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- Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
- Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
- Sprache: Englisch
Religious Conversion: Religion Scholars Thinking Together explores various issues relating to the nature, methods, and effects of religious conversion in the major world faiths. * Presents the results of an innovative ten-year project initiated the World Council of Churches * Features contributions from religious scholars and leaders of Buddhist, Christian, Hindu, Jewish, and Muslim traditions * Considers myriad issues relating to the nature, methods, and effects of religious conversion in the major world faiths * Addresses questions on religious freedom, legal considerations, and the future for religious conversion
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Seitenzahl: 390
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2015
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CONTENTS
Cover
Title page
Notes on Contributors
Introduction
Part I: Preliminary Considerations
1 Thinking Together: A Story and a Method
Thinking Together: Our Story
Thinking Together: A Method
2 Defining Religious Conversion
Religious Conversion as Rediscovery
Religious Conversion as Preference
Religious Conversion as Extension
Religious Conversion as Replacement
3 Models of Religious Belonging
Further Reading
4 Conversion Sought and Feared
To Convert To and to Convert From
Obliged to Invite to Conversion?
Conversion through Mission or Proselytism
The UN Declaration on Freedom of Religion or Belief
Aid Evangelism
Conversion as an Issue in Interreligious Relations
A Critical Moment on Conversion
Thoughts of a Convert
Part II: Views from Five Religious Traditions
5 Buddhists on Religious Conversion: A Critical Issue
Buddhist Terminology on Religious Conversion
The Historical Buddha’s Attitudes to Religious Conversion
Mass Buddhist Conversions: The Case of Dalits
Recent Buddhist Responses to Religious Conversions
Further Reading
6 A Christian Perspective on Conversion
A Religion of Converts
Evangelism and Conversion
A Reshaping of Evangelism
Conversion of the Heart
Further Reading
7 Conversion from a Hindu Perspective: Controversies, Challenges, and Opportunities
Introduction
Exclusive Theology, Community, and Conversion
Caste and Conversion
Social Service and Conversion
Conversion, Human Rights, and the State
Conversion and Hindutva
Conclusion
8 Islamic Perspectives on Conversion: Aid Evangelism and Apostasy Law
Introduction
Christian Mission and Islamic
Da’wah:
A Comparative Perspective
The Context for the Re-emergence of the Debate
The Conflict between Religious Freedom and Islamic Apostasy Law
Mission and
Da’wah
in a War Context
Misled by Dialogue
Religious Freedom and Community Solidarity in Islam: A Way Forward
Conclusion
Further Reading
9 Jewish Perspectives on Conversion
A Brief History of Jewish Engagement in Conversionary Activity
Jewish Opposition to Mission
Jewish Teachings on Religious Tolerance and Their Implication for Conversion
Conclusion
Further Reading
Part III: Conversion and Human Rights
10 Conversion and Religious Freedom
Internal and External Manifestations of Religious Beliefs
Religious Freedom and Tolerance
The State and Religious Freedom
Religions and Religious Freedom
Conversion and Religious Freedom
Missions and Religious Freedom
Is Religious Freedom an Absolute Right?
Spirituality and Religious Freedom
Further Reading
11 The Right to Religious Freedom and Proselytism: A Legal Perspective
Introduction
Religious Freedom as a Legal Right
Proselytization and the Right to Religious Freedom
Religious Freedom as a Human Right
Conclusion
Part IV: Looking to the Future
Epilogue: To Learn and to Encourage: Insights from the Thinking Together Group
What We Have Learned
What We Would Encourage
A Study Guide
Session I: Opening Session
Session II: Multiple Meanings of Conversion
Session III: Models of Religious Belonging
Session IV: Buddhist Perspectives
Session V: Christian Perspectives
Session VI: Hindu Perspectives
Session VII: Islamic Perspectives
Session VIII: Jewish Perspectives
Session IX: Conversion and Human Rights
Session X: Concluding Reflections
Index
End User License Agreement
Guide
Cover
Table of Contents
Begin Reading
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Additional praise forReligious Conversion: Religion Scholars Thinking Together
In this path-breaking and immensely valuable work, divergent voices decipher the issue of conversions – an issue which has long remained a persistent and provocative presence at the tables of inter-religious dialogue. The strength and success of this project lies in the inter-religious nature of its authorship. Distinctive voices, each deeply rooted within their own religious tradition, draw the threads of their experience and expertise to weave together a rich tapestry of thought which can foster dialogue on a potentially divisive theme. Premawardhana should be commended for envisioning this creative work of critical importance and courageously bringing it to fruition!
Peniel Jesudason Rufus RajkumarWorld Council of Churches, Geneva
Religious Conversion
Religion Scholars Thinking Together
Edited by
Shanta Premawardhana
This edition first published 2015© 2015 World Council of Churches PublicationsThis volume is published under license from the World Council of Churches
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Religious conversion : religion scholars thinking together / edited by Shanta Premawardhana. pages cm ISBN 978-1-118-97238-0 (cloth) – ISBN 978-1-118-97237-3 (pbk.)1. Conversion. 2. Psychology, Religious. I. Premawardhana, Shanta, editor. BL639.R48 2015 204′.2–dc23 2015020793
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Notes on Contributors
S. Wesley Ariarajah is Professor of Ecumenical Theology at Drew University School of Theology. Before Joining Drew he served at the World Council of Churches in Geneva for 16 years as the Director of its Interfaith Dialogue Program and as its Deputy General Secretary. He has given lectures and seminars on Ecumenism and Interfaith Dialogue in many parts of the world. His publications include The Bible and People of Other Faiths (1985, translated into German, Spanish, Swedish, Dutch, Arabic, Swahili, Malayalam, Sinhalese, Indonesian, Korean, and Japanese), Hindus and Christians: A Century of Protestant Ecumenical Thought (1991), Not Without My Neighbour: Issues in Inter-religious Relations (1999), Axis of Peace: Christian Faith in Times of Violence and War (2005), and We Live by His Gifts – D.T. Niles: Preacher, Teacher and Ecumenist (2009).
Mahinda Deegalle, a Buddhist monk from Sri Lanka, is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Humanities and Cultural Industries at Bath Spa University, United Kingdom. He serves on the Steering Committee of the Buddhism Section of the American Academy of Religion and on the managing committee of Spalding Symposium on Indian Religions. He is the editor of the journal Buddhist–Christian Studies. His publications include Popularizing Buddhism (2006), Dharma to the UK (2008), Buddhism, Conflict and Violence in Modern Sri Lanka (2006), and Pāli Buddhism (1996).
Amy Eilberg is the first woman ordained as a Conservative rabbi by the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. After many years of work in pastoral care, hospice, and spiritual direction, Rabbi Eilberg now directs interfaith dialogue programs in Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota, including at the Jay Phillips Center for Interfaith Learning and the St. Paul Interfaith Network. She teaches the art of compassionate listening in venues throughout the United States, and is deeply engaged in peace and reconciliation efforts in connection with the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, as well as with issues of conflict within the Jewish community. She lectures and writes on issues of Jewish healing, spiritual direction, interfaith dialogue, and peace making.
Rita M. Gross is a Buddhist scholar-practitioner who has made significant contributions to scholarship on Buddhism and gender and to interfaith interchanges as a Buddhist. She is professor emerita of Comparative Studies in Religion at the University of Wisconsin–Eau Claire and a past president of the Society for Buddhist–Christian Studies. Her best known book is Buddhism After Patriarchy: A Feminist History, Analysis, and Reconstruction of Buddhism (1992), and she has many other significant publications. She also functions as a Buddhist dharma teacher at Lotus Garden, the North American center of the Mindrolling lineage of Tibetan Buddhism and in that capacity she teaches Buddhist meditation throughout North America.
Rabia Terri Harris, an essayist, activist, and theologian, is founder and director of the Muslim Peace Fellowship. Established in 1994, MPF is the only organization specifically dedicated to the theory and practice of Islamic non-violence. Harris, an Elder of the Community of Living Traditions at Stony Point, NY (an Abrahamic residential peace community), has spent two decades engaged in interreligious peace and justice work. She is a practicing community chaplain and concurrently teaches in the Intellectual Heritage program at Temple University in Philadelphia, PA. Harris holds a BA in Religion from Princeton University, an MA in Middle Eastern Languages and Cultures from Columbia University, and a Graduate Certificate in Islamic Chaplaincy from Hartford Seminary. She is a senior member of the Jerrahi Order of America, the Western branch of a 300-year-old Sufi order headquartered in Istanbul.
A. Rashied Omar is a Research Scholar of Islamic Studies and Peacebuilding at the Joan B. Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, University of Notre Dame, USA. He completed an MA and a PhD in Religious Studies from the University of Cape Town. He also holds a Master’s degree in International Peace Studies from the Kroc Institute, University of Notre Dame. Omar’s research and teaching are focused in the area of Religion, Violence, and Peacebuilding with a twin focus on the Islamic Ethics of War and Peace and Interreligious Dialogue. In addition to being a university-based researcher and teacher, Omar puts theory to practice. He serves as the coordinating Imam at the Claremont Main Road Mosque in South Africa, international trustee of the Council for a Parliament of the World’s Religions in Chicago, and international advisor to the Dutch-based Knowledge Forum on Religion and Development.
Shanta Premawardhana is the president of the Seminary Consortium for Urban Pastoral Education in Chicago. Previously he was the director of the program Interreligious Dialogue and Cooperation at the World Council of Churches. Prior to that, he was the Associate General Secretary for Interfaith Relations at the National Council of Churches, USA. A native of Sri Lanka, he is a Baptist minister with long pastoral, interreligious dialogue and community organizing experience. He received his PhD from Northwestern University in Evanston in the History and Literature of Religions with specialization in Buddhism and Hinduism. He is the author of numerous articles and lectures widely on subjects pertaining to interreligious dialogue.
Anantanand Rambachan is Chair and Professor of Religion, Philosophy, and Asian Studies at Saint Olaf College, Minnesota, USA, where he has been teaching since 1985. Professor Rambachan is the author of several books, book chapters, and articles in scholarly journals. Among his books are Accomplishing the Accomplished (1991), The Limits of Scripture (1994), The Advaita Worldview: God, World and Humanity (2012), The Hindu Vision and Gitamrtam: The Essential Teachings of the Bhagavadgita (1992). His writings include a series of commentaries on the Ramayana. The British Broadcasting Corporation transmitted a series of 25 lectures by Professor Rambachan around the world.
Ravin Ramdass is an admitted advocate of the High Court of the Republic of South Africa. He is also a specialist family physician and a qualified teacher. He obtained a Master’s degree from the University of KwaZulu-Natal for his dissertation entitled “Hinduism and Abortion, a Traditional View.” He was a student activist in the anti-apartheid struggle and has been involved in interfaith dialogue for the past 30 years. He is Chairperson of the Greytown Hindu Forum.
Jay T. Rock has served, since 2003, as the Coordinator for Interfaith Relations for the Presbyterian Church (USA). From 1987 to 2003 he directed the Interfaith Relations Office of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA. He holds a PhD in History and Phenomenology of Religions from the Graduate Theological Union, and is an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church (USA). His experience of interreligious relations, and perspective on the issues, rooted in North America, has been enlarged by short-term visits, engagements, and dialogues in the Southern Caribbean, Israel/Palestine, Africa, and Europe, and by many conversations sponsored by the World Council of Churches, especially the Thinking Together project.
M. Thomas Thangaraj retired as the D.W. & Ruth Brooks Associate Professor of World Christianity at the Candler School of Theology, Emory University, Atlanta, GA, USA in 2008. He has published widely both in English and in Tamil, and his most recent publications are The Crucified Guru: An Experiment in Cross-Cultural Christology (1994), Relating to People of Other Religions: What Every Christian Needs to Know (1997), and The Common Task: A Theology of Christian Mission (1999). Currently, Professor Thangaraj is teaching at Oklahoma City University’s Wimberly School of Religion during spring semesters, and is associated with the work of the Bishop Stephen Neill Research and Study Centre, Tirunelveli, India.
Hans Ucko is an ordained minister of the Church of Sweden and has throughout his ministry been involved in Jewish–Christian and interreligious dialogue with research at the Institut Eglise et Monde Juif in Paris, the Swedish Theological Institute and at the David Hartman Institute, both in Jerusalem. He received his doctorate in theology at the Senate of Serampore College, Calcutta, India, where he wrote his thesis on the concepts of “people” and “people of God” as integral to the Jewish tradition and to Asian contextual theologies. He was, from 1981 to 1989, the Executive Secretary of the Church of Sweden for Jewish–Christian Relations, interreligious dialogue, and East Asian Relations, and from 1989 to 2008 was Program Executive for the Office of Interreligious Relations and Dialogue of the World Council of Churches in Geneva, Switzerland. He is now the President of Religions for Peace Europe and an interfaith advisor to the Arigatou Foundation.
Deborah Weissman, a resident of Jerusalem since 1972, is an Orthodox Jewish educator with extensive professional experience in Israel and in 17 other countries. Her PhD in Jewish Education was earned at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem for work on the social history of Jewish women’s education. She is Co-Chair of the Inter-Religious Coordinating Council in Israel and is heavily involved in interfaith dialogue and teaching on both the local and international levels. She is a practicing Orthodox Jew, active in the religious feminist movement and the religious peace movement. Weissman has lectured and written widely, both in Hebrew and in English.
Introduction
Shanta Premawardhana
When I was growing up in Sri Lanka, there was a saying, “When you convert to Christianity you get a British accent.” Today they say, “When you convert you develop a taste for Coca Cola!” These comments succinctly describe the subtext in the new controversies raging in many countries on the question of conversion today: identity and power.
The anxiety that Sri Lankan Buddhists feel about the question of conversion cannot be divorced from the political domination they experienced for five centuries under the colonial powers. The oppressions that Buddhist monks, temples, and communities had to undergo as well as the aggressive evangelistic methods used to convert people during that period are well documented.1 Colonial governments that originally disdained the missionary movement later supported the missionaries, when they discovered that conversion to Christianity also shifted the political allegiances of many in favor of the colonial government, or that it at least subdued the potential for political agitation.
While it is indeed true that some converted to Christianity seeking privileges such as education and employment, others clearly converted out of spiritual conviction. While some also attempted to be more like the colonial masters and did acquire British accents, others sought to maintain loyalty to their ethnic and national identities despite the change in their religious identity. Their compatriots, however, generally considered the converts as traitors; not because of the change of religion, but because conversion implied that now they were politically allied with the colonial masters. The struggle for independence therefore included not only a desire for political and social self-determination, but also for a particular kind of religious freedom: the freedom from conversion.
In the post-independence era, the iconic American evangelist Billy Graham, who traveled the world preaching to packed stadiums with his strong theological emphasis on each person making a “decision” to receive Jesus Christ as his or her “own personal savior,” had a significant impact on some parts of the Christian world. This particular American brand, different from the more church-oriented message of the previous generation of missionaries, appealed to large numbers of people, many of whom, following their conversion, were effectively trained to be evangelists themselves, giving new life to the worldwide Evangelical movement. The gathering of its leaders from across the world, in Lausanne, Switzerland in 1974 for the International Congress on World Evangelization was a critical organizing moment for this movement. A key sentence from the Lausanne Covenant describes one of the movement’s primary motivations: “World evangelization requires the whole Church to take the whole gospel to the whole world.”2
Expressed in such grand terms, this goal is not without its antecedents. It stands in the tradition of the so-called Great Commission (Matthew 28:18–20) which calls Christians to “make disciples of all nations.” In one of the most significant ecumenical councils of the twentieth century the International Missionary Council, which met in Edinburgh in 1910, called Christians to engage in evangelizing the world in this generation.3 While such key phrases in these texts as “take the whole gospel,” “make disciples,” or “evangelize the world” can make for interesting missiological debate, these statements are perceived by many Christians as calls to make the whole world Christian. Whether it is theologically legitimate or desirable to attempt to do so is a question that requires serious consideration but is not within the scope of this book. The more serious problem with such a goal, though, is that other religious communities can and sometimes do perceive it as an existential threat.4
Energized by the Lausanne Covenant of 1974 and subsequent congresses that further refined and amplified the theme, largely US, European, and South Korean Evangelical Christians began to arrive in various Asian, African, and Latin American countries for the express purpose of evangelization. The liberalization of travel and trade provided the necessary access for these evangelists. I have met, and know that many – perhaps most – such evangelists engage in this activity with sincere intentions and use ethical practices in their evangelism. However, there are others who use aggressive evangelistic methods and unethical practices that create serious problems not only for the religious communities in the host country, but also for the churches that have been there for centuries. For example, the use of aid as an instrument of evangelization by numerous Western Evangelical groups following the disastrous South Asian tsunami of 2004 was an egregious example of unethical evangelism. In several affected countries, this resulted in significantly heightened tensions between religious communities and violence against many churches and their clergy regardless of denominational affiliation.
This new missionary movement, coinciding as it did with spreading economic globalization, was seen by the religious communities at the receiving end as ominous. If the missionary movement of the previous era effectively softened the ground for political oppression, the argument goes, the present movement would soften the ground for economic globalization – which is worse, because it is more subtle. Therefore it must be vigorously opposed.
A few years ago in Sri Lanka, a parliamentary bill banning conversions, in which both the converter and the converted get a fine of Rs. 500,000 (approx. US $5000) and a five year jail sentence almost became law. Similar laws have already been enacted in several states of India, as in Pakistan. The public discussion in many of these countries includes the sentiment that conversion to Christianity means that converts would cast their sympathies politically with the West and therefore with its hegemonic tendencies.
The World Council of Churches (WCC), which arose from the ecumenical strand within the colonial missionary movement, began struggling with these questions a century ago. When its precursor, the International Missionary Conference, met in Edinburgh in 1910, it was at least partly to consider a new realization that had arisen among the missionaries that among people of other religions there are those who have a genuine and devout spirituality. Even though the Edinburgh conference ended with a call to evangelize the world, in the ensuing conferences, the question persisted. The Asian theologians who participated in the conference at Tambaram, South India in 1938, for example, forcefully argued that interreligious dialogue should be the way Christians relate to other religious persons, rather than seeking their conversion. The Asian theologians did not win the day, but over the following decades significant progress was made leading to the establishment of a Sub-unit on Dialogue with People of Living Faiths and Ideologies in 1971. Yet, questions of mission, evangelism, and conversion and their relation to interreligious dialogue have continued to be in the forefront of the ecumenical movement’s agenda. While most have accepted the value of dialogue as the preferred method of relating to people of other faiths, other churches remain unconvinced.
In 2005, the WCC convened 130 leaders of many religions to a conference entitled “Critical Moment in Interreligious Dialogue.” One of the urgent questions for the ecumenical movement, as well as for those who engage in interreligious dialogue, was brought to the floor by the Ven. Bhiksuni Chueh Men of Taiwan. When she and others spoke forcefully about how in many Asian countries Evangelical Christians were using unethical methods to seek conversions, it was necessary to take note. In response the WCC initiated two actions. The first resulted in an historic agreement between the three largest global Christian bodies: the Vatican, the World Evangelial Alliance and the World Council of Churches. The result, “Christian Witness in a Multi-Religious World: Recommendations for Conduct” was released in June 2011. The second is the present project on Thinking Together on conversion.5
Thinking Together, an experiment in cutting-edge research in interreligious dialogue, brought together religious scholars from five major religious traditions as a think-tank to work on subjects of common concern. The articles they wrote from the point of view of their own religious tradition were subject to critique by their colleagues from other religions. In their review, these colleagues sought as much as possible to view the document from the writer’s own religious perspective while remaining faithful to their own religious commitments. The final product, therefore, while being authentic to each religious tradition, has emerged from the sharpening and refining that result from this endeavor.
The story of the Thinking Together group and the uniqueness of the methodologies that were used in engaging this question are outlined in the essay by Thomas Thangaraj entitled “Thinking Together: a Story and a Method.” This is immediately followed by a second essay, also by him, in which, engaging the thinking of several religious traditions, Thangaraj points the reader to the complexities of defining religious conversion. Rita Gross’s essay, “Models of Religious Belonging,” invites us to explore the variety of ways in which religions understand themselves, and draws our attention to how these differences impact the different ways in which religions view the question of conversion. Hans Ucko, who coordinated the Thinking Together group for most of its 10-year history, points in his essay “Conversion Sought and Feared” to several interesting questions. Himself a convert, Ucko points to the ways in which a convert’s view of conversion is different from the ways in which those who attempt to convert view the same.
In the second section of the book, a member from each religion – Mahinda Deegalle on Buddhism, Jay Rock on Christianity, Anantanand Rambachan on Hinduism, A. Rashied Omar and Rabia Terri Harris on Islam, and Amy Eilberg on Judaism – offers a perspective of how that particular religion views conversion. Their essays come to us following a rigorous process of peer review by colleagues from other religions and include ways in which this unique reflection has helped each of them to broaden his or her own understanding of conversion.
The question of conversion is never far removed from the questions around religious freedom, about which the book includes two essays. The first, by Wesley Ariarajah, gives a more general introduction to the question, and is followed by Ravin Ramdass’s essay, which gives more detailed legal analysis of the issues including, specifically, how these are spelled out in the South African context. In the final chapter the group reflects together on what it has learned through this entire process and offers several encouragements to religious communities. This is followed by a study guide to help religious communities to engage in their own reflections.
I want to express my deep gratitude to all the members of the Thinking Together group for their sustained commitment to the process of Thinking Together, for their willingness to subject their own deep faith commitments to the rigorous scrutiny of members of other religious communities, and for the high level of trust with which each treated the other. I am particularly grateful to my teacher and colleague Thomas Thangaraj, whose help in the initial editing of the material was of immense value; to Hans Ucko, my predecessor at the WCC who coordinated the work of this group for many years; and to Yvette Milosevic, who assisted in the organizing of the meetings and in the final processes of getting the book ready for print. Finally, I am grateful to the World Council of Churches for being willing to take the bold step of experimenting with an interreligious group, for providing it with the funding it needed, and for allowing the group the freedom to work at its own pace.
At one point in the group process, I expressed to the group my gratitude for addressing what has mostly been a problem created by Christians. This sentiment was quickly disowned by the group. It’s a problem for all of us, they said. All our traditions in one way or another have to deal with the question of how people move in and out of our religious communities. Despite those sentiments, I still believe that this is a question that has particular salience for Christians. Our churches are still struggling with the difficult questions that arise in the intersection of mission, evangelism, and interreligious dialogue. Even though the Ecumenical movement has a century of thinking behind these questions, they don’t easily translate in the day-to-day functioning of our churches. It is my fervent hope that this volume and the process it represents will provide a valuable opportunity for churches, and indeed mosques, synagogues, temples, and other religious institutions, to engage with these questions.
Notes
1
For a recent analysis of this question, see Elizabeth J. Harris,
Theravada Buddhism and the British Encounter: Religious, Missionary and Colonial Experience in Nineteenth Century Sri Lanka
(London and New York: Routledge, 2006).
2
Lausanne Covenant:
http://www.lausanne.org/covenant
.
3
World Missionary Conference 1910: The History and Records of the Conference Together with Addresses Delivered at the Evening Meetings
(Edinburgh: Oliphant, Anderson & Ferrier; New York: F.H. Revell).
4
The 2009
Report of the Commission to Examine Unethical Conversions of Sri Lankan Buddhists of the All Ceylon Buddhist Congress
(Colombo: All Ceylon Buddhist Congress, 2009), (in Sinhala) identifies Christian literature that points to such an interpretation. That such a perception is an existential threat to Buddhism in Sri Lanka is clear from the report; see especially pp. 11–32.
5
Christian Witness in a Multi-Religious World: Recommendations for Conduct:
https://www.oikoumene.org/en/resources/documents/wcc-programmes/interreligious-dialogue-and-cooperation/christian-identity-in-pluralistic-societies/christian-witness-in-a-multi-religious-world
Part IPreliminary Considerations
1Thinking TogetherA Story and a Method
M. Thomas Thangaraj
What is the next stage in our journey of interreligious dialogue and cooperation? In other words, while we have been engaged in constructing and articulating a theology of and for interreligious dialogue, what would our own theologies look like if our experiences of dialogue were brought right into the very process of theologizing?1 This is what many who were participating in the programs of the Office of Interreligious Relations at the World Council of Churches (WCC) or in events and ventures in their own local settings were asking. In the early years of WCC’s involvement in interreligious dialogue, the focus was on discovering a biblical or theological warrant for such interreligious engagement. This was rightly called a theology for dialogue. The next stage was viewing dialogue as a theological issue in order to reflect on it and to articulate a theology of dialogue. So the question now was to reconstruct one’s own theology in light of and in the process of engaging in active interreligious dialogue. Could this be the next stage in our journey of interfaith relations?
Interestingly, this initiative by the WCC coincided with the challenges faced by theologians and thinkers in various religious traditions in different parts of the world who themselves were actively involved in interreligious conversations. They were asking themselves more and more the following question: Why is it that my own theological thinking is always done in my solitude, in the privacy of my study, or in consultation with theologians of my own religious community, and without the physical presence of all my interreligious conversation partners, while my life is lived out in lively interfaith relations and dialogical engagements? The Christian theologians in the academy began to address this question with utmost seriousness. The emergence of a discipline, called Comparative Theology, is a result of this ferment. Francis Clooney is one of the pioneers in the development of this discipline.2 Several others have also worked along these lines in constructing their theologies in conversation with other religious traditions. As John Thattamanil, a comparative theologian, writes:
Comparative theology is conversational theology. Such theology goes beyond taking an inventory of other people’s convictions for the sake of specifically Western intellectual projects like comparative religion or ethnography. Comparative theology takes the content of other people’s ideas seriously, seriously enough to be changed by those ideas. Comparative theology, as a work of Christian faith, strives mightily to avoid bearing false witness against our neighbors. We do this by entering into dialogue with them in a common inquiry about ultimate matters.3
Comparative theology is by no means peculiar to Christian theological enterprise alone. For example, some members of the Thinking Together group have been involved in such comparative thinking for some time. Rita Gross has been involved in comparative “theological” thinking for years, Rambachan’s writings clearly exhibit a comparative character, and so do Rashied Omar’s.
Thinking Together: Our Story
Once this ferment was discovered, it became clear to Dr. Hans Ucko, the Director of the Office of Interreligious Relations, that such a move involved constructing one’s own religious or theological thinking in the presence or in the company of thinkers and theologians belonging to religious traditions other than one’s own. With this in mind, a group was invited to think together, and, as the group began to meet yearly, it took “Thinking Together” as its name. The mandate for this group of 12–15 theologians/thinkers from five different religious traditions, such as Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, and Judaism, was to engage in thinking and articulating their own religious tradition in the presence of others. The group met for the first time in Bossey, Switzerland to address the question: What difference does religious plurality make for my thinking and my theology?
Over the years the composition of the group changed because some of the invitees left the group due to personal and professional reasons. While some found this method of thinking together unsuitable for their own theological/religious thinking, others were unable to devote the amount of time and the kind of energy this process demanded. New members were invited to take their places. The group was saddened to lose Professor Tikva Frymer-Kensky, who taught Hebrew Bible and the History of Judaism at University of Chicago Divinity School. She passed away in 2006 after a four-year battle against breast cancer. She made a lasting impression on the members of the group through her insightful contribution toward our thinking together.
The current group, which has been responsible for this volume on religious conversion, consists of Vinu, a medical doctor who works among the poor in South India; Mahinda, a Buddhist monk from Sri Lanka, and Parichart, a Buddhist lay woman from Thailand, both of whom are professors in universities in England and Thailand respectively; Rita, a Buddhist teacher and professor from Wisconsin, USA; Debbie, an Orthodox Jewish educator in Israel; Amy, a rabbi from Minnesota, USA; Anant, a Hindu from Trinidad who teaches religion in St. Olaf’s College in Minnesota, USA; Thomas, a Christian theologian from India who taught World Christianity in Atlanta, USA; Rashied, an imam and professor from South Africa; Rabia, a Muslim educator from the USA; Jay, a Presbyterian church leader in the USA; Hans, the former Director of the Office of Interreligious Relations, WCC, Geneva; Ravin, a Hindu who is a specialist in medicine and an advocate in South Africa; Wesley, a veteran in interfaith dialogue who had served as the Director of the Office of Interreligious Relations of the WCC for many years and currently teaches theology at Drew University School of Theology in the USA; and Shanta, a Christian theologian from Sri Lanka and the USA, who succeeded Hans Ucko as the Director of the program.
The tragedy of September 11, 2001 brought a sense of urgency and seriousness to the group as it met in St. Petersburg, Florida in January 2002. Engaging the theme of religion and violence, the group moved to think together on how each religious tradition viewed the “other” or the “outsider,” during the years 2003 and 2004.4 The discussion on “the other,” was crystallized in a book, entitled Faces of the Other: A Contribution by the Group – Thinking Together.5 Two conferences that took place in Geneva in 2005 – Critical Moment in Interfaith Dialogue and Interfaith Youth Event – brought to the forefront the issue of religious conversion as the next agenda for Thinking Together. That interest coincided with what was happening in India and Sri Lanka with regard to the legitimacy and the legality of religious activities that aim at converting the other.6 The group met in 2006 at Shanti Ashram in Coimbatore, India to begin its thinking on religious conversion, and it continued its wrestling with the issue through 2007 and 2008. What is found in this book is the result of three years of thinking together as Buddhists, Christians, Hindus, Jews, and Muslims on religious conversion.
There has been a great sense of excitement about this process of thinking together among the members of the group. We always looked forward to every meeting with great expectation and enthusiasm. There were several factors that helped the success of this group to think together, as I discuss below.
Freedom from constraints
The group is indebted to WCC whose generous funding made this process possible. Without this, theologians and thinkers from different parts of the world representing five different religions could not have met year after year like this. Therefore, the group experienced great freedom from financial restraints. Further, under the leadership of Hans Ucko, the WCC gave us utmost freedom to shape the direction and dynamics of this process. We were never compelled or constrained to come up with a particular product or result. WCC took the risk of letting the process discover and gain its own direction. The participants experienced a safe space and a holding environment within which one could think boldly together. This was possible because we met for several years and came to know each other as fellow travelers on the path of religious life. Another source of freedom was that none of us in the group were chosen as “official representatives” of our religious traditions. Our accountability was to one another, even though we were quite conscious of our commitment and responsibility to our own religious communities. Therefore, religions were not in conversation; but practitioners and thinkers of various traditions were. It was not a dialogue among systems and institutions, but rather an encounter of minds, a dialogue of hearts, and a conversation of souls with an experience of true religious freedom.
Celebration of diversity
Even though most of the participants held jobs in the United States of America during this period, the group did represent significant geographical diversity – hailing from India, Sri Lanka, Trinidad, South Africa, Thailand, Israel, Sweden, and the USA. The group was intentionally inclusive with regard to gender, unlike many interreligious dialogue activities that tend to be dominated by men. Our meetings were held in English even though for most of us English is our second language and not our mother tongue. This meant that we spoke English each in our own peculiar ways. Vocationally, we had differences too, even though most of us were educators of one kind or another. Some were ordained leaders in their religious traditions such as Amy, a rabbi, Rashied, an imam, Wesley, a Christian minister, and Rita, a recognized Buddhist mentor. The coming together of lay and ordained made our diversity richer and more valuable it than otherwise would have been. Diversity was not simply something we brought to the group but something we discovered in the very process of thinking together. The national and political backgrounds from which we came were diverse as well: India, the largest democracy, America the most powerful nation, South Africa, a community in transformation with a history of religious and political persecution, Israel with all its political and religious challenges, Sri Lanka with its ethnic conflicts, and so on. As a policy we made sure that there were at least two persons from each religious tradition so that we could appreciate the intra-religious diversity. The recognition of similarities in our commitments and intentions often led to the epiphany of our differences. We stood amazed at how much together we could be in the midst of this rich variety of religions commitments!
Exploring common concerns
One of the strengths of our thinking together was that the agenda was not set by someone outside the group; the agenda grew out of our recognizing common concerns that affect each and every one of us in the group and our religious communities. Of course, the first two sessions did have themes that were suggested by Hans Ucko. It was not just a particular religion’s problem that we were going to think about; rather we were focusing on matters that affected all of us, though in various forms and at various times. Violence attributed to religion was indeed one such issue that gripped us all following the horrific event of September 11, 2001. In addressing this issue, we discovered another common concern. We together recognized that our perception of the other often led to violence and so we focused on how each of our religious traditions viewed the outsider. The interreligious conflicts in India, Sri Lanka, and elsewhere triggered by the issue religious conversion became our common concern after 2007. Since the concerns were commonly and corporately discovered, our thinking truly became thinking together.
Risks of self-disclosure and self-criticism
Our ability to engage in self-critical thinking did not come easily to us. It was our regular, repeated, and sustained meetings year after year that helped the development of a true and genuine friendship among us. We became a community of friends. This was strengthened by what we did apart from meeting around tables for discussion. We ate together, took walks together, climbed a small hill together, prayed together, shared family news with each other, and literally lived together whenever we met. It was this experience of intimate friendship that enabled us to take the risk of self-disclosure – sharing the joys and sorrows, ecstasies and agonies, successes and failures, and the beauty and the ugliness of each of our religious traditions. We were willing, as well, to expose our ignorance of the other’s religious tradition. When we took a walk over a hill which had lovely trees with beautiful flowers, I just recited a text from the New Testament: “Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin; yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these.”7 Amy, a rabbi among us, said: “Thomas! That is beautiful. Did you make that up right now?” “Well,” I told her, “these are the words of Rabbi Jesus!!” Amy was so pleasantly surprised that she shared the story with her Jewish congregation in Minnesota when she returned home!
One major element in the area of self-criticism is that all of us in the group have been impacted and shaped by what one would call historical consciousness. When one is historically conscious, one knows that all our religious traditions have been shaped in and by the processes of history. No religion has come out of the blue like a thunderbolt; each has been nurtured in the sociopolitical and economic realities of its history. Once we recognize the historicist character of our religious traditions, it becomes easier to acknowledge the dark aspects or the underside of our religious traditions. Such historical consciousness has instilled in all of us a critical approach to our own traditions and a genuine hesitancy to uncritically privilege our tradition over others. Further, it does not allow us to rush into absolutist claims about our own religion and its history. We feel compelled to ask, when we read and interpret our sacred texts, questions such as: What did this text mean at the time it was written? What could it mean today? Are there things in our sacred texts that need to be questioned and rejected? Such historical and critical questions were accepted by the group as important questions to ask while interpreting our religious traditions.
Experience of self-discovery and growth
Thinking together truly enabled us to discover ourselves anew and grow in our own religious belonging. Debbie, during our meetings in India, and through her conversations with Anant and others, was able to discover her Jewish faith to be not so distant nor disconnected from the Hindu tradition; rather there were significant points of contact and continuity between these two traditions. Our self-discovery included acknowledging the darker side of each of our religions and their histories. Mahinda, the Buddhist monk, discovering stories within the Buddhist religious tradition that might promote violence, was one such experience. Christians in the group were ready to acknowledge with sadness the violence against and the destruction of peoples in the name of Christian missionary expansion. We all experienced growth in and enhancement of our own individual religious faith. We felt strengthened in our commitment to our own religious traditions. We became better religious persons in the process and thus better human beings.
