Lenten Mercy~Meditation: Remembering Gandhi

Mohandas Gandhi (1869-1948) was the non-violent, Hindu advocate and leader of independence for India from British rule. I remember reading his vast autobiography (The Story Of My Experiments With Truth) in seminary. I don't know how I managed that; the required reading theology text books, when piled up on the floor, reached my chin. 

Anyway, the 1982 Oscar winning film, Gandhi, was on television the other day, and I remembered all of this and the impact his life made on me. So I did some research (computers weren't around for our use in the early 70's) and discovered many things Gandhi said. Here are a few. It is said that Jesus' Sermon on the Mount influenced Gandhi's thought. Have you ever read that teaching? Matthew 5,6,7.

• "The real love is to love them that hate you, to love your neighbor even though you distrust him."

• "To believe in something and not to live it is dishonest."

• "An ounce of practice is worth more than tons of preaching."

• "The one religion is beyond all speech."

• "To give pleasure to a single heart by a single act is better than a thousand heads bowing in prayer."

• "Nothing has saddened me as much in life as the hardness of heart of educated people."

• "Action expresses priorities."

• "Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it."

• "If you want real peace in the world, start with children."

• "Liberty and democracy become unholy when their hands are dyed red with innocent blood."

• "Say what you want but you never say it with violence."

• "Non-violence is a weapon of the strong."

• "There are people in the world so hungry, that God cannot appear to them except in the form of bread."

• "You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is like an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty."

These last two quotes are "cheeky" (British expression).

The interviewer asked Gandhi: "What do you think of Western Civilization?" Gandhi answered, "I think it would be a good idea." 

"I don't reject Christ. I love Christ. It's just that so many of you Christians are so unlike Christ." (My note: At that time, ruling England still called  itself a Christian country).