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SUMMARY AND UPDATE - 2/14/05 4:15PM

Yahoo India News has a post dating back to mid-January, alledgedly reporting on nuns in southern India demanding Christian conversion as a condition of receiving tsunami aid Below are the numerous posts I have done on this topic.

The story seems bogus on it's face because of a lack of details and because such an action would be a violation of widely-accepted Christian doctrine. This story has spread through the left-wing blogosphere like wildfire as evidence of their utter conviction that Christians are evil.

To date I have contacted Catholic Relief Services, one of the largest relief organizations in the world and received a flat denial that anything like what is reported could have happened on their watch. -- see below. I have calls into the Los Angeles Archdiocese and an email into the Vatican for comment as well. I have sent emails to all the government offices in the local region of India I could find -- some 50. To date, no comment from any of those contacts.

I have; however, heard from the Chairman of the Board of Presbyterian Frontier Fellowship, one of the leading protestant denominationally affiliated missionary organizations in America.

Before reading your article this weekend, I had a long conversation with an Afghan Muslim leader whom I met while we waited at the pharmacy in San Francisco for a prescription for our children. After our initial nice comments, I told him I was a Presbyterian Minister. He gruffly remarked that I was controlled by the Pope, who wanted to dominate the Muslim world. Rather than be defensive, I said, " Let us assume that I was controlled by the Pope. Who told you this fact?"

He said that it was a common topic of the Mullah's teaching in Pakistan, that all the Christian sects were simply front agencies for the political efforts of the Pope to dominate Islam.

This sub-text to the story (although formed in fantasy) could explain the sensitivity of other national reporters in interpreting the events, and prayers of relief workers as conversion efforts.

This raises the honest question regarding what is the motive of the religious worker who responds to this unprecedented global disaster?

Last week I hosted a prayer gathering for Buddhist, Muslim, and Christian leaders from the Continents afflicted by the Tsunami to pray for the victims and survivors, and to raise funds for the relief efforts.

The two hour long service was held in our gymnasium so as to not have any religious symbol which would offend other faiths. I opened the service by saying that we wanted to come together not to judge each other, or to evangelize each other, but to share in our collective grief for the tragedy of many nations. And that we gather to do what we do best in each of our traditions: we are compelled to pray to our Lord and Our God. We were called upon to do this without trying to be overly sensitive to each other, without trying to convert each other, without trying to justify our own religious tradition.

Our gathering was a wonderful building of bridges between our leaders. We raised ten thousand dollars at the event, but more importantly we raised the level of trust we had for each faith community by working together. I said in my greeting: we believe that the Light shines in the darkness, and therefore in my tradition it is Jesus Christ who shines brightly as we gather together for our prayers of grief and solace.

Greg Roth

That a misunderstanding could have occurred between the villagers and the missionaries is a very real possibility, but that's not the point. It is awful journalism to offer a story like this completely uninvestigated and unsubstantiated. There is enough ill will directed at Christianity today for us to allow stories like this to go unchallenged.

Original Post - 2/10/05 4:18PM

Yahoo News carries this story, courtesy of Asian News Intenational.

Jubilant at seeing the relief trucks loaded with food, clothes and the much-needed medicines the villagers, many of who have not had a square meal in days, were shocked when the nuns asked them to convert before distributing biscuits and water.

I have to wonder about this one. The relief organization is not named -- though the presence of nuns is indicated which would narrow the field pretty significantly.

For the time being, I am going to write this off to bad journalism. If a Christian organization really did do this, then I'm all over them like a bad attitude, but I don't know who to get on. The way this piece is written, it's almost as bad as Eason Jordan's off-handed accusation at the military.

I sure hope this is not true. I have sent an email to ANI for more info. We'll see.

UPDATE 2/11/05 7:30AM

No response from ANI in about 16 hours. I have placed a call to Catholic Relief Services for comment, but as yet have been unable to speak to anyone directly.

UPDATE 2/11/05 9:33AM

I have just gotten off the phone with Jeffrey Griffith, Communications Associate for Catholic Relief Services (CRS), the largest Catholic relief organization in the world, and one of the largest responding to the tsunami in general. Mr. Griffith firmly denies any involvement of CRS with any action of the type described in the article. Mr. Griffith emphasized that any such action would be "against policy" for CRS and that they are "not engaged in proselytising." According to Mr. Griffith, CRS offers relief aid to all regardless to ethicity or religious affiliation, and that CRS employs people of all religions .

I called CRS because the story indicates that nuns were present, and that is the only clue available as to the idenitiy of the relief organization that might be involved. This story has now spread all over the Internet, with over 10,000 Google hits. This story is looking more and more like a back-handed slap at the church. More to come.

UPDATE 2/11/05 1:40PM

I have a call into the Los Angeles Archdiocese for comment.

I have heard again from CRS and they have pointed me to this page on their web site regarding guiding principals. Here are some pulls from that page:

Catholic Relief Services work is founded on the belief that each person possesses a basic dignity that comes directly from God. Because of this belief, we advance the intrinsic value and equality of all human beings, and strive for systems and procedures that demonstrate fair and equitable treatment of all people.

We understand ourselves to be a part of a wider global family and believe that our responsibilities to one another cross national, cultural, and religious boundaries. Our work worldwide is a concrete expression of the interdependence of all people in community with each other as we seek to fulfill our responsibilities to our brothers and sisters worldwide.

We also work with institutions of other religions and secular organizations that share this commonality of purpose. (emphasis mine)

Lest anyone should argue that this is a bad story and not in need of much refutation, I would point the reader again to the over 10,000 Google hits on the story mentioned above. Yes, most of them are left-wing radical bloggers, but note also that some are Arab News Services. We ask why they hate us -- well allowing stories like this to spread unchallenged might be a good starting point.

UPDATE 2/11/05 7:30PM

Still no response from the LA Archdiocese. I have also sent an email to the Vatican information office requesting comment. I have located the web site for the government of the Indian province where this story is reported to have occurred. I have written to them asking for any information they may have and any more local contacts they can recommend.

Once again, I want to emphasize how important this confirming or debunking this story is. SmartChristian has done me the courtesy of a post on this topic. The first comment (and only at time of this posting) is:

Given the treatment I have been given by the church and its resultant effects on my daughter, it does not surprise me at all that this is going on, and I surmise that is not just one incident.(sic) See my blog if you doubt me.

Such sentiments are being echoed throughout the parts of the blogosphere that many of us do not venture into. We are sinners, and therefore, the church makes mistakes - some of them quite costly. Can we afford to stand accused of a mistake we did not make?

UPDATE 2/13/05 2:10PM

As more evidence that this story has got to be bogus, I refer you to this post at 'Eternal Perspectives.' (HT:Adrian Warnock) This "exposipost" on the parable of the good samaritan indicates how completely antithetical to the teachings of Jesus behavior of the type described in the stroy would be.

My emails went out too late Friday to hit the India state government offices before Saturday tehir time. I am still hoping for information from them once the week gets started.