Dr. P. Dayanandan
‘Option for the least or poor’ is an idiom for ‘equality’. Without equality how can people claim to be children of one God or brothers and sisters of Jesus? “Will you give me a drink?” was the pathetic cry of a tired man, a cry for equality with his Samaritan sister of an ‘untouchable’ land. 2000 years later we have similar stories to tell. When the poor ‘untouchables’ had no equal right to draw water to quench their thirst, Savitribai and Jotirao Phule invited them to take water from their well in 1868. One hundred years later in 1968 when Fr. Pedro Arrupe, Superior General of the Society of Jesus, was engaging with the concept of ‘poverty’, the Latin American Bishops institutionalized the Church’s ‘Option for the poor’. In 1983 when the Latin American ‘Liberation theology’ was influencing Christians across the world the Jesuits affirmed the Church’s ‘preferential option for the poor’.
“Preferential option for the poor?” Bishop Masilamani Azariah of the CSI Diocese of Madras asserted that the Church has only one option. He said God completely, not preferentially, sides with the least, oppressed, marginalized, poor, and victimized. Bishop Azariah’s mother was from a tiny hamlet south of Sriperumbudur: Mettupalayam Kandigai (Christu Nattam). As a young girl Annammal dared not touch nor dip her pot in this water tank to carry drinking water for her family living half a kilometer away.
Neither was my father, a boy of 8, nor his parents and grandparents in the same village, allowed to touch the water for fear of polluting it. They were all Dalit Christians of the Free Church of Scotland Mission. They must wait till some Telugu caste Christian comes by who was willing to pour water into their pots. This was the only source of water for our family to quench their thirst or cook a meal. The Roman Catholic Christians of Palnellore Kandigai who ‘owned’ the water tank came from Kilacheri. The Kilacheri Telugu Christians themselves were migrants who fled from Guntur district in 1786, unable to bear persecution by non-Christians. Rev. Fr. Manenti, an ex-Jesuit, led about 300 families out of oppression and settled them in Kilacheri.
Denial of access to water is absolute travesty of equality and justice. We must face it: caste Christians in India value the book of Manu more than the Gospel of Jesus, even today, even in their institutions and churches. “I am thirsty, would you give me something to drink” he asks. But we tell Jesus to “wait, hang on for some more time on that cross till some NGO fights for your access to water. We are busy drinking the Communion wine.” On 20 March 1927, Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar led the Mahad satyagraha to drink water from the Chavadar Tank accessible only to caste Hindus, Muslims, and Christians, but not Dalits. They did have other sources of water but they marched to Chavadar to challenge caste discrimination. Ambedkar said: “We are not going to the Chavadar Tank to merely drink its water. We are going to the Tank to assert that we too are human beings like others. It must be clear that this meeting has been called to set up the norm of equality.” Jesus would agree! On Christmas day of the same year Ambedkar burnt Manusmriti because it is a symbol of injustice and oppression.
Jesus wanted freedom and equality. His commandments to love and treat others just as we would like to be treated, his compassion for the poor, needy, and least of his brothers and sisters is what the church is all about. Hundreds of thousands of women and men went all over the world taking this good news, not because they were afraid of any hell for disobedience, but because the gospel is an over-pouring force of goodness. The results are undeniably plain to see in the liberating power of evangelism, education, healthcare and empathetic option for the least. This is not only a story of the past, but also of the present and future.
The gospel values are not exclusively Christian. They are also inherently altruistic instincts of humans. These values can be found in every religion and spiritual tradition, secular teachings of literate and illiterate people, and in protest literature and folk ballads. Such values have given shape to how we govern ourselves. We now drink water from tanks because the Right to Equality is a Fundamental Right enshrined in the Constitution of India. Caste discrimination in Christianity remains mostly unchanged. For those who claim to follow Jesus, there is still plenty of work to do. People still cry out for equity and justice. But the Christian option for the poor is not a matter of handouts or charity, but of sharing life in the footsteps of a man who emptied and humbled himself to serve.
I am puzzled and so I ask: other than in the miracles, did Jesus ever give food to the hungry, water to the thirsty, clothes to the naked, invite a homeless stranger, look after a sick person, or visit a prisoner? How am I to do all these? I cannot do miracles. Mathew 25 is not any threat of judgment but a passionate command to figure out how to care for the least among us. Paul the Apostle expressed it eloquently: “Our desire is not that others might be relieved while you are hard pressed, but that there might be equality. At the present time your plenty will supply what they need, so that in turn their plenty will supply what you need. The goal is equality, as it is written: “The one who gathered much did not have too much, and the one who gathered little did not have too little.” (2 Cor.8:13–15)
Come! We have clear, calm waters. Together we will fill our pots!
About the Author
Dr. P. Dayanandan is a botanist who taught at Madras Christian College. He was a Fulbright Scholar at the University of Michigan and also a NASA postdoctoral fellow. He achieved first rank in B.Sc. and M.Sc., Madras University. He received the Sir C.V. Raman gold medal for research and Dr. Radhakrishnan best teacher award from Tamil Nadu Government. He was a member of many committees including the Siddha and Unani Councils of Govt. of India and the Botanical and Zoological Survey of India. With grants from Central and State agencies he helped many students, including 10 Ph.D. scholars, carry out research on developmental biology of rice, sorghum, bamboo, grasses, neem and other plants. Prof. Dayanandan’s research interests include gravitational biology, plant development, light and scanning electron microscopy, environment, evolution, history of human migration, science & religion, Pallava art history and Tamil literature. He and his wife Anne research and write about the history of missions, churches, and Dalit village congregations.
