From Our Special Correspondent
Daijiworld Media Network - Bengaluru
Bengaluru, Apr 27: Several Catholic and Christian organisations, who have come together under the banner of Indian Christians United Forum (ICUF) headed by social activist T J Abraham, have warmly welcomed the recent circular on the contentious language issue in the liturgy in the Archdiocese of Bangalore giving primacy to Kannada.
The Archbishop’s efforts to put an end to the contentious issue, which has been festering for the last 40 years in the Archdiocese of Bangalore disturbing peace and curbing progress of the Catholic church in the name of using different languages in liturgy in the churches must be supported by all Catholics as the issue of giving primacy to Kannada had been dividing the Catholics along linguistic lines and creating an unhealthy and uncomfortable atmosphere.
"In fact, the situation had been vitiated to such an extent that many Catholics were keeping off the Church or moving towards other denominations of the Christians," Abraham said.
The news conference addressed by ICUF President T J Abraham was attended by Victor Edward D’Souza, Chairman of the Federation of Konkani Catholic Associations, Silvian Noronha President, Indiranagar Konkani Kutam, Johnson, Secretary of Bangalore Central Council Vincent de Paul Society, Antony M Lobo, President, Karnataka Kannada Christa Yuvakara Balaga, Dolphy D’Cunha, President Carmel Kutam, Sandeep Pilli, President Living Lay Youth Bangalore Diocese, Lullus Cutinho, Area Council President Vincent de Paul Society, Edwin D’Souza, President, Sarvabhasha Catholic Christra Sangha, Ida Sequeira, President, KONCAB, Lawrance, Secretary Karnataka Kannada Christa YuvakaraBalaga, Aida Margaret D’Cunha, Secretary, ICUF, Richard, Secretary, Sarvabhasha Catholic Christra Sangha, and Arun Fernandes, Secretary FKCA.
With the issuance of the latest circular by the Archbishop, the four-decade-old language controversy has been put to rest and a "best possible permanent solution" has been found with the intervention of Vatican.
"We welcome the circular issued by the Archbishop based on the directives of the Vatican as it allows people of all language groups like Konkani, English, Telugu, Hindi, Tamil or Malayalam to express their faith and participate in the Holy Mass and other religious activities in their mother-tongues even while giving the due respect and priority to Kannada in all the churches of the Archdiocese, which is in accordance with the spirit of the Vatican Council II," a joint press release issued at the press conference said.
Abraham said people belonging to other religious conglomerations have been trying to derive pleasure by creating trouble in the Catholic community, at the instance of Anti-Catholic people/agents within our community, who are pretending to be Catholics overtly but are covertly working for Non-Catholic denominations to damage the interest of the Catholic Church and take away people to their denominations. If there is an iota of self-respect people who are not Catholics should not comment on the internal matter of the church.
"We challenge the Non-Christians, who want to comment or interfere in the language issues of the Catholic Church to first convert and become Christians to gain a right to comment about the internal affairs of the Catholic Church," Abraham said pointing out that when we talk about the population of Karnataka as six crore, the figure includes people speaking Telugu, Urdu, Konkani, Tulu, Hindi, English, Tamil, Malayalam, Bengali and other languages and they cannot be expected to forget or neglect their own mother-tongues, especially in matters like prayers or religious services.
The press release pointed out that there have been several groups claiming to be from the Catholic community interested in the Preservation, Propagation and Protection of the Kannada language and have been publicly protesting and perpetually creating an atmosphere of hatred amongst Catholics on linguistic lines, and added: "With the latest directive/language policy their demands have been very well addressed and settled. If the real reason of these groups was/is the concern for Kannada, the present/new policy should be acceptable."
If the current language policy is not acceptable to someone, Abraham contended that their opposition should be construed as motivated by some other anti-Catholic reasons and not Kannada at all. There are some people in the garb of being Catholics, actually working towards disturbing the cordial atmosphere amongst the Catholics, only to drive people away from the Catholic community to other denominations.
"The real Kannada Catholics who have real concern for Kannada should be able to identify such bogus crusaders, who are out there to mislead Catholics saying Kannada is being disrespected or is not being given its due status," Abraham said.
The present circular/language policy making Kannada the principle language of the Archdiocese, with scheduling Kannada Mass to be given prime time and that Jubilee, Chrism Mass, Ordination etc, which the Archbishop presides will be held in Kannada, is a directive by which the Archbishop has succeeded to introducing something, which the State Government itself has failed in trying to introduce Kannada as a compulsory subject in schools across the state.
Those who oppose the directives of Vatican should understand that they are actually opposing the directive of the highest Authority of the Catholic Church, which is being given due respect by the highest court of our nation, for it is ecclesiastical matter.
Catholics irrespective differences should make a concerted effort to implement the new Policy/laws with the spirit of goodwill and undivided obedience to our higher ecclesiastical authorities, and also strive to put an end to this long-standing language controversy which has caused lot of pain and hampered growth in the Archdiocese, Abraham has appealed.