By P J Chacko
The Church in Kerala appears to be in agonizing throes. Court cases, division among the priestly class, the laity split into ‘for’ and ‘against,’ oblique criticisms and tongue in cheek inanities, part of the laity becoming doubting Thomases and part wading through confused feelings, and a flourishing charismatic industry. And, reports have it that there is an emergence of Satan worshipers to add to the ‘cauldron bubble.’
Perhaps it was coming. The crumbling part, the falling apart. The spurt of sky-embracing steeples, monumental erection of churches to compete with the Roman Basilica, the highly patronized and sponsored liturgical theatricals, and such other items manifest the pride of sections of both the clergy and the laity. The humble Nazarene is kept imprisoned in gilded tabernacles and concrete churches. The rest is business. Pride goes before a fall. And her sister, prejudice, is in a gyrating and convulsive mood.
Time was when the Kerala Church was known for its vibrant faith community and missionary vision. But, it appears that both have taken a nose dive. High-priced liturgical services, donation boxes bulging with fat offerings as if to bribe the Lord of the universe, and priests gauging the vibrancy of the faithful by the bulge of donations and offerings are not myths, but ground realities. Pompous weddings and sponsored liturgical items add charm and magic to Christian life.
Sections of diocesan clergy and religious congregations of men and women compete to grab ambience in running posh educational institutions to strike gold by catering to the upper class upper caste gentry. There is little interest in them to give time and space to the fast emerging problems in families, among young men and women, to family counselling, to creative formation in education etc.
Education is a lucrative business with little creative formation for its students. Just as the church steeples go up, high-rise educational institutions become favorite service centers. Added to these is the little taste the young have towards humanitarian service as many are caught up in the net of the highly commercialized digital world, social media, and drugs.
Further, the nucleus family concept catching up in Kerala has little to offer by way of sending young men and women for missionary work outside Kerala. Most priests and religious going out of the state appear to carry the mission of propagating the Syrian liturgy in the rest of India as if the Latin liturgy is a second class entity. Some have wondered if this attempt is not intended to create a class within a class. The pride of one’s liturgy becomes an underlying factor of devotion to Jesus.
The Church in Kerala, not just the Catholic group, needs to reinvent itself if it has to survive. It has to consciously step down from its pedestals of power and glory, name and fame, and face a diagnostic therapy.
The scandals that pop up one after another are but symptoms of a deep-rooted malaise of complacency, arrogance both among the clergy and the laity, worshiping the mammon of wealth, glorying in temporal power, and eagerness to grab the spoils of a commercialized church. Sections of the clergy and the laity need to face the bar of conscience.
The clergy should ask themselves where they are as far as Christian service is concerned. In today’s world, the priestly class and the religious assemblage are not expected to indulge in liturgical services only, but in humanitarian services too. The third eye, that is the social eye they are expected to possess, seems to have been kept closed for the sake of convenience. That is where a breakdown of communication between the priestly-religious class and the faithful exists. Each wants to hold on to its narrow world vision with its eyes on parallel lines.
And, as if to embolden this parallel line approach, there are vested interests to make them fight against one another and, thereby, grab the resultant benefit. The media world is out with a hatchet to gain instant popularity. Someone has aptly said that the media often makes a mountain out of a mole hill and thinks that it has the last word on everything else.
Then there are disgruntled anti-Church groups within the Christian fold. They sit in judgement like straight-laced Pharisees equipped with stones in hand. Such groups take special pleasure in washing the dirty linen in public view. They have no qualms in making a beeline for sacramental confession in private while their index finger is pointed out at the other. They and the enemies of the Church connive together to condemn people to hell.
The Kerala Church has much cud to chew. The need of the hour is humility for all warring factions to sit together and sort issues out amicably and equitably. A pharisaic approach will not work. They need to down the shutters of their arrogance and let in Jesus Christ into the Church. Otherwise, they will be provoking the Nazarene to stage his entry with whip in hand.
(P J Chacko is a Jesuit lawyer and social activist, a native of Kerala, who has been working among tribal people of Santal Parganas in Jharkhand state for more than half a century.)