Kay Benedict

New Delhi: The Catholic church, which is on a collision course with the CPI(M)-led government in Kerala, alleged on Friday that the Marxists were trying to divide Christians and destroy their religious symbols to serve their “vested political interest”.

Endorsing archbishop Joseph Powathil’s recent exhortation to the Catholics to send their wards only to Christian management-run schools and colleges, Catholic Bishops Conference of India (CBCI) spokesperson Fr Babu Joseph alleged that as soon as it assumed power in the state, the CPI(M)-led government made attempts to control and even suppress legitimate constitutional rights of Christian minority institutions.

Criticising the “poor quality” of education imparted by government-run educational institutions and the “huge”, “disproportionate” resources spent by the state, the CBCI spokesperson demanded a “social audit of these government schools and colleges that drain the nation’s resources while awfully under-performing”.

Joseph said the Marxists were trying to obliterate “any references to religion. “They don’t want us to teach even catechism to our children, then why we invest in our institutions. There is no compromise on it. They want to inject more Marxian and atheist ideology in school curriculum”.

“The move to exercise greater control and even to the point of taking over educational institutions belonging to the Christian minority is a step in the wrong direction because the community has established the institutions with scarce resources primarily for the development of its own members and also for others.

Our institutions played a significant role in raising the level of literacy and education in Kerala,” said Joseph.

The CBCI official also alleged subtle moves to drive a wedge between well-off Christians and those who are economically-weak.

Rejecting the charge that Powathil’s fiat amounted to religious fundamentalism, Joseph said “there’s been a move to remove all religious colour from our institutions.”

CBCI secretary general and archbishop Stanislaus Fernandes also backed his Kerala counterpart saying “it’s been the tradition of the church that Christians be brought up in a Christian environment”.

 

Source : DNA India