Well-known Indian born Christian thinker Dr Ravi Zacharias, visiting professor at Wycliffe Hall, Oxford University, who is now an American citizen, spoke on life in multiracial and multireligious United States.
Q: In your academic presentation (in Universiti Malaya) on the Three Great Challenges to Religion and Society: A Proposal for True Spirituality, you mentioned that we need to defend truths and should not take pluralism to mean moral relativism but to what extent religious absolutism should be encouraged?
A: I believe in the absolutes in the governance of my personal life but I cannot impose those absolutes on my neighbour. I use the process that allows me to give
my neighbour the sanctity of his own choice. In the framing of the common good, there cannot be an imposition of religion on anybody because the supreme ethic is love and love cannot be compelled, it can only be chosen. I cannot force my children to love me. I may be able to force them to comply with something but I cannot force them to love me. When you look at the framing of the world, God clearly delineated
truths but He never imposed it on the creation. If God being all-powerful gives us the freedom to believe or not believe, why are men with less wisdom and power
impose their beliefs on others?
Q: What about the need of some groups who believe that they are their brother's "keeper" and hence need to ensure that fellow believers do not deviate from the truth?
A: In the past, the dominant truth in the West was slavery. In India, the Brahmins were the only ones who could talk to God and there were the untouchables in
the country. Are these right? The problem with people who hold on to the position that "I am my brother's keeper, therefore I have the right to dictate my
religion on him," they do not allow others to debate their religion in public. So it is one of imposition and not one of intellectual integrity.
I was talking to a professor of a certain religion in a certain country and I ask him what he would do if his daughter converted to another faith? He said:
"I'll do everything in my power to keep her from moving in that direction. If she moves in that direction, I'll kill her." That is not the freedom to believe or disbelieve. That is only giving the freedom to "agree with me or die." This was not the way Jesus worked. When a disciple cut off the ear of a man who came to arrest Jesus, Jesus disapproved of it and healed him and said: "Those who live by the sword will die by the sword."
Q: In your academic presentation (in Universiti Malaya) on the Three Great Challenges to Religion and Society: A Proposal for True Spirituality, you mentioned that we need to defend truths and should not take pluralism to mean moral relativism but to what extent religious absolutism should be encouraged?
A: I believe in the absolutes in the governance of my personal life but I cannot impose those absolutes on my neighbour. I use the process that allows me to give
my neighbour the sanctity of his own choice. In the framing of the common good, there cannot be an imposition of religion on anybody because the supreme ethic is love and love cannot be compelled, it can only be chosen. I cannot force my children to love me. I may be able to force them to comply with something but I cannot force them to love me. When you look at the framing of the world, God clearly delineated
truths but He never imposed it on the creation. If God being all-powerful gives us the freedom to believe or not believe, why are men with less wisdom and power
impose their beliefs on others?
Q: What about the need of some groups who believe that they are their brother's "keeper" and hence need to ensure that fellow believers do not deviate from the truth?
A: In the past, the dominant truth in the West was slavery. In India, the Brahmins were the only ones who could talk to God and there were the untouchables in
the country. Are these right? The problem with people who hold on to the position that "I am my brother's keeper, therefore I have the right to dictate my
religion on him," they do not allow others to debate their religion in public. So it is one of imposition and not one of intellectual integrity.
I was talking to a professor of a certain religion in a certain country and I ask him what he would do if his daughter converted to another faith? He said:
"I'll do everything in my power to keep her from moving in that direction. If she moves in that direction, I'll kill her." That is not the freedom to believe or disbelieve. That is only giving the freedom to "agree with me or die." This was not the way Jesus worked. When a disciple cut off the ear of a man who came to arrest Jesus, Jesus disapproved of it and healed him and said: "Those who live by the sword will die by the sword."
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