Participants:
Series Code: LI
Program Code: LI190453A
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00:26 Welcome to the Liberty Insider.
00:28 This is a program that will bring you insight, 00:31 I hope into religious liberty events in the US 00:35 and around the world. 00:36 My name is Lincoln Steed, editor of Liberty Magazine, 00:39 and my guest on the program, Greg Hamilton, my good friend, 00:44 President of the Northwest Religious Liberty Association. 00:46 Nice to be with you. 00:48 Let's really take an expansive view today. 00:50 And very often we talk about the US 00:52 and governmental systems here, 00:54 but there's a whole wide world out there. 00:55 Yeah. 00:57 And as you look at the world at the moment, 00:58 I think it's hard to avoid 01:00 the troubling awareness 01:05 that more and more countries, 01:06 even some formerly quite democratic countries 01:09 are heading toward strong man phase, 01:11 a reaction rephase... 01:13 We seem to be going back to that, yeah. 01:15 Where a strong man, you know, from with the center 01:18 of the good portion of the country, 01:20 but they're acting in very un-liberal ways 01:23 against minorities, against concepts and, you know, 01:27 it's almost a fascist view of the state, 01:29 you know, the government, the state, you know, 01:31 we'll support it and here I'm your leader and... 01:33 Democracies and constitutions are failing worldwide. 01:36 And, you know, I made a comment, 01:38 I think it was between programs 01:39 that we're living in a little golden age 01:42 that is backing the trend. 01:44 Most of the time of the world's history, 01:45 it's been repressive, 01:48 the individual hasn't had too many rights. 01:49 Right. 01:51 And what we think of as liberalism 01:53 or as the enlightenment period, 01:55 it's only a couple hundred years 01:57 out of thousands. 01:59 And even within that period, it's been spotty. 02:02 So yes, let's talk about this. 02:05 What examples do you see 02:07 as you look around the world today 02:08 that are of a troubling shift toward this view that, 02:11 of course, among other things will almost naturally restrict 02:15 religious freedom 02:16 for many factions of the communities? 02:20 Well, to me the most alarming is coming from India, 02:23 where the Prime Minister Modi. 02:26 His name is Modi, M-O-D-I 02:29 is basically trying to promote 02:34 Hindu nationalism, 02:35 which basically in its parliamentary 02:40 he is trying to basically outlaw Islam. 02:45 And which is interesting 02:48 because it totally defies their constitutional system 02:50 from their founding, 02:51 dating back to Gandhi and Nehru, 02:57 I think was his name and so forth. 02:59 Nehru. The founders. 03:00 And so you... First prime minister. 03:02 Yes. 03:03 And so that is troubling 03:07 because India is the world's largest democracy 03:13 and it has functioned quite well. 03:16 It has its problems with Kashmir, 03:19 which is mostly a Muslim province, 03:23 which they've had problems with it, 03:24 dispute with Pakistan and so forth. 03:26 In fact, it's caused both countries 03:28 Pakistan and India to develop 03:33 nuclear weapons 03:34 that basically to be honest with you, 03:37 it's the biggest 03:40 explosive tinderbox 03:43 ready to happen, so to speak, 03:45 and lot of the world isn't looking there. 03:51 But I really believe it's a tinderbox 03:52 and it will explode any day. 03:54 Of course, I think the same. 03:55 If you're talking nuclear conflict, 03:57 I still think India-Pakistan 03:58 is the most likely in the whole world. 04:00 But what's triggering it? The first thing is... 04:01 Well, it's the original sin of the Indian continent. 04:05 But isn't it interesting 04:06 they would erode religious freedom 04:09 in order to basically destroy their constitution? 04:12 Isn't it interesting how religious freedom 04:14 is front and center 04:15 of authoritarian governments rising? 04:18 They want to either redefine it or eliminate it. 04:23 I remember, India was ruled for hundreds of years 04:26 by the British Raj. 04:28 Yes. 04:29 That sort of devolved from the... 04:32 Was it East India Company, 04:33 a trading company that after a while 04:35 needed to become an administrative control 04:37 and then hand it over to the British government? 04:40 And England always had trouble in India, 04:42 which is a huge continent, many racial groups. 04:45 Yeah. 04:46 You think Indian is just one person, 04:47 but many tribal groups. 04:49 It's very diverse. 04:51 And many religions. 04:52 Yeah. 04:53 Majority Hindu, but ten even to this day, 04:57 I forget the exact number, 04:59 but it's several tens of millions 05:00 of Muslims in India. 05:01 And remember, 05:03 even Alexander the Great could not conquer India. 05:07 Well, he was at the end of his tether 05:08 and his men were rebelling 05:09 and they crossed the Indus River. 05:11 But it says... 05:13 He had to deal with elephants 05:14 that was what India had back then. 05:15 Yes, but a lot to be said about India's strength 05:18 and resiliency over the years. 05:20 Yeah. 05:21 But anyhow, when the British Raj 05:24 had a religious problem 05:26 that they nearly lost India over it. 05:28 The colonial powers didn't keep country 05:34 under control by huge armies of their own. 05:37 They co-opted the locals and they were the armies 05:40 and the sepoy army of England 05:44 was large and they kept down the Maharajas 05:47 and disenfranchise them in different places 05:49 or unless they were very agreeable. 05:52 And things were going well until the agitation on religion 05:57 hit a flashpoint, 05:58 and the Muslims who are chafing under what... 06:01 Some of their leaders with bad intent 06:04 said that the casings for the muskets 06:08 that they use they had to bite them 06:10 as they put it that there was pigs grease on it. 06:12 Yeah. 06:13 And that created a rebellion that swept India. 06:18 Even among the soldiers. Yeah. 06:20 Well, they rebelled against the British officers. 06:22 Right. 06:24 They killed in Calcutta, 06:27 I think, it was a couple of hundred Europeans 06:29 were killed, butchered. 06:31 It was just an out of control, 06:33 it was like the Belgian Congo for area. 06:35 Right. At least when I was a kid. 06:37 So religion was big and then I mean, 06:40 a big contention within, 06:42 you think it's just uniformly Hindu, it's not. 06:45 Then coming up to the independence, 06:47 Gandhi with his pacifist views still had troubles 06:51 with the Hindu-Islam divide 06:57 and he wanted it to be one India. 07:00 But against Gandhi's advice, 07:01 violence broke out and the killing was immense 07:06 at that time, just around the 1949 or so. 07:09 Right. 07:10 Well, the movie Gandhi brings this out. 07:11 Right. Immense killing. 07:13 And... 07:15 End result of that was the splitting, 07:16 the partition of India. 07:18 People forgetting that Pakistan was part of India. 07:20 Right. 07:21 They split it to the mostly Muslim area, 07:23 tens of millions of Muslims moved there, 07:25 tens of millions of Hindus the other way. 07:27 Right. But it couldn't solve it. 07:30 And in my lifetime, I can remember, 07:32 I think it's three wars with Pakistan over religion. 07:36 There was East Pakistan, 07:39 which is now Bangladesh, 07:41 India fought them and all over religion. 07:45 This is not a territory. 07:46 And you mentioned, Kashmir, 07:49 that isn't really a territorial dispute, 07:51 it's a religious dispute. 07:52 Yes, correct. 07:54 The territory is disputed because the religious majority 07:57 that happens to... 07:59 I think it's a majority in Kashmir are Muslims. 08:00 Yes, correct. 08:02 And the world, you're right, the world is watching it now. 08:05 But we've ignored that almost continuously 08:07 since the formation of the modern state of India, 08:11 there's been a hot war 08:13 between Pakistan and India, up in Kashmir. 08:15 And it's no coincidence that's where Osama bin Laden 08:19 chooses his hideout, was in Pakistan. 08:21 Right. 08:22 And my view is we've been in a slow boiled 08:25 to a global religious war between Christians and Muslims. 08:31 Yeah, I suppose... 08:34 Yeah, maybe. 08:35 I'm not saying it should happen or I hope it doesn't. 08:38 But it's being progressive. 08:40 And you mentioned this, and it's not... 08:42 I think the tensions are great. 08:43 I would agree with that as far as, you know... 08:47 Well, you gave another example 08:48 as we were teaming up for this program, 08:51 Chiner and the Uyghurs. 08:52 Yes, the Uyghurs. 08:54 Yes. 08:56 China sees their ethnic distinctness, 09:01 but most particularly their religious identity... 09:03 And these are Muslims 09:05 in the western Province of China. 09:06 And I'm sure I'm not exaggerating 09:08 because China are seriously bothered by another loyalty, 09:12 The Falun Gong... 09:15 It's in Jiang province, where the Uyghurs are located. 09:18 Yeah. 09:20 And there are about 13 million of them. 09:21 Toward Mongolia. 09:22 And 3 million of them have been put in concentration camps. 09:25 Right. 09:27 My point is the... In recent years... 09:28 We're not exaggerating to say 09:30 that it's religion rather than ethnicity 09:31 that's bothering them. 09:33 Because the Falun Gong movement in China 09:35 where tens of millions of people 09:37 were doing morning exercises 09:38 in the park that had a philosophical connection 09:44 perhaps to ancient Chinese religions, 09:46 but it's not a religious movement. 09:47 Yeah. 09:49 There's tens of millions of people 09:50 that have been imprisoned in China 09:52 just because of their loyalty to Falun Gong. 09:54 So Islam which is a real religious loyalty 09:58 is troubling China. 09:59 So again, 10:01 here the largest country in the world 10:02 is troubled by they see is the threat from Islam. 10:06 India, majority Hindu is all but at war every day 10:11 with Pakistan 10:13 and with the Muslim minority in their country. 10:17 And remember, it's not that many years ago 10:19 that terrorists came across from Pakistan in, 10:24 I'm trying to think of the city, 10:25 but attacked one of the main 10:27 Mumbai. 10:28 The hotel in Mumbai, just a few years ago. 10:30 Yeah. 10:31 So this is an active movement. Yeah. 10:32 And they have a sense rightly or wrongly in India 10:36 in this case that they're under mortal threat 10:39 from a broad based religious movement 10:42 opposing them. 10:43 And are we any different in the West since 9/11? 10:46 The US is paranoid. 10:47 And you and I know that most people 10:50 of any religion are faithful to their religious tradition, 10:54 but they're good human beings 10:56 and they're not violent or problematic to other people. 10:59 But what makes us very interesting is it India 11:01 as an emerging nation, 11:03 an emerging nation in terms of wealth, 11:05 in terms of, you know, 11:08 the digital age. 11:09 I mean, my goodness, I mean, 11:11 India is becoming the leader in technology. 11:16 It's where almost all the marketing 11:20 and service calls that you get from overseas 11:22 in terms of marketing calls. 11:23 They have there in Silicon Valley. 11:25 I've flown over. 11:26 That's a whole city. 11:28 There all these calls from India, you know, 11:29 from Indians on the phone, have you ever noticed that? 11:31 It's fascinating. 11:33 But... Forget the telemarketers. 11:34 Have you ever noticed some of the major businesses, 11:38 international corporations, 11:39 they're owned and run by Indian billionaires? 11:44 Yes. 11:45 India is not an inconsequential country in modern world. 11:47 No, not at all. 11:48 In fact, as it rises up in power, 11:50 it seems to want to do away with real religious freedom. 11:54 And that's very troubling. 11:56 They don't want to deal 11:57 with the diversity in their midst. 11:59 Is that a sign of the times for nations 12:02 across this earth, this planet? 12:05 I think it is. 12:06 What you put your finger on is troubling 12:07 is that this present administration in India 12:11 seem agreeable to restrictions. 12:14 I think largely until this point, 12:17 the government had pretty good principles. 12:21 The laws were okay. 12:23 But the horrific things were happening in the villages 12:25 where mobs would rise up and lynched. 12:28 We've had Seventh-day Adventist pastors lynched there. 12:31 Right. 12:32 As well as many Muslims and the Christians, 12:38 but, you know, what could the government 12:40 at a large country do to stop ignorance 12:44 and paranoia and mob action in attend 12:47 other than then having active policing, 12:50 but this is a shift 12:51 from that where there's a cultural animus 12:54 to where the government seems to be going backwards 12:57 and they're doing it 12:59 in the name of sort of India first and... 13:01 Right. And Hindu nationalism. 13:04 Another factor is interesting 13:05 is that the Seventh-day Adventist Church 13:08 has grown tremendously in India, 13:10 especially in the northern regions, 13:12 in terms of building churches, 13:15 lots of evangelism having been done there, 13:18 and it has grown tremendously. 13:20 So it affects even I'm sure. 13:22 But I can tell you in a nutshell 13:24 how that causes problems in India. 13:27 Because a large attraction for Adventism for Christianity 13:33 is that the poor people, 13:37 the untouchables can escape 13:39 the rest, social restrictions of Hinduism. 13:41 And so it draws them to Christ largely. 13:44 And it's largely the untouchables 13:45 that became Adventists. 13:47 Yeah, a very high percentage. 13:48 I don't know you said largely, but a very high percentage. 13:49 Yes. 13:51 Well, you couldn't create something 13:52 more naturally antagonistic as Hindus. 13:56 True. Very true. 13:57 So there's reasons for these things, 13:59 doesn't excuse it. 14:00 Right. 14:01 But it's not just a free floating antagonism. 14:04 There is social changes of it. 14:07 And as we know, 14:08 in the world at large Islam is more easily threatened 14:12 because in many majorly or majority Islamic countries, 14:16 culturally, they haven't really advanced 14:18 much from the medieval era. 14:21 I mean, if you want to criticize Christianity, 14:23 go back into the Middle Ages 14:25 and the Inquisition and all the rest. 14:27 It was every bit as bad as obtrusive 14:29 and persecutory as say, 14:31 Saudi Arabia or some more toward non-Muslims. 14:34 Let's take a break. 14:35 We'll be back to continue 14:37 this discussion on the world as it is. |
Revised 2020-02-15