Book review: "Holy Warriors: A Journey into the Heart of Indian Fundamentalism" by Edna Fernandes

Not only is India home to all the major faiths, it is also host to virtually every type of religious fanatic. But what drives these “holy warriors” of various faiths? Their actions sometimes have tragic consequences. In this a fascinating, disturbing, brave and at times funny book, British Indian journalist Edna Fernandes explores the world of Indian fundamentalism. By travelling to areas of past conflicts and interviewing a number of key figures, she reveals an interesting picture of a country where the forces of fundamentalism are very much alive as in the past.

In Jammu and Kashmir, the only Muslim majority state in India, Fernandes finds a region still suffering from the wounds of a violent insurgency that broke out in 1989. Between 40,000 and 100,000 people are thought to have been killed here. Both local Muslims and outside agitators supported by Pakistan have been involved in the militancy. Kashmir is the unfinished business of partition: for the militants and Pakistan it is a question of territory in the name of Islam, while for India it is a question of territory in the name of secularism. A fall out of the insurgency is that hundreds of thousands of Kashmiri Brahmins have had to flee their ancestral homeland due to threats from militants, and their tragic plight is borne out in the book.

In the small, rural town of Deoband in the Hindu heartland of Uttar Pradesh, Fernandes visits a madrassa known as Darul-Uloom, the House of Knowldge. This is no ordinary school; it is the second most important Islamic academic institution in the world. Here the gates of ‘ijtihad’ (independent thinking) are firmly closed and a rigid, puritanical version of Islam is taught. Darul-Uloom was established soon after the Indian Mutiny in 1857 and since then thousands of Deoband-affiliated madrassas have been established worldwide, particularly in the tribal regions of Pakistan and Afghanistan. Although Muslim leaders in Darul-Uloom stress on the peaceful message of Islam, some of its sister schools teach a more radicalised version of it.

Fernandes is from a Goan Catholic background and there are some delightful reminisces about her childhood throughout the book. It was in Goa in the sixteenth century that St Francis Xavier, outraged by the licentiousness of the Portuguese colonialists as well as how Indian converts to Christianity continued their earlier religious practices, requested the Inquisition. The Inquisition only ended in 1812. Fernandes finds a Goa today that is changing fast. On the one hand, there’s a rising Hindu conscientiousness with the BJP party trying to rake up old history and undermine the church; and on the other, there’s a lot of external influences from Delhiites, foreigners and people from Mumbai. While old churches are razed to make way for new apartment blocks and hotels, criminal gangs from Russia bring prostitution and drugs.

The Protestant powers that came to India were initially slower than their Catholic counterparts to see the opportunity for missionary work, but eventually they too encouraged it. Despite their obvious contributions to education and healthcare, Christian missionaries in India remain controversial. They have been accused by Hindu hardliners of using forceful and fraudulent means to convert Hindus to Christianity. In recent years there have been attacks on Christians including priests, nuns and missionaries.

One area where Christian missionaries did have a big impact was the north-east. Here the overwhelming majority of the population is Christian. In the restive state of Nagaland, Fernandes encounters a people who have been fighting for a separate homeland. The Nagas are not Aryan or Dravidian but of Mongoloid stock. They were one-time tribal headhunters before they were converted by American Baptists in the nineteenth century. In terms of culture, language, race and religion they see little in common with other Indians. “Nagaland for Christ” is the call of the Naga nationalists, but Fernandes is sceptical of their chances of success as they have little support from powerful external allies.

In Punjab, Fernandes finds the situation is a lot calmer today than at the height of Sikh militancy in the eighties. The storming of the Golden Temple by the Indian Army to flush out armed militants, and the gunfight that ensued at Sikhism’s holiest shrine, led to the assassination of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in October 1984. In retaliation many Sikhs were openly butchered in Delhi and other parts of northern India, which only made calls for a separate Sikh nation, Khalistan, even louder. The man who led the crackdown on the Khalistan movement was K. P. S. Gill, former Director General of Police (DGP) Punjab, and there’s a fascinating interview with him in the book. By the mid-nineties there was little support left for Khalistan as the activities of the militants didn’t endear them well with the community. However, a sense of grievance felt by Sikhs remains because grave human rights abuses were committed and the guilty were not punished.

The final part of the book deals with Hindu nationalists. There’s a vivid account of the Gujarat riots in 2002 in which Muslim owned businesses, homes, apartments, vehicles and places of worship were systematically targeted and destroyed by Hindu fanatics. The violence left at least 2,000 people dead and up to 140,000 Muslims in refugee camps. Fernandes was able to get a good picture of what actually happened because she visited the area just a few weeks after the riots began. There was evidence that Narendra Modi’s hard-line BJP government was complicit in the violence, yet it was retuned to power in the state elections later that year. The irony was that this all happened in the same state where Mahatma Gandhi was born.

There are interviews with two firebrand Hindu nationalist leaders - Bal Thackeray and Praveen Togadia. Thackeray formed Shiv Sena in 1966 to stop south Indians coming to Bombay and taking the jobs of Marathis; but as the city became a melting pot of people from all over India he transformed the prejudices of his party to be more explicitly anti-Muslim. To Thackeray the Muslims in India are the enemy within and they should always know their place. Togadia, leader of Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), is arguably more extreme. He has publicly defended the Gujarat riots and called Sonia Gandhi “that Italian bitch”. He believes India should drop a nuclear bomb on Pakistan to be rid of terrorism forever. There’s also an interview with Yukta Mookhey, former Miss India and Miss World, who campaigned for the BJP in 2004 general elections. Yukta is passionate about her country; she wants to help the common man and be remembered for more than beauty, but she naively thinks the BJP will help her fulfil all this.

There’s a glimpse into the world of the RSS, the mother of all Hindu nationalist organisations. At a RSS shakha in Delhi Fernandes finds men dressed in khaki shorts doing marches and exercises. They may look like boy scouts but their ideology is far from comical. Based on 1930s European fascist movements, RSS wants to create a theocratic Hindu state in which the minorities, particularly Muslims and Christians, are reduced to being second-class citizens. Central to the RSS ideology is the belief that Hindu submissiveness is to blame for India’s turbulent past in which the Hindu has been the constant victim. First, the Hindu was the victim of the Muslim invaders, and then the British imperialists. Today, he is the victim of the minorities and Pakistan.

This is an interesting book which I enjoyed reading just like the author’s other book “The Last Jews of Kerala”. It is well written and quite objective. Fernandes is a good observer, has an eye for detail and brings her characters to life. She is not shy to express some of her her own views. Where the book does fall short is seeing the bigger picture. How strong are the secular forces in India? To what extent do class and caste play in sectarian violence? How has bad governance played a role? What about expatriate Indians and their influence on fundamentalist groups? The book is not an extensive study, but it does give a valuable overview of the various sectarian fault lines in the country today.

Since the book was published in 2007 there have been more instances of terrorism and sectarian violence in India. This shows, as highlighted in the book, there are clearly some leaders who are willing to exploit and fan the flames of bigotry. Communalism is very rarely spontaneous and nearly always manufactured. One only hopes that with time things will improve. That of course remains to be seen.

Bono on Jesus

Bono is the lead singer of the Irish rock band U2. He was born in Dublin as the son of a Catholic father and Protestant mother. U2 was one of the most successful bands in the 1980s and 1990s with hits like "Mysterious Ways," "Where The Streets Have No Name," and "Beautiful Day." There are few people in the music industry like Bono who have done so much for the poor and hungry in places like Africa. He was involved in Bob Geldof's Band Aid and Live Aid projects in the 1980s, and later helped Geldof organize Live 8 project in 2005. He has successfully enlisted the help of powerful leaders in a variety of spheres including government, philanthropic organizations, religious institutions, popular media, the business world, as well as spearheading new organizational networks himself, for global humanitarian relief. Another cause he has firmly believed in is racial equality. He wrote a song called “Silver and Gold” for Steve Van Zandt’s Artists Against Apartheid, and participated in Van Zandt’s anti-apartheid single "Sun City". Bono and his band-mate, The Edge, attended the Festival Against Racism in Hamburg, Germany, in 1993. He has received three nominations for the Nobel Peace Prize, and was deservedly awarded an honorary knighthood by Queen Elizabeth II in 2006.

Once in an interview with French music journalist and novelist Michka Assayas, Bono was asked what he thought about Jesus. Many people, non-Christians as well as non-religious, believe Jesus was a great teacher and reformer but they are reluctant to call him the Son of God. This is what Bono had to say:

Assayas: Christ has his rank among the world’s great thinkers. But Son of God, isn’t that far-fetched?

Bono: No, it's not far-fetched to me. Look, the secular response to the Christ story always goes like this: he was a great prophet, obviously a very interesting guy, had a lot to say along the lines of other great prophets, be they Elijah, Muhammad, Buddha, or Confucius. But actually Christ doesn't allow you that. He doesn't let you off that hook. Christ says: No. I'm not saying I'm a teacher, don't call me teacher. I'm not saying I'm a prophet. I'm saying: "I'm the Messiah." I'm saying: "I am God incarnate." And people say: No, no, please, just be a prophet. A prophet, we can take. You're a bit eccentric. We've had John the Baptist eating locusts and wild honey, we can handle that. But don't mention the "M" word! Because, you know, we're gonna have to crucify you. And he goes: No, no. I know you're expecting me to come back with an army, and set you free from these creeps, but actually I am the Messiah. At this point, everyone starts staring at their shoes, and says: Oh, my God, he's gonna keep saying this. So what you're left with is: either Christ was who He said He was—the Messiah—or a complete nutcase. I mean, we're talking nutcase on the level of Charles Manson. This man was like some of the people we've been talking about earlier. This man was strapping himself to a bomb, and had "King of the Jews" on his head, and, as they were putting him up on the Cross, was going: OK, martyrdom, here we go. Bring on the pain! I can take it. I'm not joking here. The idea that the entire course of civilization for over half of the globe could have its fate changed and turned upside-down by a nutcase, for me, that's far-fetched …

What Bono is saying here is that Jesus was either mad, like self-proclaimed messiahs like Charles Manson and David Koresh, or he was who he said he was. Given that a mad man wouldn’t have had such an impact or inspired as many followers as Jesus has done, we have good reasons to accept Jesus’ claims and centre our lives on him. The ultimate proof of his identity is, of course,the Resurrection for which there were many witnesses at the time. When we centre our lives on Jesus we become less self-centred and more self-giving. In an industry which is well known for its eccentric and narcissistic characters, Bono deserves credit for standing up for fine humanitarian causes.

Mangalore plane crash: lessons need to be learnt

India had experienced a relatively safe period in civil aviation history over the last decade until the morning of Saturday 22 May 2010, when Air India Express flight IX 812 from Dubai overshot the runway at Bajpe Airport, Mangalore, and plunged into the valley below, killing almost everyone onboard. Air India Express is a low-cost subsidiary of India’s national carrier Air India, and most of the passengers on this flight would have been low-income expatriate workers in the Gulf. Only eight passengers managed to jump out of a gap in the fuselage and escape, while the remaining 158 passengers and crew were killed. Many of these people would have been looking forward to spending a short break with their family and friends. Sadly, apart from the lucky few, they met their end soon after their Boeing 737-800 aircraft touched down.

Already the suspicion is falling on the commander of the plane, Capt Zlatko Glusica, who was a British national of Serbian origin. Eyewitness reports suggest the plane landed some 2,000 feet past the touchdown zone. The plane then veered off the runway, after suffering a suspected tyre burst, and crashed through the airport perimeter wall to the valley below. Bajpe Airport has a reputation for being a difficult airport because it is located on a hilltop with a drop of 100 metres on all sides. Although the runway is sufficient in length for most small aircraft, such as the Boeing 737, the margin for error is small with little overshoot space. Pilots are required to undergo special training before they operate from Mangalore.

The “black boxes” and the cockpit flight recorder, which have been recovered from the crash site, will be crucial in piecing together exactly what went wrong. The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) in India will be responsible for carrying out the investigation. However, one must bear in mind that the DGCA is an integral part of the government of India, and whatever its findings they will not be perceived to be truly independent. Previous investigations have tended to pin the blame on the pilot, even though other factors may have been involved, and an air of mystery still surrounds many past accidents. "To my knowledge in the last 50 years no inquiry report has been made public," Kapil Kaul, head of the Centre for Asia-Pacific Aviation in South Asia, told Reuters.

The Indian aviation industry has enjoyed phenomenal growth over the past decade with a number of new private airlines starting operations and many Indians taking to the skies. India’s air safety record has been remarkably good during this time. A number of near misses in recent years at Indian airports, including Mumbai and Delhi, have, however, raised question marks about whether the infrastructure is keeping pace with the growth in air traffic in the country. From personal experience, I think there is a general problem with all types of infrastructure not keeping pace with economic progress in India. This adversely affects safety. "Safety standards in Indian aviation have been on the wane for the last six years. Efforts are being made to correct the drift, but the systematic rot is so deep ... we are not likely to see any improvement in safety unless drastic changes are made," A. Ranganathan, an airline safety consultant and pilot instructor, told Reuters.

I do hope the DGCA will conduct a proper investigation of this accident. They owe it to the victims, their families, and Indian air passengers in general. Apart from the obvious suspicion of pilot error were there other factors that could have contributed to the disaster? Was there any communication problem between the Serbian pilot and his Indian co-pilot? Were they sufficiently well trained? Was fatigue a factor? Was the runway dangerous? Did the airline’s procedures contribute in any way? Is Mangalore waiting to happen at other “table-top” airports in the country like Kozhikode? This would be a good time to carry out such a review. It is quite easy to blame the dead pilot for the crash, for he has no voice to defend himself. The attitude should be to do as thorough an investigation as possible and learn from the mistakes in order to avert the possibility of a similar accident in the future.

It has emerged that the Environment Support Group (ESG) had objected to the building of the second runway at Bajpe Airport on the grounds that the design simply did not conform to the most basic national and international standards of airport design. Twice it took the case to the Karnataka High Court, but the case was dismissed. Finally the ESG petitioned the Supreme Court, which too dismissed the plea while emphasising that laws and norms be followed while expanding the airport. Not heeding this direction, construction of the second runway began in 2004 without a techno-economic assessment, feasibility study, or even a comprehensive Environment Impact Assessment. "This was no accident, but apparently the failure of officials in ensuring proper construction of the second runway at the airport resulted in the tragedy," alleged Leo F Saldanha, coordinator of ESG. The ESG had previously suggested a more appropriate location for the second runway would have been towards north of the old runway. This option was not even considered, as the acquisition of such lands would displace about seventy large landholding families that were well connected politically.

I do have the highest regard for Indian pilots, who I believe can be matched to the best in the world. Having flown into some dicey Indian airports in the past, such as the old Cochin Airport, which offer very little room for error, I know that it was the skill of the pilot more than anything else that ensured nothing went wrong. But relying on the skills of the pilot alone without the support of the underlying infrastructure is risky, especially at a time when Indian aviation is experiencing high growth. In an industry in which safety is critical it is important that standards are not compromised. It is essential that proper investments be continuously made to ensure the highest levels of safety are always maintained. If India is serious about the safety of its air passengers, it must have an independent air safety board which is transparent and free of political manipulation.

Despite this tragic accident, air travel remains incredibly safe. It is statistically safer for you to travel on a commercial airliner than it is for you to cross the road. Improvements in technology and lessons learnt from past mistakes have made air travel safer. Air travel is increasing worldwide. However, the fact remains that since an aircraft is a machine and a human being is responsible for flying it, there is always the risk of something going wrong. The best we can do is to minimise that risk, which involves learning the lessons from accidents such as this one in Mangalore and taking safety seriously.

Greece: from empire to economic disaster

The news coming out of Greece these days is not good. The country is in serious economic trouble, after racking up debt to the tune of around 115% of GDP, and the government has been forced to go cap in hand to the IMF and EU for a bailout. Riots have broken out in protest against severe austerity measures, and the crisis has sent shockwaves through global stock markets. What a contrast to the times of ancient Greece, when during just one century of splendour under King Philip and his son Alexander the Great, the country was at the centre of an empire that stretched all the way from Egypt to northern India. Although this period of greatness was brief, the intellectual and creative achievements of the Greeks had a profound influence on the history of mankind.

Greek Empire

Greece’s rise to prominence started after the defeat of the Persian Empire which attacked Athens in 480 BC. Then followed the Golden Age of Greece, in which there were great advances in the fields of government, art, philosophy, drama and literature. Great thinkers of that time included Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Socrates, Plato and Aristotle. A form of governance known as “democracy” became established in Athens and other city states. King Philip of Macedon, from the kindred kingdom just north of Greece which is today known as Macedonia, took control of all Greece following the Battle of Chaeronea in 338 BC. He developed what is known as the Macedonian phalanx, an infantry formation which proved to be lethal on the battlefield. Philip had had a thoroughly good Greek education and he ensured his son Alexander also received the same. After his conquest of Greece, he set his sights on Persia but was assassinated. It’s rumoured his wife, Queen Olympias, was jealous Philip had married a second wife and secretly conspired to kill him.

Alexander ascended the throne, and in 334 BC crossed into Asia, defeated a not much bigger Persian army and captured a number of cities in Asia Minor. In 332 BC he took Egypt from the Persians and built great cities at Alexandretta and Alexandria. In 331 BC he marched into Babylon and at Arbela, near the ruins of Nineveh, he defeated the Persian emperor Darius III. Then Alexandar made a military parade of Central Asia, going all the way to northern India. There he fought a great battle on the Indus against the Indian King Porus. The Macedonian troops encountered war elephants, which terrified them, but eventually they emerged as victors.

Alexander was forced to head back west when his troops refused to go further into India. He sought to win over his new subjects and assumed the robes and tiara of a Persian king. He arranged a number of marriages between his Macedonian officers and Persian and Babylonian women - the famous "Marriage of East and West" meant to symbolize the new racial unity he was hoping to create. He did not achieve the integration he planned, and he died in 323 BC when a fever seized him after a drinking bout in Babylon. Immediately his vast dominion fell to pieces, and the heady days of Alexander came to an end.

Early Church

The result of Alexander’s conquests and his policies was that elements of Greek civilization combined, in various forms and degrees, with other elements taken from conquered civilisations. This was known as Hellenism. Although the nature of Hellenism varied from place to place, it did provide the Eastern Mediterranean with a certain degree of unity that opened the way to Roman conquest, and then the preaching of the gospel. Roman law and Hellenistic culture were the context in which the early church took shape.

The Romans were not great thinkers like the Greeks, but they were very pragmatic people. They built well paved and well guarded roads that connected distant provinces, and since trade flourished travel was constant. The circumstances in the first century favoured the spread of Christianity. In other aspects the circumstances were a threat to Christianity. To communicate their faith in the midst of this Hellenistic culture, Christians found two philosophical traditions particularly attractive and helpful: Platonism and Stoicism.

Platonism is the philosophy associated with Plato, who criticized the ancient gods and taught about a perfect and immutable supreme being. Plato believed in the immortality of the soul, and he affirmed that far above this world of fleeting things there was a higher world of abiding truth.

Stoicism is a school of philosophy founded by Zenon. It teaches the development of self-control and fortitude as a means of overcoming destructive emotions; becoming a clear and unbiased thinker allows one to understand the universal reason (logos). A primary aspect of Stoicism involves improving one’s ethical and moral well-being.

Defence of the faith

The objection to Christianity on the part of many cultured pagans was not purely an intellectual matter, but it was deeply rooted in class prejudice. The majority of early Christian converts in the Roman World were from the lower sections of society. The cultured pagans could not conceive the possibility that this Christian rabble were more enlightened than them. To them Christianity was the religion of a peasant from Galilee. Jewish teachers had never risen to the level of Greek philosophers; so if anything good is found in Jewish Scripture, this was because the Jews copied the Greeks.

Some Christians, such as Tertullian, believed many of the heresies that circulated in their time were the result of mixing pagan philosophy with Christian doctrine, and they insisted on a radical opposition to pagan culture. Tertullian’s “Address to the Greeks” is an attack on everything the Greeks considered valuable, and a defence of the “barbaric” Christians. Since the writings of the Jewish prophets such as Moses are much older than those of Plato or Homer, any agreement between Greek philosophy and the religion of the Christian “barbarians” is because the Greeks derived their wisdom from the barbarians.

Other Christians took a different stance. On becoming a Christian, Justin Martyr did not cease being a philosopher, but rather took upon himself the task of doing “Christian philosophy”. He claimed that there were several points of contact between Christianity and pagan philosophy. For instance, Plato and Socrates believed in a Supreme Being and life after death. The partial agreement between the philosophers and Christianity could be explained by the doctrine of the Logos, a Greek word meaning “word” and “reason”. The Gospel of John affirms that in Jesus the logos or “word” was made flesh. Thus, according to Justin, what happened in the incarnation was that the underlying reason of the universe, the logos or Word of God, was made flesh. Other early Christian intellectuals such as Augustine and Origen also drew on Greek philosophy to explain and defend Christian doctrine. While accepting truths found in the philosophers, they insisted on the superiority of the Christian revelation.

Other Greek influences

All the New Testament gospels were written in Greek. The word “Christ” is the English translation of the Greek word Khristós meaning "the anointed one"; and “Christian” means “belonging to Christ”. The ancient Greek word “Ichthus” means "fish". It was used by early Christians as an acronym for "Jesus Christ, God's Son, Savior": I=Jesus, Ch=Christ, Th=Theou (God's), U=Uios (Son), S=Soter (Savior).

In the first few centuries after Christ, when the early Christians faced persecution in the Roman Empire, they used the fish symbol as a secret symbol to identify safe meeting places and tombs as well as a fellow believer in Christ:

"…when a Christian met a stranger in the road, the Christian sometimes drew one arc of the simple fish outline in the dirt. If the stranger drew the other arc, both believers knew they were in good company. Current bumper-sticker and business-card uses of the fish hearken back to this practice. The symbol is still used today to show that the bearer is a practicing Christian."

—Christianity Today, Elesha Coffman, "Ask the Editors".

Summary

Empires never last but their legacies often do. However miserable the situation is in Greece today, there’s no doubt that the creative output of its brief Golden Age of antiquity still endures with us. Probably the biggest contribution of ancient Greece to our modern world is democracy. Greek philosophy also had a profound influence on man and still continues to provoke intellectual thought. It was often used by pagans to attack Christianity, but many early Christians also embraced it to show that Christians too could do philosophy. Any shortcomings in Greek philosophy, they said, could be answered by the fullness and superiority of the Christian doctrine.

St Thomas Christians

In the Southern Indian state of Kerala, where I originally come from, there is a very strong tradition that it was none other than Thomas, the apostle who famously doubted Jesus’ resurrection "until I have placed my hands in the holes left by the nails and the wound left by the spear," who came there in the first century and baptised their ancestors. For this reason they are known as St Thomas Christians. According to the tradition, St Thomas landed at the ancient port of Kodungallur, converted some of the local Brahmins with the aid of miracles and established seven churches. He then headed eastwards to the ancient temple town of Mylapore, on the outskirts of modern Chennai, where he was eventually martyred. His followers built a tomb and monastery over his grave which is today one of the principle pilgrimage centres in Southern India.

For the St Thomas Christians, this tradition is more than a myth. It is a belief, passed down from one generation to the next, which is central to their identity and place in Indian society. It is neither a recent tradition, for many travellers to Kerala, dating back to at least the sixth century, testify to it. I wish to examine here the St Thomas tradition, and what evidence there is to support it.

The Acts of Thomas

The "Acts of Thomas” is an apocryphal text that was not included in the New Testament because of its clearly mythical qualities. It is believed to be the work of a Syrian Gnostic romancer in the early third century. The text tells the story of how the apostles cast lots as to where they should go, and India fell to the lot of Thomas. As Thomas was very reluctant to go to India, Jesus appeared in a supernatural way to Abban, the envoy of an Indo-Parthian king called Gondophares, and sold Thomas to him to be his slave. After reaching the court of Gondophares, in northwestern India, Thomas was entrusted with the task of building a new palace for the king. The king gave him money to buy materials and hire workmen, but Thomas spent the money on the poor and needy. The king became angry and put Thomas in prison, but then his brother Gad died and miraculously returned to life. Upon his return he told Gondophares of the magnificent heavenly palace he had seen, which was being built through Thomas’ gifts to the poor. The king and his brother were converted and baptized, and Thomas moved on to other parts of India, eventually reaching the kingdom ruled by King Misdai. Here he converted Tertia, the wife of Misdai, and his son Vazan. After this he was condemned to death, led out of the city to a hill, and pierced through with spears by four soldiers.

Nineteenth century biblical scholars had dismissed the whole text as fictitious, for there was no record of Gondophares or any of the other details in the account. In the late nineteenth century, however, British archaeologists found coins that proved there was indeed a ruler by that name and that he had a brother called Gad. Further archaeological discoveries have confirmed many other details of the story, revealing that maritime contacts between the Roman world and India were much more extensive than previously thought. Therefore, it is difficult to dismiss the story categorically; it is possible that it contains a nucleus of truth, which may have become embellished with all kinds of legend. A. E. Medlycott concluded (1905), "It is impossible to resist the conclusion that the writer of the Acts must have had information based on contemporary history. For at no later date could a forger or legendary writer have known the name."

Early references to St Thomas

Apart from the Acts of Thomas there are many other early references to St Thomas. Here are just a few:

• Eusebius of Caesarea (d. 340), quoting the theologian Origen says: “When the holy Apostles and disciples of our Saviour were scattered over all the world, Thomas, so the tradition has it, obtained as his portion Parthia….”
• The Syriac document entitled “The Doctrine of the Apostles”, which dates back to the third century, contains the passage: “India and all its own countries and those bordering on it, even to the farthest sea, received the Apostles' Hand of Priesthood from Judas St. Thomas, who was Guide and Ruler in the Church which he built there and ministered there.”
• St Ephrem composed many hymns that bear witness to the Edessan Church’s knowledge about St Thomas’ apostolate in India. In one hymn, the devil speaks of St Thomas as the “Apostle I slew in India”. In another hymn Ephrem speaks about Thomas’ mission: “The earth darkened with sacrifices’ fumes to illuminate”. “A land of dark people fell to thy lot”, “a tainted land Thomas has purified”; “India’s dark night” was “flooded with light” by Thomas.
• St Jerome (342-420 AD): "He (Christ) dwelt in all places: with St. Thomas in India, Peter at Rome, with Paul in Illyricum."
• St Paulinus of Nola (354-431 AD): "Parthia receives Mathew, India St. Thomas, Libya Thaddeus, and Phrygia Philip".
• St Gregory of Tours (538-594 AD): “St. Thomas the Apostle, according to the narrative of his martyrdom is stated to have suffered in India. His holy remains (corpus), after a long interval of time, were removed to the city of Edessa in Syria and there interred. In that part of India where they first rested, stand a monastery and a church of striking dimensions, elaborately adorned and designed. This Theodore, who had been to the place, narrated to us.”
• St Isidore of Seville, Spain (560- 630 AD): "This St. Thomas preached the Gospel of Christ to the Parthians, the Medes, the Persians, the Hyrcanians and the Bactrians, and to the Indians of the Oriental region and penetrating the innermost regions and sealing his preaching by his passion he died transfixed with a lance at Calamina...a city of India, and there was buried with honor".

These are not minor names; they include some of the eminent theologians and leaders of the early church. From a very early age, it seems, the major churches were unanimous in witnessing the tradition of St Thomas’ mission to India.

Tomb of St Thomas

It is believed that St Thomas was martyred and buried in Mylapore on the outskirts of Chennai. Beginning with the Acts of Thomas, there are statements about the existence of his tomb in India in almost every century. His body was later taken to Edessa. St Gregory of Tours, before 590AD, confirms this as well as the existence of a church over St. Thomas’ tomb: “His holy remains (corpus), after a long interval of time, were removed to the city of Edessa in Syria and there interred. In that part of India where they first rested, stand a monastery and a church of striking dimensions, elaborately adorned and designed. This Theodore, who had been to the place, narrated to us.”

The church in Edessa has a record of the arrival of the corpse. An early entry on the church’s ecclesiastical calendar reads: “3 July, St Thomas who was pierced with a lance in India. His body is at Urhai [ancient name for Edessa] having been brought there by the merchant Khabin. A great festival.” Today a beautiful church, called San Thome Basilica, stands over the site of St Thomas’ original tomb.

Nestorianism

A controversy to affect the early church was Nestorianism, which was a doctrine advanced by Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople from 428 – 431 AD. He held the belief that in Jesus there were two distinct persons, one divine and one human, rather than one divine person. Nestorianism spread east to Persia, a traditional enemy of the Roman Empire, and across Asia. The church in Kerala, which was rather cut off from the rest of the Christian world, received bishops from Persia and was influenced by Nestorianism. However, with the arrival of the Portuguese in 1498 things took a different turn.

The Portuguese viewed all St Thomas Christians as heretics, and they felt it was their duty to bring the local Christians under Rome and purge them of their doctrinal errors. This foreign incursion into the internal affairs of the church was resisted by many St Thomas Christians and caused splits. Many of them did eventually did come into communion with the Roman Catholic Church but others did not. It is possible that the Portuguese, who only tolerated the supremacy of Rome and its Petrine apostolic tradition, may have destroyed any documentary evidence there was of St Thomas’ apostolate in India.

Upper caste origins

St Thomas would have sought out the Jews first in his ministry, for that was what Jesus had instructed his disciples to do, and then the Gentiles. At that time there were many Jews in Kodungallur, as well as some other parts of Kerala, who were involved in the vibrant sea trade between Kerala and the Mediterranean. It is highly likely that some of these Jews became the first Christian converts. The other converts are thought to have come mainly from the upper caste indigenous people.

If one accepts oral tradition, the Apostle received into the Christian fold only those who came forward willingly and out of conviction. Presumably it was the upper caste people who were more able to engage with the Apostle in debates and accepted the new faith. All this happened at a time before the Brahmin hegemony of Kerala when society was not as highly stratified as it later became. It is unlikely, therefore, that these converts had much to lose socially or economically.

Sceptics point out that Brahmins only arrived in Kerala in the seventh century. It is true that the major influx of Brahmins to Kerala happened then, but there were already small, sparsely scattered Brahmin settlements in the first century. Palayur in Thrissur District, where my paternal ancestors come from, was one such settlement. There was also a Jewish settlement here, and local tradition says St Thomas preached to the Jews first before the others. After the conversion of some Brahmin priests the rest of the Brahmins of Palayur left the village cursing the land. So this area came to be known as Shappakad (“cursed land”), and later as Chavakad. The temple in Palayur was converted to a Christian church. A palm leaf record kept by a Brahmin family in the nearby village of Venmanad, quoted by Fr Placid J Podipara, showed that in the Hindu kali era of 3158, a Christian sanyasi called Thomas came to the village and converted a few Brahmins by baptizing them in the temple pool, thereby desecrating the holy temple.

Pope Benedict XVI

Pope Benedict XVI caused a bit of stir in Kerala when, in a speech at St Peter’s Square on 27 September 2006, he said, “Thomas first evangelised Syria and Persia and then penetrated as far as western India, from where Christianity reached also South India.” This seemed to imply that St Thomas did not visit South India at all, which was a departure from previous popes who on several occasions referred to St Thomas as the “Apostle of India”. The Vatican did subsequently amend the text of his speech, but there is nothing in the statement that denies the possibility St Thomas visited South India.

Conclusion

Although none of the evidence is conclusive proof of St Thomas’ visit to Kerala, the possibility he did go there cannot be dismissed out of hand. The more you study the evidence, including local traditions in Kerala, the more you are drawn to the conclusion he did go there. What is undeniable is the antiquity of the church in Kerala, which predates many churches in the west. No longer cut off from the rest of the Christian world, many St Thomas Christians are today in communion with the wider Catholic Church; and at a time when Christian worship in Europe is falling, the church is Kerala is thriving. Christians in Kerala are very much part of the fabric of society unlike some of their co-religionists in other parts of the country.

For the St Thomas Christians, that the Apostle came to their land and baptised their ancestors is a matter of faith, great pride and joy. Their memories of St Thomas are passed down in their songs and traditions from one generation to the next. The apostle who famously doubted Jesus’ resurrection and allegedly pleaded not to go to India has most definitely redeemed himself there.

In secular Europe Catholic bashing is fair game

The last few weeks haven’t been a good time for Catholics. Almost on a daily basis, the media has been full of reports about child abusing priests, and allegations that the current pope, Benedict XVI, failed to act against known child abusers when he was Cardinal Ratzinger. Despite penning an unprecedented letter to Irish Catholics, in which the Pope acknowledged the wrongs done by wayward priests, the scandal continues unabated. As victims of child abuse at the hands of Catholic clergy have emerged in a number of countries including Ireland, America, Germany, Switzerland and Netherlands, the scandal does appear to be a global one rather than one confined to a particular country.


Some of the stories that have emerged are truly tragic and disgraceful, and my heart goes out to the victims. I can understand their anger. It is a kind of rage that probably will last for the whole of their lives however many apologies they receive. That the cases of child abuse reported happened a long time ago, during the 1960s and 1970s, when Benedict XVI wasn’t even pope is inconsequential to them. They want revenge and their target is the pope. However, as Cristina Odone, writes: “This Pope has done more than any other churchman to address the issue of priestly child abuse. He has stopped the practice of turning over priests accused of abuse to therapists, as we now know that therapy seldom helps a paedophile. He has fast-tracked the defrocking of priests found guilty of abuse. He has promoted co-operation, at a diocesan level, between church authorities responsible for canon law and police.”


Apart from a few Catholic columnists like Christina Odone and Damian Thompson, who have defended the pope, the tide is very much in the other direction. Too many journalists seem content joining the dots and accusing the pope of being complicit in the cover-up of child abuse. The impression one gets from the media is that most of the Catholic clergy are child abusers. This is simply not the case. Research in Ireland (SAVI Report, 2002) indicates that 3.2% of sexual abuse victims in Ireland were abused by clergy or religious orders. On the other hand, 80% of perpetrators were known by the victim, who included family members (cousins, uncles, brothers, fathers, stepfathers, etc), neighbours, teachers, babysitters, childcare workers, sports coaches, and youth leaders. 25% of child sexual abusers were children themselves. One has to remember that child abuse has occurred in many secular institutions too.


To be frank, the media never really warmed to Benedict XVI right from the start of his papacy. As a conservative, as a staunch defender of the Catholic faith, as a critic of homosexuality and moral relativism, as a German who was conscripted in the Hitler Youth, and lacking the unique charisma of his predecessor John Paul II this was, I suppose, inevitable. However, Pope Benedict XVI is not a bad man. He is far better many previous popes who were morally and intellectually lacking in comparison. We are simply living in a different age when the authority of the pope in its traditional heartland, Western Europe, continues to decline – a decline that has been underway since the Protestant Reformation in the sixteenth century.


In contemporary secular Europe, the role of the church is diminishing fast. Today only a small fraction of the population goes to church on a regular basis. Congregations are falling so much that the survival and maintenance of many churches are under threat. Christians are increasingly seen as misfits in society who are sexist, homophobic, anti-Semitic, sexually repressed, and generally out of touch. They believe in authority and an invisible God. To the modern liberal secularist, who prides in unfettered individualism above all things, Christianity is an anachronism. Yet the products of unfettered individual freedom are all too evident to see: the collapse of the institution of marriage such that nearly a quarter of all children now live in a single-parent family; around 200,000 abortions in UK alone every year; an increasingly unequal society in which class determines one’s chances in life; and rising levels of teenage alcoholism and drug abuse. Christianity is being hounded out of the public space like never before. Unfortunately Christians themselves are complicit in this surrender. As Dinesh D’Souza says in his book “What’s so great about Christianity”: “Instead of engaging this secular world, most Christians have taken the easy way out. They have retreated into a Christian subculture where they engage Christian concerns. Then they step back into secular society, where their Christianity is kept out of sight until the next church service. Without realizing it Christians have become postmodernists of a sort: they live by the gospel of the two truths. There is religious truth, reserved for Sundays and days of worship, and there is secular truth, which applies the rest of the time.”


Modern Europe more or less mirrors the largely decadent Greco-Roman world in which Christianity was born. Modern day European secularists look at other parts of the world and remark with horror about the growth of religious “fundamentalism”. Of course, the religious militants of this world are a grave menace, but what they fail to distinguish is the growth of traditional religion; and Christianity is doing better than other religions even in the most hostile countries. In 1900, there were about 10 million Christians in Africa, representing about 10% of the population. Today there are 360 million, nearly 50% the population. It is estimated that in China there are between 80 million to 100 million members of underground Christian churches, unapproved by the state. To these people Christianity means something; it’s a form of social liberation and emancipation just as it was in the Mediterranean world nearly two thousand years ago.


Some people have said that the latest crisis affecting the Catholic Church is the greatest challenge since the Protestant Reformation. I don’t see it that way. The Reformation was a reaction to the widespread simony and corruption within the medieval Catholic Church. It was an internal conflict among Christians themselves. This crisis is entirely different. Most of the people attacking the Catholic Church are from outside the church, with no genuine interest in it's welfare, so there is unlikely to be a split within the church. What is more likely to happen is that the trend in secularisation will simply continue with renewed vigour. The Catholic Church has to be seen as the institution it is, made up of fallible human beings, but trying to preserve the catholic or universal doctrine based on the witness of all the apostles. Benedict XVI can take credit that today in England and Wales child protection officers monitor every encounter between children and clergy - a fact the British media conveniently ignores. As Bishop of Rome he is successor to Simon Peter, the apostle Jesus entrusted to be the “rock” upon which he would build his church, which according to his words, “all the powers of hell shall not prevail against it.” In the meantime, Catholic bashing is fair game.

Vailankanni: The Lourdes of the East

(Source: NRI America)

Some interesting points about Vailankanni:

• Small town located on the south eastern coast of India in the state of Tamil Nadu, 12km south of Nagapattinam and 350km south of Chennai. It was once a trading port, which traded with Rome and Greece, that gradually lost its commercial importance to the larger Nagapattinam.
• It is associated with two apparitions of Mary and the rescue of Portuguese sailors during a violent storm.
• First appearance: Sometime in the sixteenth century, around 1560, Mary appeared with her infant son to a Hindu boy carrying milk to his master. He was resting under a banyan tree near a tank. She asked the boy for some milk for her son, and the boy gave it to her. On reaching his master’s house, the boy apologized for his lateness and the reduced amount of milk by relating the incident that occurred on his way. His master didn't believe him until the milk jar miraculously began to overflow with milk. Wanting to see the place where the apparition occurred, the man accompanied the boy to the place where Mary appeared. Our Lady appeared once again appeared to both of them. The tank where the apparition took place became known as "Matha Kulam" or Our Lady’s tank.
• Second appearance: Towards the end of the sixteenth century, Mary appeared with her infant son to an invalid boy who sold buttermilk on the outskirts of Vailankanni. She asked him for a cup of buttermilk for her son, and the boy complied. Our Lady asked the boy to inform a certain wealthy Catholic man in the nearby town of Nagapattinam of her appearance. When the boy informed her he could not walk, she asked him to stand up. He was cured of his ailment, and he immediately went to see the gentleman. The man had a vision the previous night in which Our Lady asked him to build a chapel for her. Delighted to see the boy, the man went with him to the site of her appearance. Then Our Lady appeared again to both of them. The man erected a thatched chapel for Our Lady at the site of Her second appearance.
• Rescue of Portuguese sailors: In the seventeenth century, a Portuguese merchant ship travelling from Macau to Sri Lanka encountered fierce storms in the Bay of Bengal. In desperation, they prayed to Mary and vowed to build a church in her honour wherever she led them, if she saved them. The storm calmed down and the sailors came ashore near Vailankanni on the on the feast of the Nativity of Mary (Sept. 8). Falling on their knees in thanksgiving, local fishermen recognized them as Catholics and directed them to the shrine of Our Lady. A few weeks later they started building the church which they had promised to build in her honour. On subsequent visits they improved on it, using rare porcelain plates and statues they acquired in China and elsewhere. The modest church the Portuguese built has been extended many times and transformed to the magnificent basilica it is today.
• It draws around 20 million pilgrims each year - more than any other sacred shrine in India.
• The feast of the Our Lady of Vailankanni or Our lady of Good Health is an annual festival which lasts for nine days, starting on 29 August and ending on 8 September. It draws more than a million and a half pilgrims.
• The pilgrims include people of many faith backgrounds, including Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs as well as Christians.
• Hundreds of miraculous cures are reported by pilgrims every year. Many of these favours are received by non-Christians.
• The Asian Tsunami on 26 December 2004 wrought much destruction in Vailankanni, killing thousands, but miraculously the basilica and 2,000 pilgrims inside were spared of any damage. What makes this more extraordinary is that buildings on the same elevation, further inshore, were destroyed.