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Re: social justice

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Rajaram Venkataramani • January 19, 2002 


Even if the story of the nun is true, the rich man does not represent vedic knowledge. As per vedid injunction, we are not supposed to judge others by their past karma. 
Let me tell you an anecdote  that one Christian missionary told me. He had given up Christianity and taken up Vaishnavism. As an ex-Christian, his old god brothers had invited him to their church and started telling him a similar story of love and told him that there is no sense of love outside of Christianity. My friend walked with them to their kitchen and started talking about the delicious cuisines  that the arch bishop loves- these were made of beef, meat and chicken. My friend pointed out that the arch bishop is lacking in love for animals and other poor human beings. For mere satisfaction of mortal body - his tongue -  the arch bishop is forcing his followers to kill innocent animals. He added statistics to show how eating non-vegetarian food deprives millions of poor people their simple food. There was nothing but empty assertion that Chritianity allows non-vegetarianism.   
Most of the missionaries do social service to attract followers like Teresa for example. She used to spend frugally on her patients who get victimized by her untrained nurses inspite of the fact she gets millions from drug and arms dealers as donation. Most of the Christian missionaries run schools and hospitals for a living, creating a following and almost always using tax payers money. There are some genuine social service minded Christian missionaries. This is purely their personal merit and happens inspite of the influence of modern day Christianity. 
Before getting into Vedic view, let me quicly dwell on modern Day Christianity. Most of the teachings of Jesus were lost because the Church burnt whatever was not comfortable to them. As a result of this folly, with the modern day bible we can prove that Jesus never existed! My brother is writing a book for the benefit of the modern day chrsitians. You may request him to pass some of the manuscripts to you karthik_v@yahoo.com. Ofcourse,  I believe that Jesus existed because there is reference to him. As per the original teachings, there is karma, reincarnation and vegetarianism. Th latter day church leaders like the Paul, the king Constantine and other Popes did a poor job of destroying the work of jesus. So we can prove that Christianity supports karma theory with the help of of Bible, other contemporary literature and living Christian traditions. For details, contact my brother. 
Having said that the orignal Christianity is a diluted version of sanatana dharma taught by our acharyas like Ramanujacharya, and it contains essential vedic teachings like karma,  let me share my little understanding of the concept of love in Vedas. Due to my own ignorance and hard heart that is devoid of bhakti to Sriman Narayana, I may be able to do only a poor job. But I am sure that by the causeless love of the Lord, you will get a start. 
We are supposed to give away in  charity to other humans for which we have so many classifications of dhana like anna dhana, vidya dhana etc. We are also supposed to perform bhoota yajna. When we draw kolam or rangoli (paintings with rice flour) infront of the Lord, the ants are supposed to eat them. We offer food to crows and other birds in the morning before we even eat our own food. And we are supposed to feed dogs. Even today, you can go to Indian villages and see our ladies calling out to dogs with food in hand saying "tho tho". But our sense of loving sacrifice culminated in loving sacrifice of the results of all our activities to Narayana. Please note that our love is based on spiritual equality of all beings and is based on the love of God Himself.  
And if you dont accept the concept of karma, your modern day Christians have a big problem. Why is the Lord cruel to some of His own creations ? While we recognize that karma exists, we have temporary means of burning karma away like prayaschittam and permanent upaayam namely surrender un to the Lord. 

  greg michel  wrote: Pranams,
Usually when it comes to discussing hindu bielefs
often orthodox christans say that it has no sense of
social justice. They say that theory of karma make
people fatalistic about their lifes.
Whatever happens to me is my karma and there is no
point of counteracting it. For instance lately I have
heard a story from a christan nun. She was serving
people in hospital and one day came to her a man from
lower caste ( sudra, or loer) suffering from stomach
ache. She find out that he was working for a rich
landlord but landlord wasn't paying him for his job.
In effect he was starving and suffering from
deasise.The nun visted landlord to speak with him
about the matter. She asked why he wasn't paying the
man for his job and mentioned that a man was about to
die. The landlord replied: "It is his karma, and you
have done a wrong thing by helping him. If he would
have died he surely would have attained higher caste
in his next birth as a effect of his service to me."
The things has taken place in India in mid sixties.
She went on saying, it was on a radio, that vedas
have no teachings of love. Only Christe commanded "To
love your neighbour as yourself" or "Whatever you have
done to this lowest among yourselfs you have done it
to me". Therfore, she concluded, christian faith
represents much higher teachings than any hindu sect.
Could you comment on this. Is it really true? Are
there commandments in Vedas similiar to christan? 
With best wishes,
Garga Rsi das




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