alone raised his voice against separatism, and that the religion he taught is the only one which does not recognize caste, the dalit leader exhorted his followers to convert to Buddhism -- "which is a religion of this country" -- rather than Christianity, which enticed the poor and the oppressed "by giving them porridge free of cost."
It has also been argued that Buddhists are accepted more easily in Indian society than other minority groups. Since Buddhism, like Jainism or Sikhism, is an Indic religion, it is not considered alien. Christianity and Islam are both perceived by Hindus even today as the religions of the conquerors and invaders.
"Dalit" literally means depressed. Mahatma Gandhi named these hapless citizens Harijans, meaning "the children of God." In the ancient and much abused system called varna ashrama, citizens were originally divided into castes based upon the professions they followed. Even during the days of British rule, manual workers in India’s villages were placed in the lowest hierarchy of the caste system. It was only after independence in 1947 that the govenment instituted a policy of affirmative action, through its Constitution, to reduce these inequalities.
By reserving 23 percent of all central and state government jobs for Scheduled Castes and Tribes, with comparable reservations for school and university admissions across the country, India paved the way for improving dalits’ professional and educational opportunities. They also have seats in legislatures, state assemblies and Parliament so as to allow them greater participation in the country’s governance. Conversion, unfortunately, only deprives the dalits of these special privileges, which are intended only for Hindu Scheduled Castes and Tribes.
The answer, then, is not in religious conversion so much as in streamlining the system of reservations itself. While this system has gone a long way to better the economic status of India’s 82 million Scheduled Castes and Tribes, it has lost its direction because it is not envisioned as a time-bound program. The earlier beneficiaries and their progeny continue to enjoy its privileges even after half a century. These privileges are now passed on to the second and sometimes to the third generation. Families who have reaped the full benefits of the Indian governments reservation policies have already advanced in both social and economic terms. And they continue to corner desirable jobs and university or school admissions through the reserved quotas.
Result: the poorest sections of the same reserved categories are denied their due. It is not uncommon, especially in rural India, to find poor and illiterate Scheduled Caste workers serving as the bonded laborers of their rich and influential kinsmen. An insidious caste system has thus crept into dalit circles as well. Privileged members of the community do not many those doing menial jobs, since they consider them inferior. A few years ago, the Indian government reduced the opportunities of dalits further by extending reservations to other backward castes. And lately the government in New Delhi has extended reservations in promotions to those who have already benefited by its policies. Consequently, almost every caste is seeking the "backward" tag to claim a piece of the pie.
No wonder this poorest and most backward segment of India’s population is constantly exploited: by politicians for their votes; by religious leaders for their numbers; by their self-styled advocates for power. Despite much touted policies of compulsory primary education, there are no proper school facilities for dalit children, Family planning and other health-care programs rarely reach dalit women. Illiterate, impoverished and vulnerable, the Scheduled Castes cannot even reach the jobs that are earmarked for them because they are not qualified.
These crucial issues are completely ignored by their champions, who prefer to harp on caste discrimination and religious conversion rather than take the real measures that might improve dalits’ lives.
Posted by: Mr. Hasya Brahma At: 18, May 2006 10:56:17 AM IST
de^Samlo nirudyo^ga samasya ro^ju ro^juki perigipo^to^ndi
andaru injani^rlu DaakTarlu yaakTarlu laayarlu sainTishTulu
raajaki^yanaayakulu lekchararlu ku^livaaru
vyaapaarastulu jernalishTulu rowDi^yijam che^se^vaaLLu kalekTarlu chirudyo^gulu kaale^ru kontamandi i^vidhamaina udyo^gaannennukonTunnaaru .....andaridi okaTe^ dhye^yamu...ade^ bratuku teravu....adi e^dainaa kaavachchunu.....
manamu paTTina kunde^luki naalugu kaaLLunDavachchunu....vaaDupaTTina kunde^luki mu^De^ kaaLLunnaayanTaaDu...nammaalsinde^...idi^ ante^...manishi puTTinataruvaata tana bhavishyattulo^ e^miche^staaDani teliyakane^
ilaa raka rakaala avataaraalettutaamu...
matamaarpiDilo^nunnavaaLLu ku^Daa bratakaTaaniki puTTina avataara purushule^
ni^ kampyu^Tar`lo^nunna saafTuve^ru paata kaalam naaTidi ...maadi nyu^versan` lo^Du che^sikommani anTunnaaru....le^dabbaa A varshan` naa kampyu^Tar`lo^ lo^D` che^Saanu adi sariggaa paniche^yaTam le^dani inkokaDanTunnaaDu....ilaanTivi anubhava pu^rvakamugaa telisikonaalsinde^.....nijaanni grahinchaalsinde....ro^jukoka saafTuve^ru maaruto^ndi.....e^dimanchidi?....intakumundunna versan` e^mikaavaali....antaa ayo^mayam.....kaadu...kaadu...e^varsan` ekkuva upayo^gamo^ daaniki maarutu^ unDaali..marala krottavarshan`...vachchinappuDu.....daaniki maaraali......
ennimaarinaa manishi manasu buddhi anta@hraatma ....nityamu sangharshaNaki lo^navutu^...ji^vinchaTaaniki...avusaramaina....sande^SaalistunTaayi
Posted by: Mr. Bhaskar At: 18, May 2006 10:44:36 AM IST
Conversion of Sikhs into Christianity in Punjab
(March 14, 2003)
AMRITSAR: Religious conversions have generally raised the hackles of the clergy and bodies associated with the affected religion. The villages along the national border in Punjab are the latest affected, with cases of conversion of some Sikhs and Hindus to Christianity. Sikh bodies have called for revamping of Sikhism-preaching institutions to combat the trend.
Village Nagoke along the country's border lies in Amritsar district. Lying adjacent to the border, these villages have witnessed upheavals of communal tension. Since independence, however, they have settled down to a predominantly Sikh and Hindu population. Happenings and reports over the last couple of weeks have shown minor signs of a will to accept change in the religious texture. Christian missionary bodies preaching redressal of social ills supplemented with financial help have gained acceptance among a section of the economically backward.
Religious conversion is already a sensitive issue that has raised the hackles in other parts of the country. Here too, whereas some claim it to be a balm that Christianity provides, others dismiss it as downright bribery given in the name of faith. Says one of the young boys whose family has converted to Christianity, "As a child I remember my father coming home drunk and shouting at us without any control. There was no food in the house and we were reduced to beggary. Once, some missionaries came home and taught us lessons for a better life. "This made my father give up his bad habits and he started going to work. With the Lord's blessings things changed for the better. My father adopted Christianity and I followed suit."
Another villager, however, puts it down to giving away of material favours by the missionaries who are convincing the villagers to convert. "When I asked the boys as to why they have converted to Christianity, they said they had been given cash and free education. In our village alone, 5 to 6 people have converted and, of course, their generations to come would also be Christians", he says.
Prayer meetings like this one held regularly in the area preach the message of Christianity which is said to be attracting the populace. Six churches have already come up over an area of 4 or 5 villages. On their part, Sikh experts and religious leaders have called for an awakening on the part of Sikh preachers and social workers to revive the tenets of peace and equality that lie at the core of the Sikh religion too. It is all, they say, about getting the message accross.
Gurbachan Singh Bachan, former Secretary of the Shiromani Gurudwara Prabandhak Committee, says " People who are converting from Hinduism and Sikhism to Christianity are those who have lost understanding of their own religion. "Under the moral and ethical extension programme, the Shiromani Gurudwara Prabandhak Committee, Singh Sabha, Chief Khalsa Diwan, Khalsa institutions and the Government need to educate the people about the values of a religion, and tell them that all religions are equal and no religion teaches us to fight with each other."
Villagers who are against the working of the missionaries have urged imposition of control, if not ban, on their activities before tensions rise further. Somewhere though, this is also a pointer to maladies that have crept into Sikhism and Hinduism that need to be looked into quickly. Former SGPC general secretary Bibi Kiranjot Kaur puts it down as the failure of the committee of religious preachers. "The Sikh preachers who go to the villages and teach the message of the Gurus have failed to reach out to the people and change their attitude. They have not moulded themselves according to the demands of the day. They need to be given orientation and a form of training so they can carry out their duties in an effective manner, as per the demands of the changing times."
The divider between religious groups working to remove social ills and, as alleged, handing out money and blatant incentives for conversion, is a thin one indeed touching on issues of ethics +and religious sentiment. The response, perhaps, lies on which side of that divide one is on.
Posted by: Mr. Hasya Brahma At: 18, May 2006 10:07:08 AM IST
The Psychology of Religious Conversion
Henry Newton Malony
Fuller Theological Seminary
delivered at the
International Coalition for Religious Freedom Conference on
"Religious Freedom and the New Millenium"
Tokyo, Japan May 23-25, 1998
Allow me to begin this address on the psychology of religious conversion by presenting some definitions of terms. Initially, let it be admitted that while we are primarily considering the issue of religious conversion, conversion is a more general term that applies to all changes that involve a transformation of opinion from one belief to another. For example, we might speak of conversion from being a member of the Democratic Party to being a member of the Republican Party in the United States. That would be a sad conversion, in my opinion. Or we might say that a person who was a long-haired, unshaven, unemployed guitar-playing hippie and is now a clean-shaven, business suit-dressed, computer salesman who lives in an upscale condo has gone through a conversion. Further, an auto enthusiast who has switched from purchasing a Volkswagen to buying a Toyota might be described as having been converted from German to Japanese carmakers.
The same word, conversion, applies to those who change their religious belief. For example, it is common to say that a person converted to Catholicism after marrying a spouse who is a member of that church, or it was said in America that Sammy Davis Jr., the late popular singer/dancer, converted to Judaism. The strategic point I wish to make is that while conversion is a term usually applied to religious change, it is in fact a more general term that stands for all significant life changes. More importantly, for our consideration at this conference, the psychological processes involved in religious and in other types of conversion do not differ.
Some writers have asserted that religious conversions result from a process variously called mind control and/or brainwashing. But little or no evidence exists to support such a presumption. For a review of this research you might look at Dick Anthony’s dissertation. However, in all fairness, the senior author I referred to, Margaret Singer, has generalized her presumption to claim that mind control and/or brainwashing is involved in all conversion decisions, especially those which persons later come to regret. That is an important caveat. Most people don’t think of conversion as involving brainwashing or mind control until they reflect on it after the fact and decide they didn’t like what they decided to do.
In litigation with which I am acquainted, Singer inferred these processes were at the core of individuals’ decisions to become Snap-On Tool dealers or defraud the U.S. government. If you are interested in that litigation I can tell you about it. It was outlandish. Nevertheless, my assumption in this address is that the process of social influence involved in religious and all other changes of opinion and belief are the same and that they do not include any unique features unless the conversion situation included physical confinement and/or bodily threat. Across all fields of conversion, very few, if any, situations do include these conditions, and where such abusive examples of social influence exist, they are by no means limited to religion. In fact, labels such as undue influence or coercive persuasion might better be applied in our day to day techniques of product advertising than to religious evangelization.
Thus, I subsume the term conversion under the more general term social influence and contend that the psychological processes involved are the same for the techniques used as well as the decisions that are made. In this address I will attend primarily to the way that conversion decisions are made rather than the influence techniques that are used. But it should never be forgotten that, for me, the decision of a Muslim to become a Moonie is no different than the decision to change from using an electric typewriter to using a computer.
The second clarification I should like to make pertains to my definition of religion. Since religious conversions are our primary concern, I assume that religious conversions are different not in the psychological processes involved but in the content of the decision. As William James said so many years ago, “religion is the feelings, acts and experiences of individuals in relation to that which they consider divine.” Take note of the last phrase, “in relation to that which they consider divine.” This statement is both simple and profound. It delimits the field of interest to which the term religion applies. Religious conversion implies some sort of relationship with divinity. Vocational conversion implies some sort of relationship with jobs and/or professions. Artistic conversion implies some sort of relationship with aesthetics. Culinary conversion implies some sort of relationship with new foods. James implies that to be called religious a person should be interacting with a divine reality. Quite apart from the question of whether that reality exists or not, religious actions are based on this presumption.
Now lest you hurriedly say there are some religious decisions that are not related to the divine, a more contemporary clarification of this understanding of religion was suggested by a writer in 1961 name Lemeret. He proposed that religions are (1) people gathered together around (2) a transempirical idea. I like this definition. It has been called a substantive empirical approach. The value it has is that it delimits the substance or content of religion and can be seen by all observers. In other words, it is empirically verifiable as a social group. It is an elaboration of James’ understanding; through the use of the term transempirical it allows for nontheistic groups, such as Buddhism or Scientology, to be included but retains the idea that the core idea of a religion goes beyond anything that can be verified by the five senses.
Of course, this definition says little about the inner motives that provoke conversion to a new or a different religion. It merely helps us to distinguish religious from other conversion behaviors and helps us to denote religious behavior when we see it. The inciting motivations provoking religious behavior in the first place have been clearly stated by Yenger. He suggested that religion addresses the need to answer three things in life: mysteries, tragedies, and circumstances.
This definition presumes that whenever religious behavior occurs, it can be assumed that the religion is attempting to deal with life’s mysteries, the meaning of life, the meaning of death, tragedies, the disruptions of life, and/or circumstances, the situations in which people find themselves. Mysteries refer to the overarching meaning of life. Tragedies refer to the losses, disappointments, and disruptions of life; circumstances refer to the limiting and confining situations in which people find themselves. Religion provides both constructive and compensatory energy for life in the face of these imponderables. In other words, religion will help make sense of those situations; it will also give the energy to supersede them.
It could be presumed that all persons face these issues. But we need to face the fact that not all persons deal with these issues religiously, in the sense that they do not identify with a group whose identity is shaped around a transempirical belief. This leads to my final assumption, namely, that there is no such thing as unmotivated behavior. Where identification with a “religious” group occurs, it can always be assumed there are motives underlying the behavior. These motives are the three needs that I mentioned earlier: the need to deal with mystery, tragedy, and circumstance. Some groups (for example, Southern Baptists in the United States) use the term to refer to the born-again decision expected of every church member during adolescence. But the term more often implies a decision to align oneself with a new or different group than that to which one was socialized during childhood.
Religious conformity is the term that describes the decision to do what is religiously expected in one’s culture, for example, in Japanese culture, to follow along with the Buddhist and Shinto way of seeing things. Or, in the culture with which I am most acquainted, American culture, to go through a confirmation class provided by the church of your childhood. That is religious conformity. While the motivation might appear different in conformity and in conversion, such a presumption can be easily dis-confirmed by asking the why question of born-again Southern Baptists, United Methodist conformance, or young people attending a Shinto shrine. All of these would answer the same way, regardless of whether that answer came from a yes answer to the invitation to accept Jesus as savior or from a memorization of answers in a church membership booklet, or simply to say I am following what my parents told me.
Each of these would report that they had made decisions relating to mystery and purpose, to tragedy and hope, to circumstance and consolation. You may want to challenge me on this, but I think that is true. And these answers would be similar to what converts to new or different religions might say in answer to the same why question. In other words, an adolescent young person who follows the religion of his childhood might be presumed by an outsider to simply be conforming, but they would never answer the question that way if you ask them, “Why have you done what you have done? Why have you joined this church or aligned yourself with this religion?” They would answer in terms of saying it provides meaning and purpose. Or it compensates for the tragedy of my life, or this or that.
It is quite understandable that cultures react with concern and suspicion when their members do not accept the approved answers to these basic needs. But it should also be admitted that increasingly we live in the modern world, in a pluralistic environment, where there are numerous options for answering these imponderable questions. And there will continue to be those among our young people who don’t really meet the cultural stereotype of the acceptable ways to meet their religious needs. One size does not fit all, if it ever did.
In the remainder of this address I will recount the Lofton and Stark problem-solving model for conversion originally proposed in 1965 and report on its further developments since that time by the writing of an author named Lewis Rambo. The importance of the Lofton and Stark approach is that it was originally penned as an explanatory model for conversion to the Unification Church, a new religion at that time on the American scene. However, I am firmly convinced that the psychological sequence proposed in this model is foundational for religious conversion wherever it occurs. The value of Rambo’s less sequential model is that it provides a model whereby individuals can enter the conversion process in a non-conflicted way.
As Bainbridge has observed, the Lofton and Stark model unites the tradition of strained theory and social influence theory in a creative manner. Their twofold sequence begins with the experience of dis-equilibrium, a personal strain and stress, and continues with contextualizing that experience within a group situation. That is, the influence of a social situation on the way in which an answer to the problem is found. These are called predisposing sets of circumstances that interact with a disposing event. The authors call these sets of sequential steps a stage of problem-solving model.
The conversion process begins with three predispositions: (1) an inclination to seek answers to the mysteries, tragedies, and the circumstances of life through religion and (2) a sense of an enduring frustration that (3) has not been met through one’s present faith. These feelings prompt individuals to become religious seekers. They are oriented toward the kind of answers that might come from a transempirical source. Notice how this fits with my earlier definition of religion and the needs that are met.
It is this mood that sets the disposing events and leads to religious conversion. A social encounter occurs in which seeking persons meet and interact with members of a religious group who have already found the answer to the questions being asked. Their inner predisposing attentiveness makes them susceptible to the external situational contingencies in a way that would not be true of those not asking those questions. Unification Church members in the San Francisco area met buses coming into the city and asked youth who looked lost and disoriented to supper, a method based on the assumption they would be open to religious answers to their predicament. This contact was followed by intense interaction between seekers and influences wherein religious answers were provided within consistent social support.
As the conversion process progressed, seekers were encouraged to engage in further study of the group’s approach and to cut off their contact with those outside the group who might deplete their newfound approach. These actions solidified the group’s understanding within the sequence of the experience of the seeker. Now at what point one could say that conversion has occurred is an unsettled issue. The question remains, at what point in the process could a person finally be said to be converted. A colleague and I constructed an ongoing model wherein conversion might be conceived as a continuing process, during which the seeker was never fully converted but is nevertheless increasingly incorporated into the religious group.
Let us turn, finally, to the conceptualization of Lewis Rambo. His approach, like that of Lofton and Stark, is a model that begins with a crisis. However, his model attends seriously to the truth that many in the modern world do not acknowledge a predisposing sense of frustration prior to the beginning of the conversion process. Lofton, in a 12-year follow-up to his and Stark’s 1965 seminal article, also admits that this lack of strain does occur among many converts. Rambo contends that the strain may play a secondary role to the social context in which persons find themselves before they ever admit to the crises that lead them into the conversion process. The crisis may develop, therefore, by osmosis, as well as by personal experience.
This would accord with many in today’s world who report that religious participation is based primarily on friendship and only secondarily on belief. Nevertheless, one is convinced that the conversion process is only partially complete until and unless social relationships go beyond friendship association and result in some transempirical answers to the imponderable questions of mystery, tragedy, and circumstance.
It is important to recognize, nevertheless, that all behavior, from birth to death, occurs within a social context. As psychologists we are never able to measure the absolute distinction between intelligence and achievement. By the time we are able to assess infants they have already interacted with their social environment to the extent that we cannot isolate innate ability from what they have achieved in their interrelationships. So it is with conversion. There is no such thing as a completely autonomous decision to accept one religion or another. Behavior always occurs in a social context, as Rambo forcefully has said.
As much as some theorists might like to presume, the idea of autonomous decisions is illusory. The social revivalist inducements to accept Christianity I grew up with in the American South are not different from the love bombing in the religious movements. As with commercial advertisements, the influence process does induce the need as well as meet it. The processes are always the same, but some groups use them more intentionally than others. The socially accepted forms of being religious in the societies of the world that engage in disapproval and social control of new religions exemplify the well-known theories of social accommodation and power struggles. They are attempting to protect their turf by projecting fault and pseudo-theorizing in the case of religious conversion. And such thinking had been declared personal opinion, not scientific reasoning, in the American courts.
Posted by: Mr. Hasya Brahma At: 18, May 2006 10:06:02 AM IST
avunaMDI...
proddunalEchina daggara nuMDi raatri varakU ekkaDO oka chOTa ilaaMTi bahiraMga mITiMg`lu, mataprachaaraalu jarugutunnaayi anaDaMlO elaaMTi saMdEhamUlEdaMDi. aMtEMduku proddunnE E Ti.vi Chaanal` peTTinaa I mata prachaara prasaMgaalE vastuMTaayi. prabhutvaM ilaaMTi mataprachaara sabhalanu raddu chEsEvidhaMgaa charyalu tIsukOvaali. raashTra muKyamaMtri gaaru kUDaa A mataaniki cheMdinavaaru kaabaTTi vaaru yaddhEchchagaa mataprachaara sabhalanu mariMta ekkuvagaa nirvahistunnaaru. alaaMTappuDu I mataprachaara sabhalanu nirOdhiMchaDaM jarigEpanEnaMTaaraa ...............................?
Posted by: Ms. Veena k At: 17, May 2006 1:29:36 PM IST
evaDaDDukunTADanDI? okavELa evaDainA EmainA anTE, daurjanyam chEyaDamO, adEdO kEsu peTTaDamO jarugutundi. prabhutvamE prOtsahistunnappuDu iha pOlIsulu Em chEstArulEnDi. kAnI mA UrlO(sontUru) 10 ganTalaki annI bandu chEyAlani chAlA nikkachchigA pATistunnAru I madhya. alA anni chOTlA jarigitE manchidE. chUddAm , eppuDO ekkaDO rivalyUshan vastundEmO
Posted by: Bahud♥♥rapu Baatasaari At: 16, May 2006 9:59:30 PM IST
ee mata prachaara sabhalu nirvahiMchavalasina avasaraM lEdaninEnu aMTaanu. kaadaMTaaraa ?
prabhutvamE I mata prachaara sabhalanu prOtsahistuMdani naa abhipraayaM. lEkuMTE yemiTaMDi ee mata prachaara sabhalu pOlIs`la anumatitO paaTu koMta rusumu chelliMchi yadhdhEchchagaa nirvahiMchukOvachchaTa. parmishan ichchiMdE taDavugaa hOrettiMchE SabhdakaalishyaMtO prajaanikaaniki ibbaMdi kaligistunna maaTaa vaastavaM. ardharaatri aparaatri anilEkuMDaa 24 gaMTalU pratI EriyaalO kanIsaM reMDu sabhalainaa nirvahistunnaaranaDaMlO saMdEhaMlEdu. ippuDu oka aDugu muMdukEsi iLLa madhyalO oka kaaLI sdhalaanni lIjuku tIsukoni akkaDi vaaraMdarinI pOguchEsi raatri 7gaMTalaku modalaina praardhana tellavaarujaamuna 7gaMTalainaa avvaDaMlEdaMTE AScharyaM anipiMchaDaMlEdu. idi nijaM. prativaaraaniki reMDu saarlu ilaa ardharaatri praardhanalu nirvahiMchi prajaanikaanni ibbaMdi peDutunnaaru. asalE vEsavikaalaM aMdaraM ArubayaTa challanigaaliki nidrapOdaamaMTE I hOrettiMchE Sabhdha kaalushyaMtO nidhrapaTTadu, iMTlO paDukuMdaamaa aMTE vEDiki nidrapaTTadu. asalE afIs`lanuMDi / rOjuvaari panuluchEsi alasipOyi vachchina vaariki iTu iMTa nidrakaruvai, aTu afIs`lO baDalika ekkuvai satamatamai pOtunnaaru.
ippaTikaina prabhutvaM mElukoni I mata prachaara saBhalanu ApE vidhaMgaanainaa chUDaali, lEdaa prajaanikaaniki ibbaMdikalagakuMDaa takkuva SabdaalatO nirvahiMchukOnETaTTu pratyEka charyalu tIsukOvaali. nEnu chadivaanu "yunifaiD pOlIs sarvIs`' ani krottagaa peTTaaru kRushNaajillaalO. aMdulOni aMSaalannI baanE vunnaayi. karekTugaa vaaTini paaTistE baanEvuMTuMdi. asalu I yunifaiD pOlIs sarvIs uMdi annadi chaalamaTuku evvarikI telIdu. ilaaMTi vaaTiki vistruta prachaaraMchEyaali prabhutvaM. appuDu chaalaa varakU I mITiMg`lu, mataprachaara sabhalu nirvahiMchuTa taggutuMdi. eMdukaMTE oka maik okarOju vaaDinaMduku iMta rusumu chelliMchaali mariyu iMta sowMD`n#E peTTaalani ani pratyEka kaMDIshan&s unnaayi. al;aanE vaaru nijaMgaa sowMD aMtE peDutunnaaraalEdE anEdi chUsukOvaDaaniki oka adhikaarini niyamiMchaali. prastutaM alaa jaragaDaMlEdanipistuMdi. mata prachaara sabhalu nirvahiMchE pradESaM daggaranuMdi kaMplEMT vastEgaani yaakshan tIsukOmu aMTunnaaru pOlIsulu. asalu kanIsa baadhyata vaaru nirvahiMchaaligaa...
mari mIrEmaMTaaru......
Posted by: Mr. Narayanarao T At: 16, May 2006 8:04:59 PM IST
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