Christianity that Jesus would not care for

From his childhood days, Mahatma Gandhi remembered Christian missionaries standing on the corner of his grade school loudly deriding the gods and beliefs of Hindus. Converts to Christianity were de-Indianized and Europeanized. Christianity was “beef and brandy” (most Hindus are vegetarians).

Mahatma Gandhi was greatly disturbed when he heard Christians put aside the Sermon on the Mount as impractical or a dreamy idealism. He believes that, what is lived as Christianity is a negation of the Sermon on the Mount. He criticized Christianity as practiced. He criticized Christianity’s cultural imperialism.

Gandhi perceived this phenomenon to be a destroyer of the Indian culture with its aggressive missionary work.  

After such a well-founded doctrine on Christ [Sermon on the Mount], Gandhi expected Christians to be like Christ. Unfortunately, he never saw a trace of it.

Mahatma Gandhi said, “I love your Christ but I hate your Christians because your Christians are unlike your Christ.”

The bone of contention here is to get the hermeneutics of what Gandhi meant. It is necessary to have faith to be saved but following Christ cannot be theoretical. It must be shown in action and in deeds. Before continuing, it is worth noting that Jesus had warned in Mt 7: 21-23 that: “Not everyone who says to me, `Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, `Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?' And then will I declare to them, `I never knew you; depart from me, you evildoers”.

Gandhi often affirmed: “It is that sermon which has endeared Jesus to me. But what does Jesus mean to Gandhi? He revealed this to us in these words: “I regard Jesus as a great teacher of humanity."
 
Gandhi essentially came to view Christianity, especially Western Christianity, as a betrayal of everything that Christ stood for.  He saw someone such as Tolstoy as embodying what he understood to be the teachings of Christ; after Constantine, it is Gandhi's view, the institutionalization of Christianity delivered a death blow to Christ's teachings.

http://www.mkgandhi.org/africaneedsgandhi/gandhi%27s_message_to_christians.htm


At first glance, what more is necessary for a Christian than to follow the teachings of Jesus? Even after many glances, it is difficult to see why anything more is needed.  Christianity as an institution does not see this as anywhere near sufficient.  For the institution, it is all about growth, control, and dominant power.

The Christian Church as an institution has devised Dogma that drew people to it and then lay bound by its power. Much of the history of Christian Church is really about power and politics and very little about teachings of Jesus.