About a third of Hindu, Jain and Sikh youths in America marry to Christians. Even there are so many such marriages, knowledge or guidance on related issues in the Dharmic community is rather sparse. This forum is created to share your experiences and to learn from others. Please invite other Hindu-Christian married couples in America to this post to stimulated discussion on this topic.
If you have/had an interfaith Hindu-Christian marriage in the West, please share your experiences about:
• What was your initial reaction dealing with Christian family and how it evolved over years?
• Was a suggestion came up for you to be baptized for your church marriage?
• Was there any expectation of baptizing and raising children as Christians? Was there any pre-nuptial agreement for children’s faith?
• How do you manage to deal with Christian in-laws?
• How differences in Christian and Hindu beliefs impacted your married life?
• How did you managed to celebrate two sets of religious holidays?
• Are there any values in the other culture/family that you consider harmful to your child? How do you protect your child from it?
• People may not be mean to you on your face, but you may hear things through the grapevines. How do you deal with it?
• At a time, do you feel lost or cut off from your culture/heritage?
• At a time, do you feel frustrated because you cannot go to your parents for guidance for their lack of understanding of issues?
• Do you feel your married life is better or worst compared to your parents?
• Do you find it difficult to balance between two cultures and faiths?
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These are experiences shared by Hindus married to Christians in America:
| Used name | Details | Baptized?* | Status?* | Sriti | I chose to be baptized when I was pregnant with my child, to incorporate my husband’s ancestry. However, I refused to let my child be baptized, because I felt I was not in a position to make a commitment for her. Since then, she speaks our language, does puja daily and has brought our way of life back into our home. | Yes | Married | Amita | Baptism, which 2 of my kids went thru, was presented as more of starting a spiritual life, rather than a commitment to Jesus and Christianity. We explicitly stated we embraced both religions during this time. Since then, we have gone more towards the Dharmic tradition, as worshipping Jesus as the only messenger of God was too restrictive. I can say raising children in both traditions has been challenging. | Yes | 🙂 | Hinu | …so I converted into Christianity and I married without informing my family. I never dare to take murti of Lord to his home. My parents don’t know anything about my bad life. I always pretend them that I am very happy. I don’t want to see them sad. | Yes | 🙁 | Ron | My wife and I were married in a civil ceremony. We agreed to not push our beliefs on each other. Eventually, these things changed. Myself and my children are treated as “Heathens”. A church official once told me that I was not recognized as my wife’s husband because I was not a church member and as such could not be her spouse. Our children have been asked by neighbors: “Why don’t you go to church”? | Hoped for | 🙁 | Niti | We are not in align when comes to raising the kids. I have a concern and didn’t agree to baptize our children. He is ok with my decision of not baptizing the children but not happy with that. I am worried and confused. Please advise. | Yes | Dating | Amutha | 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 Bal Vihar in the US. My fiancee has agreed to participate with doing poojas, taking kids to Bal Vihar, and chanting mantras with me. His only condition is we celebrate easter and christmas with his parents. | Yes | Engaged | John | South Indian Christian dating a Gujurati Hindu and looking forward to Interfaith marriage with equality. | Probably not? | Dating | You? | Please speak out! | ? | ? |
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* It is highly recommended to read individual full story to make your own assessment.
Please share your Hindu-Christian married life experiences below and we will update above table.
Additional readings:
Hindu-Christian dating/marriage experiences
Hindu-Christian marriages
Bible on Hindus?,
Follow Jesus not church,
I am a Catholic mother and my son is marrying a Hindu,
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Don’t take baptism or convert to christianity. You believe in your religion. Hindus have many gods. Consider Christ also one among them. Attend their functions and celebrate all Hindu functions. In this world many faiths crores to lakhs of people believe in each faith. In all faiths believers are rich, poor sufferers or non sufferers from many ailments irrespective of their faith. So no faith can claim any advantage or disadvantage than other one.
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 Bal Vihar in the US. My fiancee has agreed to participate with doing poojas, taking kids to Bal Vihar, 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.
Reply at https://www.interfaithshaadi.org/?p=5087