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A COMMUNION FROM ANOTHER MUMBAI SPEAKER
The communion message at church on this Friday November 26, 2008 in Kuwait was also given by a man who has sisters-in-law still living in Mumbai.
The speaker began by noting that Galatians 3:13-14 actually talks about hostages.
The speaker, named Mohan, noted, "Christ redeemed us from that self-defeating, cursed life by absorbing it completely into himself."
Mohan explained that being redeemed was like having a third party pay a ransom or a price for us. In Greek, this meeting of a hostage takers price was one of the root meanings of the word to be "redeemed".
As at this very moment in history Mumbai residents were still being held-hostage in Mumbai the interpretation was poignant.
Mumbai residents and concerned peoples around the globe were awaiting Indian commandos to free the hostages-probably violently--whereas, Jesus purportedly intervened as a third party in our lives by his non-violent non-resistance on a Friday centuries ago.
According to Thoreau in the 19th Century, "Noncooperation of Evil is as important as cooperation with the Good is a good."
However, "love can be revolutionary" as Martin Luther King, Jr. later said
MURMURRINGS ABOUT MUJAHIDAN!?
Mujahidin of some sort, i.e. like those who had led invasions against the Soviet Rule in Afghanistan during the 1980s from Pakistan, were being blamed by many in India immediately for the attacks and murders in Mumbai this past week-even though specific large Hindu temples appeared not to have been targets at all this week.
As I heard the charges against Pakistan and Islamic groups, I thought immediately about the facts (a) that such rumors might be true and recalled (b) that back in April 1995 many Americans-including its media-had blamed Islamic radicals for the Oklahoma City bombing.
I also recognized how peoples of minority faith have often been blamed for all kinds of horrible events in recent centuries in India -and elsewhere. I mean: Jews in Europe, Christians in Asia, and Muslims in the USA .
On the one hand, I also recall my first visit to Mumbai and India back in 2000.
I, too, like many other tourists to Mumbai, had stayed within walking distance of where much of the shooting and violence has taken place in India this week.
As there is a wonderful English bookstore in the enormous Taj Mahal Hotel, situated across from the iconic Gate of India, I visited the location at least 4 times in my journeys in and around India that summer.
