Home / News / Urgent Appeals / UPDATE: The Seventh Open Letter on Fr. Pallath's case
 

UPDATE: The Seventh Open Letter on Fr. Pallath's case

July 15, 2001

UPDATE ON URGENT APPEAL UPDATE ON URGENT APPEAL UPDATE ON URGENT APPEAL

ASIAN HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION - URGENT APPEALS PROGRAM

Update on Urgent Appeal 16 July 2001
----------------------------------------------------------------------
UP-22-2001 (RE: UA-12-2001: Jesuit Priest Abused by His Own Order)

UPDATE: The Seventh Open Letter on Fr. Pallath’s case
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Friends,

We would like to send you a copy of the seventh open letter sent by the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) to the Jesuit superior general in Rome regarding Fr. Pallath’s case.

For further information, including this letter, please visit http://jjpallath.ahrchk.net.

Thank you.


Urgent Appeals Desk
Asian Human Rights Commission

===========================

[This is the seventh of a series of letters on the issues regarding the treatment of Fr. Pallath J. Joseph of the Kerala Province of Jesuits in India.]

An Open Letter to:
Rev. Fr. Peter-Hans Kolvenbach
Superior General
Curia Generalize
Compagnia di Gesu
C.P. 6139
00195 Roma Prati ITALY
FAX: 39-06-686-8214

July 16, 2001

SEVENTH OPEN LETTER RE: Physical Assault, Slander through the Gutter Press, Filing of Fabricated Criminal Cases, Denial of Right to Livelihood and Other Matters Relating to Fr. Pallath J. Joseph Request for an Inquiry

The Theme of the Seventh Letter:
Two Types of Repression: The Cases of Jacques Dupuis, SJ, (a Belgian) and Pallath J. Joseph, SJ, (an Indian)

Dear Rev. Fr. General,

In the first and second open letters to you, the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) raised some concerns from a moral and human rights point of view regarding all of the episodes relating to the case of Fr. Pallath J. Joseph of which you are aware. Our third letter to you outlined in detail why we as a human rights organisation are concerned about Fr. Pallath’s case; and in the fourth letter, we questioned the manner in which the leaders of the Jesuit order have dealt with this issue. In our fifth letter to you, we raised the issue of racism in regards to the treatment of Fr. Pallath by the Jesuit order in this case. Our sixth letter to you dealt with the use of common sense to resolve Fr. Pallath’s case. While it is not our intention to interfere with the affairs of your order, there are matters of public interest about which many people, including our commission, are quite concerned. They are as follows:

(1) The physical assault of Fr. Pallath J. Joseph by two members of your order, together with several other hired thugs;

(2) The throwing of the body of Fr. Pallath over the wall of the Jesuit’s premises and onto the road while he was in an unconscious or semiconscious state;

(3) Slandering Fr. Pallath by some members of your order using a gutter magazine called Crime Star;

(4) The filing of fabricated criminal complaints against Fr. Pallath with the view to have him arrested as a way to prevent him from entering a Jesuit house;

(5) The failure of the Jesuit superiors to respect an agreement entered into between Fr. Pallath and the Jesuits in Kerala through the mediation of the bishop of Calicut; and

(6) The failure to provide for the livelihood of Fr. Pallath after 33 years of service.

You are aware of the case of 77-year-old Jacques Dupuis, SJ, who was subjected to a notification by the Vatican criticising his book Towards a Christian Theology of Christian Pluralism for being ambiguous and potentially misleading. He told the Jesuit magazine America that the two-and-a-half-year Vatican investigation of his book had caused him “very great suffering.?In the report, the Jesuit theologian said that the most painful part of the investigation, in addition to being initially accused of doctrinal error, was the Vatican requirement that he not actively pursue his theology or discuss the investigation publicly while it was in progress. Later he was asked to sign a special declaration of faith. This strategy is very similar to the treatment meted out to Fr. Tissa Balasuriya of Sri Lanka who was initially excommunicated and was then reinstated after a large international campaign in support of his position.

The Vatican has, however, spared the Jesuit theologian from Belgium of any physical assault or assassination of his personal reputation. In modern-day Europe, of course, doing such things are unthinkable. If anyone took such action, it would inevitably lead to a secular court case.

However, within a religious congregation in India, this is still possible. The acts narrated above recount how another Jesuit, Fr. Pallath, was subjected to such violent treatment by some superiors of his own order. Why was this possible in the Indian state of Kerala?

Here we see that some achievements have occurred in Western civilisation against the violent treatment of people. Since the time that the secular jurist Cesare Beccaria (17381794) wrote his book against torture and uncivilised practices used in the administration of justice, many changes have taken place in Europe. Secular developments have had an impact on the practices in Christian institutions, and consequently, the physical and violent aspects of the Inquisition had to be abandoned. Today, however, moral and psychological suffering still sadly exists as the cases of Jacques Dupuis and Tissa Balasuriya and many others indicate.

Unfortunately, these secular influences did not have much effect in altering the main religious tradition of modern IndiaBrahminism. All reformers have lamented this fact, but still the old system remains intact. Under Brahminism, all violence is justified, and the demonstration of this is visible in all parts of India. It was this dominant priestly tradition of Brahminism to which the Catholic priesthood in the country adapted.

In this Brahmin tradition, there is no place for examining ideas as errors or any other space for critical reflection. Just take the stick and throw the fellow out. That is the theory, and that is the practice. Every conflict is trivialised. Violence and slander are justified and are used as easy ways of dealing with differences.

Does Brahmin practice acquire any respectability when it happens in a Jesuit house? Will the Jesuits say that the suffering of Jacques Dupuis is worthy of condemnation and Fr. Pallath merely got what he deserves?

As for us, a human rights organisation deriving its inspiration from the human rights ideals of our time, we consider both actions of the Vatican in Jacques Dupuis’s case and the actions of the Jesuits in Fr. Pallath’s case as equally despicable, and we condemn both actions.

Sincerely yours,


Basil Fernando
Executive Director
Asian Human Rights Commission

Document Type :
Urgent Appeal Update
Document ID :
UP-22-2001
Countries :
Document Actions
Share |
Subscribe to our Mailing List
Follow AHRC
Extended Introduction: Urgent Appeals, theory and practice

A need for dialogue

Many people across Asia are frustrated by the widespread lack of respect for human rights in their countries.  Some may be unhappy about the limitations on the freedom of expression or restrictions on privacy, while some are affected by police brutality and military killings.  Many others are frustrated with the absence of rights on labour issues, the environment, gender and the like. 

Yet the expression of this frustration tends to stay firmly in the private sphere.  People complain among friends and family and within their social circles, but often on a low profile basis. This kind of public discourse is not usually an effective measure of the situation in a country because it is so hard to monitor. 

Though the media may cover the issues in a broad manner they rarely broadcast the private fears and anxieties of the average person.  And along with censorship – a common blight in Asia – there is also often a conscious attempt in the media to reflect a positive or at least sober mood at home, where expressions of domestic malcontent are discouraged as unfashionably unpatriotic. Talking about issues like torture is rarely encouraged in the public realm.

There may also be unwritten, possibly unconscious social taboos that stop the public reflection of private grievances.  Where authoritarian control is tight, sophisticated strategies are put into play by equally sophisticated media practices to keep complaints out of the public space, sometimes very subtly.  In other places an inner consensus is influenced by the privileged section of a society, which can control social expression of those less fortunate.  Moral and ethical qualms can also be an obstacle.

In this way, causes for complaint go unaddressed, un-discussed and unresolved and oppression in its many forms, self perpetuates.  For any action to arise out of private frustration, people need ways to get these issues into the public sphere.

Changing society

In the past bridging this gap was a formidable task; it relied on channels of public expression that required money and were therefore controlled by investors.  Printing presses were expensive, which blocked the gate to expression to anyone without money.  Except in times of revolution the media in Asia has tended to serve the well-off and sideline or misrepresent the poor.

Still, thanks to the IT revolution it is now possible to communicate with large audiences at little cost.  In this situation there is a real avenue for taking issues from private to public, regardless of the class or caste of the individual.

Practical action

The AHRC Urgent Appeals system was created to give a voice to those affected by human rights violations, and by doing so, to create a network of support and open avenues for action.  If X’s freedom of expression is denied, if Y is tortured by someone in power or if Z finds his or her labour rights abused, the incident can be swiftly and effectively broadcast and dealt with. The resulting solidarity can lead to action, resolution and change. And as more people understand their rights and follow suit, as the human rights consciousness grows, change happens faster. The Internet has become one of the human rights community’s most powerful tools.   

At the core of the Urgent Appeals Program is the recording of human rights violations at a grass roots level with objectivity, sympathy and competence. Our information is firstly gathered on the ground, close to the victim of the violation, and is then broadcast by a team of advocates, who can apply decades of experience in the field and a working knowledge of the international human rights arena. The flow of information – due to domestic restrictions – often goes from the source and out to the international community via our program, which then builds a pressure for action that steadily makes its way back to the source through his or her own government.   However these cases in bulk create a narrative – and this is most important aspect of our program. As noted by Sri Lankan human rights lawyer and director of the Asian Human Rights Commission, Basil Fernando:

"The urgent appeal introduces narrative as the driving force for social change. This idea was well expressed in the film Amistad, regarding the issue of slavery. The old man in the film, former president and lawyer, states that to resolve this historical problem it is very essential to know the narrative of the people. It was on this basis that a court case is conducted later. The AHRC establishes the narrative of human rights violations through the urgent appeals. If the narrative is right, the organisation will be doing all right."

Patterns start to emerge as violations are documented across the continent, allowing us to take a more authoritative, systemic response, and to pinpoint the systems within each country that are breaking down. This way we are able to discover and explain why and how violations take place, and how they can most effectively be addressed. On this path, larger audiences have opened up to us and become involved: international NGOs and think tanks, national human rights commissions and United Nations bodies.  The program and its coordinators have become a well-used tool for the international media and for human rights education programs. All this helps pave the way for radical reforms to improve, protect and to promote human rights in the region.