Neelam, says:
Hello,
I’m a Hindu woman engaged to a Christian man. We have agreed to have our children baptized but we have agreed that this will not define them as Christians. I grew up learning the Vedas and teaching Balvihar in the USA. My fiancé has agreed to participate in doing pujas, taking kids to Balvihar, and chanting mantras with me. His only condition is we celebrate Easter and Christmas with his parents. Do you have any words of wisdom? I’m still struggling on how to preserve our Hindu heritage. Any thoughts would be appreciated. —Neelam
Admin says:
Dear Neelam,
You know your situation the best, however we will provide you with some tips to critically evaluate your situation.
Our recommendation to anyone dealing with an Abrahamic is NO BBS (in your case, no baptism). It is not that 10 minutes of a dip in water is an issue but the thought process behind asking for it is a concern. The BBS will set a tone for your married life. Your children will have to go through different confirmatory stages, including attending church during their teenage years for knowledge required for baptism. You are a pluralist, meaning Ishvara Allah tero nam, while Christianity is an absolutely exclusivist religion. The teaching in churches may not match with the teachings in your Balvihar (read McKenna versus Pooja ). Your children will get confused for who is God. You will be better off making up your mind about which one of two faiths will be good for your children. Best would be to let children decide their own faith when they become 21 year old.
If you don’t have the intention of making your children Christians (you said, “we have agreed that this will not define them as Christians”), why would you want to lie to his parents, his religious institutions and to God the Father and baptize them? Why make lies and deceptions a foundation of your married life?
Have you read the Bible? We love Jesus’ messages and for that reason we highly recommend following Jesus, not the church. Tell your fiancé that your children will follow Jesus but will not be baptized. Explain to him that following Jesus’ teachings is more important to you than 10 minutes of a baptism ritual. Is that not true?
Tell him that you agree 100% with “His only condition is we celebrate Easter and Christmas with his parents.” Yes, go for all Christian holidays, exchange lots of gifts, feed his big family with delicious food and enjoy. Be even a better Christian that most others in his church. In addition, tell him that children will (unless kids don’t want to) spend more time reading Christian scriptures than Hindu scriptures and you will take children to church every Sunday, however you wish to skip that baptism labeling now because you don’t want to lie or you want to take more time to think it over. For now keep all your options open and after having children, if you feel like it, you will agree to baptize the children.
If he and/or his parents are religious fanatics, he will not accept the “no baptism clause” and will walk away from the relationship. For his family, it may be vital that their grandchildren are sin free (it only takes 10 min of baptism ritual to wash sins!).
Neelam, according to Christian doctrine, it is possible that his parents may think you are still carrying original sin from your birth. In this case, the Christian family will reluctantly tolerate you, the sinner. They may wish you to be “saved” but will feel bad and sad that they could not convince you to follow the right path. On the Judgment Day, Jesus and God the Father will “save” your baptized children, your husband and in-laws; while you, your Hindu parents and Gandhiji will be sent to hell. What an absurd teaching if that is what his parents learned from Christianity. However, we do not feel this will be an issue considering he told you that he has agreed to participate in doing pujas, taking kids to Balvihar, and chanting mantras with you.
Stealing salt (Dandi Kutch) was not the objective of Gandhiji, but to fight injustice. Likewise, Rosa Parks did not fight for that bus seat, but for the thought process behind asking to go to the back of the bus. If Rosa Parks did not say “NO” on that day, there would not be a “President” Barack Obama. If you, a Balvihar student, will not stand up to this injustice, who else will? Do we have to wait for Mahatma Gandhi to resurrect and plan a Dandi Kutch to teach Christians that Muslims, Jews and Hindus are not sinners? In so many cases, Hindus marrying Christians in America are submitting to this request for baptism; when can we expect your Balvihar to produce a Rosa Parks?
In any dealing, there are measurable items and there are others you cannot measure it. The baptism is clearly a very specific measurable event and your child will have that “label” for his/her life. The others, like “pujas, taking kids to Balvihar, and chanting mantras with me” are not measurable. What if he joins you for pujas two times, take kids to Balvihar for a few times and chant mantras 10 times; and in the end he decides that this is not working out for him? He may say he has fulfilled his promises and now he does not want any part of it. You will be stuck with him.
If one is smart, he or she would simply say adamantly “no BBS,” then wait and see their reactions over the next few months. At the very least, this is one good way to learn the truth.
Are we anti-Christian? We hope you don’t read it that way. We are talking about interfaith marriage with equality; we do not see baptism as an equality of two faiths. Yours is not a within-faith marriage and he should not get stuck on a baptism ritual for interfaith children.
We truly believe that your boyfriend is a pluralist and not at all a religious fanatic. He may truly believe and respect Hinduism. Maybe all we have written is not at all applicable to him. Quite possibly, your planned fake-baptism for your children will not have any effect on your marriage or your children’s lives. In spite of all these, we still like you to buy an insurance; no BBS.
If you go out to buy a house and hire a home inspector, what would you expect him/her to tell you? If he/she just tells you how wonderful the flowers are there in front of the house, and does not mention the cracks in the basement foundation, you will certainly be hurt. Like a good home inspector, we are just pointing out that this BBS issue will be a major crack in your marriage foundation, and will remain with you even after 40 years. It is worth your while to seriously think these issues through, before coming to a decision that can impact the rest of your life.
Neelam, we want you to think through all potential practical issues and know the other family well. We hope we helped you make an “informed” decision, whatever that is. We wish you the best. —Admin
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Section 3.8: I Am a Christian Getting Married to a Hindu