Oscar Rebello
Over the last decade or so, the image of Goa has completely and conclusively, converted itself into a giant casino, condoms and cocaine infested paradise of Sodom and Gomorrah.
With or without our consent, simply doesn’t matter. So when a bunch of bumbling idiots from BITS Pilani, actually think that a Church and it’s sacredness is also part of Goa’s party zone, should we really be surprised?
For these folk, distinguishing between the profane and the holy is an impossible task..I’m surprised they didn’t indulge in a selfish while “eating” and “spitting” the holy communion.
But this is not about the idiots who could have been lynched if this wasn’t Goa. This is about the mature, immensely balanced and truly Christian reaction of Fr Eremito Rebello, who adroitly defused a potentially inflammatory situation.
“Hurting religious beliefs” is a cottage industry in our country today that sadly has resulted in tragic loss of innocent lives and property on a sickeningly almost daily basis.
Most times “hurting religious sentiments” is inadvertent, innocent or because a scholar has an alternative view point on a religious belief.
Most mobs, thus hurt, then run riot to please and defend their gods and political parties (never AAP) often latch on to this riot to reap political dividends – and what rich dividends – they are.
If religious leaders, like Fr Eremito seize the initiative from the word go, understand that’s it’s not a deliberate ploy to create communal strife and step forward to calm the mob, before the situation explodes out of control, then this is something so magnificently heroic that it needs applause from all around.
Certainly “offending religious sentiments” is also often a diabolical plot indulged in by unconscentious and ruthless politicians to provoke a riot to polarise communities for political gain. Gujarat, Muzzafarnagar, Bombay, Punjab, the list is endless.
To tackle this you need a law enforcing agency and bureaucracy with spine, who today of course gleefully run as hounds to chase the political opponents of the ruling dispensation
So, a little toast then to Fr Eremito, for demonstrating to us that the fundamental bedrock of his faith is the pivotal lesson the greatest rockstar of all time, taught us 2000 years ago.
Forgiveness is everything…If we forgive then love, charity, goodness, brotherhood and all other sterling qualities of the human spirit so easily follow. Needless to add, however, is that forgiveness can never never happen in the absence of justice.
Our country, indeed the planet, is crying out plaintively, for this fine balance between forgiveness and justice. Small tiny little acts like at Rachol, further that cause.
A drop in the ocean yes, but at least a drop.
