Tuesday, April 10, 2012

Gandhi's Suggestion to Missionaries

I'm wading through gobs of research for my honor's thesis paper, while looking for The Gandhi Reader I instead found "Mahatma Gandhi: An Interpretation" and (out of sheer curiosity) opened to the chapter on Gandhi and the Christian Faith which detailed the following:

E. Stanley Jones - a Methodist missionary to India - once asked Gandhi, "How can we make Christianity naturalized in India, not a foreign thing, identified with a foreign government and a foreign people...?" I love Gandhi's response:

"First, I would suggest that all of you Christians, missionaries and all, must begin to live more like Jesus Christ.

Second, practice your religion without adulterating it or toning it down.

Third, emphasize love and make it your working force, for love is central in Christianity.

Fourth, study the non-Christian religions more sympathetically to find the good that is within them, in order to have a more sympathetic approach to the people."


If only I, and all followers of Jesus, could hear and take these words to heart.
To live like Jesus I must know what he did - who he was while he walked the earth, but also, what he is doing today. It's almost impossible to not tone true Christianity down - maybe that's where all the religiosity and religion comes from. Love? How can we operate out of just love? Maybe I need to ask for God's help with this more! I do try to find the good even in "secular" materials many Christians term "bad". For all truth is God's truth, no matter where it's contained.