STOP CONVERSION 1

Hinduism is the only religion in the world that advocates religious pluralism, holding the different religions as so many paths to the same supreme truth of life and existence. Christianity and Islam are, on the other hand, both exclusive religions which uphold the doctrine of them being the sole repositories of divine truth and the pagan religions such as Hinduism as being inferior in content and in their appreciation of godhead, and thus, to be supplanted wherever they are flourishing, by conversion to the 'superior' Abrahamic faiths. This is the seed of all the disturbance caused by fanatical outfits in the world throughout history, this theological stance that one religion alone possesses the supreme truth in its entirety and is the last word on God and man and that all others are in error and will have to be brought to the right path through conversion till the world becomes a religious monolith. But that is never to be, given the natural diversity that is built into the structure of the universe, be it of matter or man. Hence, the conflict continues as each of these competing faiths keeps proselytizing to gather flock, and, where spirituality ought to have been the moving principle behind these religions, it is politics all the way through, the garnering of support for their cause through conversion, fair or foul, it scarce matters. Against this backdrop, Hinduism stands supreme in its refusal to stoop so low as to convert, to uproot one from one's natural cultural habitat, from one's stable settlement of the spirit, by inducement or coercion which it holds as the seed of all violence, a veritable war against the sanctity of the individual, a sacrilege against the soul of man, a pillaging of his essential human dignity that knows no pardon for it degrades man and reduces him to an enslaved being devoid of freedom or fundamental human rights. Conversion is a nefarious practice, is barbaric and redolent of the violent past of these exclusive exercises in faith which ought to now, at long last, learn from the highly civilized Hindus the true democracy of the spirit. It is time now that these Abrahamic religions take stock of the situation ever in ferment in the world today and do some serious soul-searching to liberalize the practice of their faiths knowing as we do that they are not empowered to alter the text of scripture as such. Stop converting the Hindu for the Hindu does not do so to you. In it lies the well-being of your faith and in it is embedded the seed of future peace on planet earth. Om! Shanti! Shanti! Shanti!