America is like this BIG place

Sai Baba on the right


On one of my trips back from BOI I was waiting for a train to bring me back down to work. This was before I realized that immigration was official business of the institute and I could get a driver for that purpose, oh well. While sitting on the platform some kid sat down right next to me (the whole personal space thing not having any merit here) and starts attempting to talk to me. It's clear that he's not well educated. His english is worse than my Tamil. I'm not kidding, it was easier for me to talk to him in Tamil than in English. So he asks the question everyone is fond of asking:
Native?

Which means, "of which nation are you a citizen?" or "where did you grow up?" Something along these lines. I of course say USA. This was sort of before I got the whole Lebanon thing down. So the next question he asks me is:
Christian?

Now I don't want to go on a diatribe to this kid about the history of christianity and how I'm a member of the American branch of the Church of England and all my theological underpinnings so I go with the answer we both understand "amma." Which simply means "yes" but is used the same way we use "yeah."

He gets really excited and asks if I know Benny Hinn. (For those of you unaware of Benny Hinn and his fraudulent ministry See here: Benny Hinn Wiki entry.) I only know about him because I pay a lot of attention to televangelists. I fervently believe that televangelists are all fraudulent and harbor great disdain for them. My apologies to those of you who are offended by these accusations.

Anyway, this kid says "Benny Hinn, number 1 ministry in USA." How very American of him to think in these terms. I tried in my woefully limited Tamil to explain to him that Benny Hinn is "ille nulla" (no good) and that his ministry is all about money. That was an complete failure. He just thought that I didn't know what I was saying. But some thoughts really hit me about this sort of religious fervor.

In one sense I should not disparage those who truly gain something from believing in frauds. I should allow them to have their peace however they should get it.
In another sense it completely burns me up inside that people are becoming fabulously wealthy off of this sort of ill-informed devotion. I think they should be exposed for the frauds and cheats that they are.

India (even with Benny Hinn having his embarrassing influence here) certainly has plenty of their own religious personalities. Hinduism is an ancient and strange religion that I don't even pretend to understand; not even one iota of understanding.
There is a man I'd mentioned before they call him Sai Baba (see here Sai Baba Wiki entry). He is the man I'd mentioned before who looks to me like an Indian Richard Simmons. I asked several dozens of Indians about him so far. Some people wish to be polite and tell me "oh yes, Sai Baba has many followers." The rest of them are outright with it and say "he is nothing, but a fraud." I really don't know anything about him, so nothing neither confirm nor deny his fraudulent status. I always get suspicious though when religious folks start telling their followers they can't read certain publications or look on the internet because in those publications there are bad things written about said leader. Sai Baba has asked this of his followers. To my mind, that's a red flag. Now, one doesn't want to offend, but come on...

Sai Baba of course isn't the only religious celebrity in India, there are hundreds, just like America, but my intuition tells me this phenomenon of complete religious devotion to television stars somehow started with the televangelist movement in the states. I could be wrong. It would certainly be wrong to state that religious fanaticism started in the states, because we all know stories from long ago about religious wars and prophets and martyrs and sages, etc, but I think THIS PARTICULAR BRAND of religious fanaticism stems from the United States. Yet another crappy thing we've contributed to the world. Because you know, like America is like this BIG place.