{"id":50795,"date":"2016-01-06T21:59:04","date_gmt":"2016-01-07T03:59:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=50795"},"modified":"2016-01-06T14:05:05","modified_gmt":"2016-01-06T21:05:05","slug":"do-we-thank-the-portuguese-and-catholicism-for-saving-sri-lanka-from-islamisation-a-response-to-daily-news-article-3-dec-2012-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2016\/01\/06\/do-we-thank-the-portuguese-and-catholicism-for-saving-sri-lanka-from-islamisation-a-response-to-daily-news-article-3-dec-2012-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Do we thank the Portuguese and Catholicism for saving Sri Lanka from Islamisation? \u2013 a response to Daily News article 3 Dec 2012"},"content":{"rendered":"

by \u00a0<\/strong>Shenali D. Waduge ( published in 2012)<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

The article titled Heritage Catholic Churches of the Kalpitiya peninsula\u201d written by Wiruma based on Sagara Jayasinghe\u2019s book Santhanadeepaya\u201d may include a collection of historical and architectural heritage of Catholic Churches in the Kalpitiya peninsula, but it also attempts to promote the theory that if not for the Portuguese and in particular Catholicism Sri Lanka would have been turned into an Islamic state. If the book attempts to suggest that allegations against the Church have been as a result of private agenda, it behoves a response in that very few historical accounts have praised the Portuguese or any European ruler for invading nations out of goodwill.<\/p>\n

While this response does not in any way attempt to question the architecture of the Churches in Kalpitiya what is important is that the present and future generations do not forget the manner that the Europeans invaded Asian and African nations and the brutality with which they treated the natives.<\/p>\n

The nations that Europeans invaded were already civilized, natives had their own agricultural systems, they followed their own cultures and customs but the vandalism, murder, destruction and crimes that these natives were subject to by European rulers is not worthy of being termed glorious\u201d. How can vandalism, murder, destruction \u00a0profess to offer the gratitude of Sri Lankans on the grounds of architectural designs of its Churches which stand erect having destroyed Buddhist temples and by building Churches over these same sites?<\/p>\n

There is little to the imagination when a Pope (Alexander VI) declares the Christian conquest of the world and gives Catholic rulers permission to invade, search out, capture, vanquish and subdue all Saracens and pagans\u2026to take their possessions and\u2026 reduce their persons to perpetual slavery\u201d<\/em> \u2013 4 May 1493. If we accept Sagara Jayasinghe\u2019s version that the arrival of the Portuguese was a remarkable event\u201d<\/em> \u2013 why is there thousands of local and international studies, research and findings that cover European colonial rule as those of brutality and human crimes! Colonial treacheries are far too many to brand them as Saints or Angels when they did not spare even infants!<\/p>\n

Therefore, Sagara Jayasinghe, Wiruma or any other espousing the theory that Sri Lanka should be grateful to the colonialists needs to first negate the accounts of brutality attributed to their rule in not just Sri Lanka but all other nations they invaded!<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong>It was in 1542 that Father Bartoleme de Las Casas estimated 15m natives had been killed in Caribbean and Mexico, when Vasco de Gama landed in India in 1498 he forced Indian Christians to pay allegiance to Rome or die, 40,000 Jews in India were destroyed and the Pope apologized to Israel in 2000. The crimes are far too many to list.<\/p>\n

The simple fact is that Europeans arrived in Asia not to shake any Asian hands. They came with 2 intentions \u2013 to explore trade and exploit natural resources and to convert natives to Christianity\/Catholicism. This was a State objective not just the desires of the explorer traders.\u00a0 To Christianize non-Christian Asia, European rulers had to suppress and destroy the religions being practiced so Buddhism, Hinduism and Islam became targets.<\/p>\n

Sir James Emerson Tennent describes the conduct of the Portuguese in Sri Lanka as gloomy and repulsive\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026.. we are ill-prepared to hear of the rapacity, bigotry and cruelty which characterised every stage of their progress in the East. They appeared in the Indian seas in the three-fold character of merchants, missionaries and pirates. Their ostensible motto was amity, commerce and religion. Their expeditions consisted of soldiers as well as adventurers, and included friars and chaplain majors. Their instructions were to begin by preaching, but, that failing, to proceed to the decision of the sword.”<\/em> Are these the people we have to be grateful for?<\/p>\n

Historian Paul E Peiris says that the Portuguese succeeded in producing nothing but chaos\u201d <\/em>while G P Malalasekera says that Portuguese rule was marked by a rapacity, bigotry, cruelty and inhumanity unparalleled in the annals of any other European colonial power\u2026..their inhuman barbarities were accompanied by callousness which knew no distinction between man, woman and child\u2026.\u2026people were \u2026 mashed to pulp between millstones, while their mothers were compelled to witness the pitiful sight before they themselves were tortured to death. Men were thrown over bridges for the amusement of the troops to feed the crocodiles in the river\u201d.<\/em> Is this what the Sinhalese need to now be grateful for?<\/p>\n

It was at the behest of the Roman Catholic Emperor of Portugal, his Viceroy at Goa and the Roman Catholic priests in Sri Lanka that resulted in the systematic campaign to burn and destroy all Buddhist temples, kovils and mosques. Natives were forced into converting. In 1567 it was declared that all religions other than orthodox Roman Catholicism were wrong and that converting to Christianity must be by force. The Portuguese declared that all non-Christian clergy, teachers and holy men had to be expelled, their sacred texts seized and destroyed. Buddhists and Hindus were prohibited from visiting their respective temples and even non-Christian weddings and events were forbidden. When present day Europeans promote equality, respect and tolerance of other religions \u2013 did the Portuguese show such to the natives of nations they invaded?<\/p>\n

Buddhist temples, hindu kovils, mosques were all systematically destroyed by the Portuguese and in its place Roman Catholic churches were built \u2013 that was how the architectural structures of the Churches in Sri Lanka and elsewhere emerged using the income from the lands belonging to non-Catholics! They introduced the principle that Ruler and the Ruled must belong to the same faith which meant the need to convert the Kings to force their subjects to follow them. The result of this was the grandson of King Bhuvanekabahu renouncing Buddhism and adopting Roman Catholicism and baptized as Don Juan Periya Bandara while his Queen became Dona Catherina in 1557.<\/p>\n

While Buddhism propagates reverence for all forms of life, Christianity and Islam are of the view that animals are created by God for human consumption. This is why along the coastal belts where fishing is a livelihood many Sinhalese were quick to fall prey to Christian missionary conversion tactics.<\/p>\n

The Church used deceitful methods to convert Hindus \u2013 Catholic priests pretended to be of superior caste and took Hindu names, they wore orange colored robes to resemble the Saniasses, they put a spot of sandalwood powder on their foreheads and began doing poojas, fasts, prayers for the dead \u2013 all with the final objective to enlist non-Catholics to convert.<\/p>\n

While Santhanadeepaya boasts of the cultural and architectural heritage of the Portuguese, it was because of the Portuguese that we cannot find Buddhist temples over 150 years old in the areas Portuguese ruled! The author may like to offer an explanation as to why the Portuguese would destroy and plunder temples and kovils in Devundara, Trincomalee, Saman Devale, Sunethra Devi Pirivena (kotte), Vidagama Pirivena (Raigama), Wijebahu privena (Totagamuwe), Nawagamuwa, Kelaniya, Mapitigama and Wattala. The Kelaniya temple was destroyed in 1575. The author may also like to explain why we should be grateful to the Portuguese who not only destroyed temples and kovils but used the materials from these sites to build churches on the same sites (ex:Roman Catholic churches in Kalutara, Keragala, Wattala, Totagamuwa etc) something even the South Indian invaders did not opt to do? Some 500 such temples are said to have been destroyed by the Portuguese.<\/p>\n

So here were invaders completely taking over a nation, humiliating the natives who had been practicing their religion, customs and traditions peacefully and thereafter forcing natives to convert and completely turning their pious living to that of slaughtering animals, consuming liquor and instilling a totally abhorrent new culture. So what is there to be grateful to the Portuguese given these facts? Are we to presume that slaughtering and eating meat, consuming liquor is to belong to a high class or refined class of people? There are many who believe that it was because of the European invaders that natives became refined\u201d totally ignoring the manner in which these Europeans destroyed life, carried out mass murder, sexual abuse of women, cultural genocide, slavery, religious and ethnic cleansing, mass expulsions all of which would by virtue of modern definition rule crimes against humanity.<\/p>\n

So if Pope John Paul can apologize to China, Ukraine and Greece in 2001 for colonial misadventures and ask forgiveness in 2000 from Israel for the wrongs done to the Jews \u2013 it is time the Roman Catholic Church apologize to both India and Sri Lanka for these same crimes. Had it not been for the Sinhalese Buddhists who braved the massacres and killings and stood against the European invaders using their stones and sticks, Sri Lanka would have been turned into Philippines where the indigenous peoples traditional religion and culture were annihilated. It may be interesting to observe that while Christian missionaries converted non-Christians all over the world by persuasion, Muslim conquerors converted people of other faiths to Islam, at the point of the sword.<\/p>\n

Arabs came to Ceylon in the 15th century not as conquerors or missionaries but as traders and they did not come to Ceylon in their thousands and therefore the Arab factor would not have altered the ethnic or demographic pattern of the Tamil Muslims from Tamil Nadu in the 14th<\/sup> century to warrant the fear of Islamization of Sri Lanka. If this were so India would have been the first victim.<\/p>\n

Having said that it is important to again reiterate that one of the two objectives of European colonial rulers was to convert natives to Christianity. Ironically, in China where there are 12m Catholics whilst conversions do take place no person is allowed to have allegiance above its State Government \u2013 even the Catholics in China whose Vatican is the only religion to have a State must at all times show allegiance to China and only China – \u00a0can this be said of Catholics in other nations and if not may we know why China\u2019s case is different?<\/p>\n

While this response is not to question anyone\u2019s faith, it goes without saying that the Portuguese, the Dutch and the British arrived and conquered nations not for any love for these nations but to plunder their wealth, to convert the natives and to use them as slaves in order to systematically tap into every resource that would fill their coffers while in Sri Lanka, the Sinhalese Buddhists offered whatever opposition thereby accounting for hundreds of thousands of their deaths as a result of the desire to save their nation from colonial treacheries \u2013 has the situation changed since, one wonders!<\/p>\n

Those that quote the handful of instances like how the colonists developed road infrastructure may like to note that these were built not to facilitate the natives but to facilitate the transport of what the colonials were plundering out of these nations including Sri Lanka!<\/p>\n

It is left for the readers to decide if Sri Lanka should be grateful to the Portuguese or any other European ruler given their history and the manner our ancestors suffered and the sacrifices they made.<\/p>\n

Shenali Waduge<\/strong><\/p>\n

Refer Article :<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.dailynews.lk\/2012\/12\/03\/fea25.asp<\/a><\/p>\n

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by \u00a0Shenali D. Waduge ( published in 2012) The article titled Heritage Catholic Churches of the Kalpitiya peninsula\u201d written by Wiruma based on Sagara Jayasinghe\u2019s book Santhanadeepaya\u201d may include a collection of historical and architectural heritage of Catholic Churches in the Kalpitiya peninsula, but it also attempts to promote the theory that if not for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-50795","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-shenali-waduge"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50795","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50795"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50795\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}