Am I over thinking this?

[Shanti]

We live in a medium sized town that doesn't have a large Hindu community (that I am aware of) or a mandir. I have two young kids and I want them to be exposed to other Hindu youth, so I joined them into a "Hindu religion" class given at a mandir about 1 hour from here. I do make sure they are exposed to our religion at home and read to them some kid friendly versions of scriptures, but I wanted them to be around others like them so they don't feel odd. Being in the States, especially when not in a metropolitan area can sometimes make you feel like your the only one around that's not Christian.

Anyway, everything went great in the class, they sang slokas, read stories, etc until the end when they started singing Amazing Grace.:headscratch:

I could easily stick them in a bible school class 2 minutes up the road from me if I wanted to hear my kids singing that!

You know the part of that song that bothers me the most is the whole "saved a wretch like me" part. It just goes against everything I believe.

So, I wanted to confront the teacher about this but since we are beginning mid-year, I don't know how much she'll change the way they do things or if I have any right to say how they do things anyway.

Then I thought maybe we could just leave early before they get to that part, but don't want my kid to feel left out either.

Ugh, am I over thinking this, should I just let him sing the song and move on with life? Would you be offended or have reservations about this too?

Thanks,
S

[Eastern Mind]

Shanti:

I think you have every right to be upset. Obviously this place is a 'liberal Hindu" place. It just goes to show you how far the Christians have infiltrated once-pure Hindu minds. Personally I would complain to higher-ups, and then pull my kids. Keep looking for a more traditional place, I guess. Best wishes with that,

Aum Namasivaya

[ScottMalaysia]

While I am very syncretic and enjoy Christian hymns (I also consider the Virgin Mary to be a form of Goddess Durga), I could understand why you would not want your children to be exposed to this. Possibly the people running the class didn't see anything wrong with "Amazing Grace" because it doesn't mention Jesus at all and is about God's grace (and therefore compatible with Hindu theology). I see that you are offended by the line 'saved a wretch like me'. Christians believe that man is inherently bad (because of Adam and Eve's sin), and this is totally opposed to Hindu theology.

Many Hindus know very little about their religion. Many have never read any Scriptures in their lives. I was shocked when my wife, a Malaysian Indian, said "You only live once". This is in total opposition to Hindu philosophy and theology. Maybe the teacher knows a few slokas and stories but knows little about Hindu theology and philosophy. Ask her if she's read the Bhagavad-Gita and if she hasn't, then definitely pull your kids out of the class.

My advice would be to look for a different Mandir. If there is no Mandir in your town, you should seriously consider moving to a town with a Mandir. It is said that a town without a temple in uninhabitable. I would never live in a town with no temple, no matter what job opportunities were there. That limits the places I can live to two cities in all of New Zealand (I don't count ISKCON temples because I'm a Durga bhakta).

[Shanti]

Thank you EM and Scott for your replies.

The teacher of the children's class runs the center, and her husband actually leads the Geeta class there as well. I wish there were more options, but that's really the closest resource we have. There is another mandir 2 hours away, I tried to get my son in there last year but there was a long wait list, I will try again this year, but it's a pretty far travel to do every week with little kids.

I will take your advice though and speak to the teacher at least. Any suggestions on the best way to "state my case"? I know I heard her mention the "all paths to one place" statement before. I'm just not sure how to explain to her that the lyrics of that song have a clearly Christian meaning. I don't want to offend, as I said it really is the closest resource we have and I'd like for my son to also take the Hindi class they offer there as well.

As for moving, believe me Scott, if we could, we would. We moved here from NYC, where I would have had my pick of which mandir to attend. But sometimes you have to take what you can get.

Thanks,
S

[Eastern Mind]

Vannakkam: Here's a link to a small on-line course, and some resources you can use at home.

http://www.himalayanacademy.com/resources/children/

If you want a social group for the kids, how about searching your local phonebook? Just maybe there are others in your small locale that are in the same boat. You have to be kind of outgoing for that though.

Aum Namasivaya

[ScottMalaysia]

I will take your advice though and speak to the teacher at least. Any suggestions on the best way to "state my case"? I know I heard her mention the "all paths to one place" statement before. I'm just not sure how to explain to her that the lyrics of that song have a clearly Christian meaning. I don't want to offend, as I said it really is the closest resource we have and I'd like for my son to also take the Hindi class they offer there as well.


Tell the teacher that the song conveys a Christian view of God and the soul. According to Christianity, human beings are by nature bad and fallen, because of original sin (the eating of the forbidden fruit by Adam and Eve). Therefore, God's grace is needed to make a person holy and wipe out the original sin (as well as personal sins committed by the person themself). It is only through the suffering, death and resurrection of Jesus, who is both God and man (a logical impossibility), that mankind can be forgiven.

Hinduism, on the other hand, teaches that a person is divine by their very nature. The real 'you' is the soul, and the soul is eternal. If you are an Advaitin, you believe that the soul is actually Brahman (God) and if you are a Dvaitin you believe that your soul is the same in quality with God.

Sri Ramakrishna said:

"Once someone gave me a book of the Christians. I asked him to read it to me. It talked about nothing but sin. (To Keshab) Sin is the only thing one hears of at your Brahmo Samaj, too. The wretch who constantly says, 'I am bound, I am bound' only succeeds in being bound. He who says day and night, 'I am a sinner, I am a sinner' verily becomes a sinner.
"One should have such burning faith in God that one can say: 'What? I have repeated the name of God, and can sin still cling to me? How can I be a sinner any more? How can I be in bondage any more?'
"If a man repeats the name of God, his body, mind, and everything become pure. Why should one talk only about sin and hell, and such things? Say but once, 'O Lord, I have undoubtedly done wicked things, but I won't repeat them.' And have faith in His name." (The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, Chapter 5)


You could also stress that you're surrounded by a majority Christian culture, and you want your children to grow up Hindu and not be converted to Christianity. The more they've been exposed to it as children, the more familiar it becomes and may make the conversion to Christianity easier. Tell her you want the children to remain free of Christian influences.




As for moving, believe me Scott, if we could, we would. We moved here from NYC, where I would have had my pick of which mandir to attend. But sometimes you have to take what you can get.


Very true. The devotees here are mostly Gujarati speakers, so at the mandir the Gita class is all in Gujarati. I'd prefer one with sizeable numbers of different Indian language speakers so the service would be in English, but I have to take what I can get. There is a South Indian temple about 20 mins out of the main city area, where my wife would fit in, but I don't understand Tamil either. Near the South Indian temple there's also an ISKCON temple, and ISKCON have a centre in town with a small temple, but they charge admission there. The one time I went I had a discussion with an ISKCON devotee and he actually told me to stop worshipping Durga and start worshipping Krishna. So I haven't been back.

[Shanti]

Thanks EM for the link, I will look it over tonight. Unfortunately, I'm not very outgoing, I prefer curling up with a good book over small talk, but I am working on that for my childrens' sake. My elder is very social and outgoing. I have tried contacting several people from the Indian community here but none were interested in forming any sort of a Hindu youth group of sorts. They prefer to keep events and such secular. I understand their POV, there is a small community of Indians here (Hindu, Sikh, Jain, etc) and rather than divide the few that are here, they prefer to keep us together. It's similar to the way it was in the town grew up in, until the Indian population there got larger. ( But we still always had a Hindu youth group.)

I appreciate the advice, Scott, I will bring up this topic to the teacher. It's sometimes difficult for me to express in words exactly what my thoughts are, but you've done a great job of summing it up for me!

It's difficult for me to find other Hindus that feel the same about our religion, most here are very "secular". Even my in-law's (born and raised in India with temples on their family property) roll their eyes when I get annoyed with them for giving Christmas presents to the kids! I get the whole "It's just a holiday" bit.

Thanks again,
S

[sanjaya]

Hi Shanti,

No, I don't think you're overthinking this. "Amazing Grace" is a Christian song no matter how you look at it. It's not evil or anything, in fact I really like it as a song. But it simply has nothing to do with Hinduism, and I think it'll only confuse an impressionable child who already is being brought up outside of India in a Christian country. It seems to me that at a temple, kids should be learning about our stories, values, and traditions. Not Christian values, which are largely antithetical to Hinduism.

I was born and raised in America, and as an adult I've now started to practice Hinduism without my parents' insistence, so I think they did something right. Though my hometown is now larger and has an active Hindu community, when I was growing up there were far fewer Hindus and only a few small puja groups. As you say, it's hard being the only Hindu in school. I in fact recall being envious of the Christian kids who had a structured religious life and went to church every Sunday (I was puzzled as to why they all hated church). Hinduism is not as heirarchical as Christianity, nor do we have any of the gimmicks like Bible camp, Christian radio, Christian cartoons, Christian TV, rock concert church services, etc. It's hard for a child to see the elegance of our religion or the reverence of our temple worship.

But honestly, when I was growing up I only went to a temple on a few occasions, and I never had any formal education in Hinduism. Don't get me wrong, these are great things, and I wish I had had them as a child. But if I can point to two things which have instilled in me the faith that I have today, I would mention my parents' monthly observance of Satyanarayana Puja, and my father's narration of Hindu stories from our Scriptures. We have always had a puja room, and every month on the full moon day my parents would prepare prasadam, read the Katha, and offer fruit, milk, and honey to God. Several times a week before bed, my father would tell me stories from the Mahabharata, the Ramayana, the Upanishads, or elsewhere in Hinduism's vast repository of Scripture.

Obviously all children are different, and especially since I'm no parent I can't offer this as a definitive prescription for raising Hindu children. But it did work for me. First and foremost the home is our temple, and we dedicate one room in it to God to show that our home is God's home. So I think that keeping a puja room in the home is very important. I also think it's important for parents to maintain a Hindu lifestyle, and explain to their kids why our traditions are important, and why God is important. I have always believed that the strength of Hinduism is our emphasis on the family. That's why we don't spend time preaching on marriage and parenting, and yet Hindus have far lower divorce and child delinquency rates than the Christians. Though I was the only Hindu at my school, it never mattered to me, because I knew that I had a stable home and family. I likewise feel that if you instill Hindu values in your children at home (as you are already doing), what other kids think of them won't matter in the long run.