You don’t see this every day.
On Saturday in Los Angeles, St. Patrick’s Episcopal Church of Thousand Oaks held a joint service with local Hindu leaders.
Part of the service included the Christians apologizing for their past and present treatment of the Hindus:
During the service, the Rt. Rev. J. Jon Bruno, bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles, issued a statement of apology to the Hindu religious community for centuries-old acts of religious discrimination by Christians, including attempts to convert them.
“I believe that the world cannot afford for us to repeat the errors of our past, in which we sought to dominate rather than to serve,” Bruno said in a statement read by the Rt. Rev. Chester Talton. “In this spirit, and in order to take another step in building trust between our two great religious traditions, I offer a sincere apology to the Hindu religious community.”
The bishop also said he was committed to renouncing “proselytizing” of Hindus. Bruno had been scheduled to read the statement himself, but a death of a close family friend prevented him from attending the service.
Not sure if there’s any course of action that will result from this, but it’s a nice gesture. Hell, any time a church apologizes for a wrong and changes what it’s doing, something good is happening.
I wonder if the proselytization of Hindus will still occur post-apology.
I wonder if the church is going to stop trying to convert those who are not Hindu.
I wonder how other churches will react to any of this…
(Thanks to Grazatt for the link!)
[tags]atheist, atheism, Hinduism, Jesus[/tags]