~ Zawlthanglien Khawzawl
Every interaction between
various groups in a society at different levels, formal or otherwise, is
defined by ends they each set for themselves.
The ends here are of differing ideological interests of standing nature,
if not mere differences of opinion which usually is the case with us. Basically,
it means there always will be differences between groups or individuals in a
society over issues and matters of overlapping nature. The inevitable question
that comes to the mind then is how to resolve such differences. The manner and
methods employed in the interactions and of the strife towards the solution of it
is a measure of societal maturity. If one were to measure our society on that
scale of maturity principle, the likely measurement would be that of a teenager
in terms of human existence. How and why it is so may well be a good thing to
start a question with.
The most significant
historical moments of our society to the present day have been, unfortunately,
met with misused of power and authority. There may only be few exceptions. The
numerous split witnessed by NEIGM in 1953 and the subsequent split experienced
by Independent Kohran in 1968 followed by the mushrooming of different
denominational church up to the early nineties testify the negative character
of power and authority playing a role in our society. However, a strict and
exclusive application of the negative or positive nature of power to explain
the phenomena may yield no conclusive conclusion but the huge efforts and
struggle for power was hugely unmistakably there looking smugly back at us with
a wide condescending grin. The struggle for it continued to this day.
The
Root Cause Behind The Idea
We often think and
perceive the numerous denominational churches in our society as a liability, an
eternally divisive existence, a stumbling block to social solidarity and the
root cause of our past and present predicament. This mode of thinking stems
from the fact that church history constitutes our history or at least, half of
it. The coming of Christianity and the subsequent formation of NEIGM and
establishment of Independent Kohran thereafter formally united the whole lot of
us who otherwise were scattered over numerous villages and across vast and
different regions without any serious or formal link as social and political
unit. Let not it be forgotten also that had it not been for the Independent Church
the very language we now speak would never have survived the onslaught of Lusei
hegemony.
Unfortunately, the very
force that had united us became or rather was made a tool of division, a baton
in the hands to beat others up who held views different from our own. The
resultant environment was so saturated with general hatred and personal enmity
that it failed to dissipate even after the passes of almost half a century long
year. The child of that environment is denominational ideology whose prisoners
we all are, perhaps. This is the foundational reason behind the interpretation
of denominations as a liability, and therefore, a force against which anyone
with the hope to achieve social unity and solidarity must struggle and fight like
it’s a fundamental duty.
The
Struggle
The power base of those
who hold such view is found mostly in the social groupings, sometimes formally
called or named Fellowship or Welfare, in various cities of our country. They are
the banners of hope of social unity and brotherhood, or so it is believed. The
core belief of such view is, in time, in the demise of the numerous
denominations towards which they keenly looked forward to.
The belief in such
thoughts is, however, not without its share of merit.
Birds of different denominations flock together and found themselves enjoying the company each other in praise and worship. Such environment stimulates and awakens the feelings of togetherness and unity, a thing no denomination in all its luxury can hope to give. It is on the strength of such powerful social feelings that the hope to unify ourselves and consolidate social solidarity have been based and built. This project, social or otherwise, however, is the point interface where two opposing ideological forces meet and interact.
This basically can be
understood as a struggle for power to capture the loyalty or allegiance of the
masses on whose verdict their political fortune rests. Two options are made available to be chosen – Fellowship/
Welfare as representing unifying force and denomination as representing
division. Any attempt to paint grey areas between the two is met with such a
fierce hostility that the situation looks like the Stalinist regime after the
WW2 wherein the popular refrain and propaganda was - there is no murder in
paradise! Of course, murders took place and murderers were there then but since
murder was (regarded as) a capitalist disease it had to be denied. So too was, and still is, our situations. Some
things must be denied and has to be swept under the rug irrespective of its
truth value. And the way this conflict
of interests plays out in the real social world is something which will
continue to haunt and befuddle social thinkers.
Anti-Denomination
as Self Defeating
Coming back to the view
that held denominations as eternally divisive, one might ask how reasonable is
it to believe in the real merit of it, and at what costs? There is a lot more
rhetoric to it and less of substance and truth in such thoughts than its
proponents may hope to admit. And I think imbibing such thoughts and creating
an impression as such upon the youths of our society is a dangerous business to
engage in simply because future social well-being of ours is at stake. Various
objections against the view can be had a few of which are discussed as follow.
Firstly, the notion
about denomination as eternally
divisive presupposes the idea that the existence of denominations is inherently
incompatible with social unity. This concept is rooted in the historical facts
of church history from which all of us can’t seem to escape. Unfortunately,
this fact is the thing which overshadows, with unfailing perseverance, our
entire current predicament of social incoherence and disunity. The fault, therefore,
on the part of the present generations is that all present social interactions
are made contingent on this historical fact. Consequently, everyone and
everything is brushed with the colour of denomination one is attached to irrespective
of the neutrality or goodness of the actions. Therefore, there is an urgent
need to break away with history and as quickly as possible, and ran away from
it as if our life, social and private, depends on it.
We need to run as far away as possible and with
all the energy our thinking mind could carry us from such thoughts because the
existence of denominations in itself is not divisive. On the contrary, it is in
the mishandling of competing group interests and the irresistible impulse to
resort to majoritarian narratives to justify our actions that our divisions
find expression. If, for the sake of argument, there are social groups as
numerous as the denominational churches we see in our society today and they each
replaced the latter, we would still face the same problems and difficulties of
social solidarity. This tells us that the problem with our struggle for social
unity is not because there are too many churches but because we fail to
understand why there are so many churches in the first place. Rights, freedom
and equality we must learn to imbibe. The active cultivation of these values
will inculcate respect into our individual and social lives. Respect,
therefore, must be the definition of every individual and social relationship
if we ever hope of achieving real unity as a social and political unit. It is
the only possible moral and logical path to solving the problems of uniting
ourselves.
The idea of denomination as divisive is false
because it is based on church history. It
is false not because it is a historical truth but because we relive it. After
all, why would we allow ourselves to be given to history that had in all its
glory divided us and pitted us against one another? History is to be celebrated and learned from
and not to be relived. If the Blacks of America always dig into their past and
actively dwell upon it, what do you think would happen in the US or in
countries where they had been immensely hurt and subjugated? Conversely, why do
you think the Middle East, and in particular Iraq, scramble over their dead and
the destructions and mayhem they experience presently? At least in part, the
active efforts made by a section of its people to establish the past and relives
it in their present social settings are responsible for the current pain they experience.
We
take more pride in reliving the past than learning from it because modern
education and its values have not changed our basic mode of thinking and
perception. We love living in a country where ‘unity and diversity’ is
celebrated and respected but balked at our own diversity. We distrusted it and
looked at it with contempt and scorn. The logical thinking and actions that
follows is to attempt, real hard, at achieving social unity within the confines
of uniformity. We failed miserably,
however, because we failed to understand that solidarity or for that matter
unity is not contained in uniformity but celebrated and realized only in
diversity. We try to realize social unity on the strength of shared group interests
and values and reject anything or anybody who does not share thoughts which are
not in line with ours. This approach is completely flawed because it makes us
blind to the thoughts that social unity is like a house built and constructed
with the bricks of disagreement and differences, and cemented together by the
values of respect for the rights, freedom and equality of each individual and
group as well. Therefore, the sooner we learn and acknowledge it the better it
will be for the cause of our unity.
Secondly, the very idea
of denominational divisions as eternal is circular in its reasoning and effect,
and therefore offers no logical exit solution for the very problem it seeks to
solve in the first place. This is so because the idea necessarily entails the existence
or creation of anti-denominational group, secular or otherwise, to counter the
supposed divisive group character of denomination. The necessity nature of its existence
necessarily, in turn, whipped up antagonism against denominations it refused to
or can’t control among its proponents and die-hard supporters. This antagonism against
denominations, which was supposed to exorcise society of its denominational
possession, unwittingly metamorphosed itself into the very evil it had hoped to
drive out of societal systems. In other words, the situation is akin to a
Pastor who becomes possessed in the process of performing an exorcism. The
Pastor becomes possessed perhaps because he lacks faith and we become possessed
because we lacked real understanding of what we fight for.
Anti-denominational
group knows perfectly well that individual doesn’t stand a chance, and hence employed
the scheme of group versus group strategy against denomination by absorbing
individuals, as many as possible, into its circle of influence. In this way, it
seeks to muster up power enough to nullify the supposed divisiveness of
denomination so as to steamroll its way to social unity. It tries to increase
its moral command and authority over people within and outside of its sphere of
influence by passively or at times actively picking on denomination with
particular emphasis on the divisions it causes within our society. However, the
unfortunate thing about this whole idea is that the more it draws people in
within its circle the more antagonism it will create between various groups in the
society. This is so because it is afflicted by the same afflictions it sees in
others. A vicious cycle of causes and effects is, thus, created with no solution
in sight. All because the very force it chooses to use for the realization of
its goal limits its capability to see beyond or escape the wall of divisions
which it blurrily sees as having source from denominations. In the end, it
becomes just another group or organisation no different from those it tries to
remove or condemns as divisive.
Thirdly, another
problem with the anti-denominational view is its one-dimensional usage of power
and authority. In other words, power and authority is used solely to impose its
views and enforce obedience in line with its ideology. Anyone found guilty of dereliction
is made to suffer social ostracism or warn with threat of stigmatization. This
inflexibility or irrationality in the use of power and authority or reasoning
is a symptom of social groups with far-right political leanings howsoever
persuasively it claims it stood for goals reflective of progress and social
wellbeing. This sort of politics is currently prevailing the world over, be it
Brexit, US under Trump or the politics of cow India presently witnesses, and it
seems we too are not far behind in the game.
The perils of
anti-denomination in its present form are, therefore, not only because it is
divisive but more so in the execution of its power and authority. The current
social conditions of the Hmars in Delhi bear testimony to it. Layman or not, we
have no qualms and we show no compunction about what we are doing. What does that tell us? Logically, we would not
hesitate displaying the same emotional quality over the whole society given we
are in a position to do it - suppress, harass, coerce or ostracize individual
or people who hold different views and beliefs on what social behaviour should
be like! Actually, we are no different than the RSS in terms of political
thoughts and action but whom we snubbed and looked at with contempt and
distrusts. This is the kind of madness we have embraced and the level of
dignity we have climbed down to for the sake of self-justifications. There is no dignity in hurting one’s own
tribesmen; it is a sign of extreme desperation and immaturity of the mind and
heart consumed by desire bereft of vision. It would indeed be a great sight and
funny too, to see a man walking hand in hand with a monkey dressed in wedding
gown with a wide grin in the face. So too is the social conditions of the Hmars
in Delhi, not because it is funny necessarily but because it is an anachronism.
Conclusion
Anti-denominational
view will not solve our problem of social unity. It will only help create more
divisions in the society because it is self-defeating. It is an idea we can
hope to follow at our own peril as a social political unit. It must be
abandoned, the sooner the better. Social solidarity will not be found in the
removal or annihilation of the diverse groups rather it is in the acceptance of
our diversity that the solution to it lays. Unfortunately, what is frighteningly alarming
is the silence of public leaders and people who called themselves guardian of
the interests of the society as well as civil societies on such issues. The silence
is deafening, actually. Might be it has something to do with the lack of
impartial observers or intellectuals because our environment has become so
saturated with hatred that impartiality has become as rare a quality as
diamond. Or still it may be the case that we don’t want to talk about it. That’s
understandable. However, this fact of our social conditions will not go away by
keeping our mouth shut or by stifling opinion. It may appear, for a time, to
have gone away but it will certainly raise its ugly head again, and again, in
the future. Therefore, in the interests of society as a whole discussion about social
issues should be encouraged, talked about and debated as much as possible. We
may fail to deliver but there never must be a time when we fail to protest
against injustice.
