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Arun Gandhi on Monotheistic ‘Dormancy’

Our dear friend Arun Gandhi posted a critical piece on monotheistic “dormancy” religion and politics at his Washington Post blog, which we are moved to repost here.  Arun examines the grossly apparent hypocrisy of the primary monotheistic traditions in his typical humble and insightful manner.rp_Gandhi_Arun-Photo_HEADSHOT_2011_Photo_Credit_Scott_Kafora_rdax_250x333.jpg

Arun Gandhi at Washington Post

I have never been able to reconcile the Catholic notion that the life of an unborn child is of greater value than the life of a living adult. They are willing to go to extremes to stop abortions but they have never, in living memory, called upon Catholics not to participate in any wars where innocent lives of adults are freely taken. This is justified by the notion of “Just War.” When is a war “Just?” The popular argument is that when it seeks to eliminate an evil personality like Hitler or Stalin or, in modern times, Saddam Hussein. This line of thinking implies that people who do bad things can be summarily eliminated to make the world a better place. But what of the millions who are killed in the process of eliminating one evil leader? Can it be said that all who follow orders of one evil leader automatically become evil themselves?

It is this notion of a “Just War” and the need to eliminate all bad people that has made Christianity the most violent religion in the world. If one attempts to compute the number killed by Christian nations in the past century the number would be mind-blowing. Clubbed together the Western Family of religions — Christianity, Islam and Judaism — are responsible for at least 75 per cent, if not more, of all violent deaths in the past century. What happens to the Catholic notion of “Respect for Life” under these circumstances? I will not even go into the question: doing to the evil person what they did to us does not make us better. Like my Grandfather, Mohandas K. Gandhi said: An eye for an eye only makes the whole world blind.

Can we ever overcome the moral contradictions in which we live? If not, then our own actions will lead to the demise of the religion we cherish the most. Hope the Catholics can pull themselves out of the morass of unreasonable thinking.

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