No Life Without Wife

There is much I love about Bollywood films: the breaking out into song and dance at unexpected times, the lack of kissing but perhaps even stronger sexual tension than Hollywood films, the random mariachi band, etc. I recently re-watched Bride and Prejudice and was struck not only by the gospel choir serenading the lead couple at the romantic climax on the beach, but also by the emphasis on place that the film is able to convey, perhaps precisely because it sets itself up against enlightenment urges for globalization.

Lalita repeatedly scorns the tendency to go to India and not really see it (but only see what money-making traps ask you to see) and the desire to leave India as backward and lacking to go to London or America. She is only able to leave her place, finally and properly, because she embraces it. She doesn't reject it, but rather embraces it as beautiful and unique. This has interesting parallels to John Henry Newman's conception of conversion, which he articulates in The Development of Christian Doctrine.

He asserts that conversion, rightly attained, is a positive and not a negative act. It involves seeing the truth that is present in heresy and correcting that truth through an acceptance of the whole tradition (which includes the needed balance to that heresy). Because Lalita loves her place wisely (and not blindly), she is able to leave it for a specific reason (a man). She can properly love the new land that she'll go to, then, and because of her attitude, she will contribute in a special way to the diversity of that place. A counter to her proper way of leaving can be seen in her cousin, the Mr. Collins character, who leaves India and indiscriminately embraces all things that belong to Los Angeles. Such a lack of self-identity and discrimination among the new things that one encounters is surely reprehensible and ultimately bankrupts not only the person who leaves himself completely open to new experiences, but also the new place, which does not receive the benefit of the person coming to it.

In the same way, the Church will benefit from converts who bring a collection of unique experiences to it, if those converts are able to distinguish between the good and the bad in their own experiences. If, however, converts attempt to start over as blank slates, they will benefit neither themselves nor the Church that they are coming to.