When the tempest first broke about Elizabeth Hurley’s Hindu wedding to Arun Nayar in Jodhpur, India, the headlines read “Hurley’s Interfaith Marriage Contested by Hindu Traditionalists,” and celebrity watchers and religion geeks scoffed in unison at the closed-mindedness of the Hindu hardliners. Wrote marriage maven Rev. Laurie Sue Brockway, “LOVE is the same, EVERYWHERE. From my perspective and experience, the soul makes no distinction between religion, culture, race.” Case closed.
But when court papers were filed this week, the complainant didn’t cite the marriage for mingling faiths. Instead, according to the Indian news site ApunkaChoice.com, the complaint charged that “since Hurley and Nayar had married in Britain in accordance with Christian rituals and started living as husband and wife, there was no reason to perform the marriage again according to Hindu traditions.”
This may not make much sense to Western minds. Christian churches tend to be exclusive about their claims to religious truth and tradition, even when it comes to love (sad but true, Laurie Sue). Because we have firm denominational boundaries, we’re used to tag-teaming with two faiths at our weddings: A reverend and a rabbi meet some couples at the altar.
There’s been more than a few couples who follow a Las Vegas wedding with a Catholic ceremony to make it stick. Despite the hardliner’s wish for racial purity, Hinduism is a little more porous. Imagine if a couple went around getting married in several Christian churches. At some point we’d cry blasphemy. Similarly, the complaint filed against Hurley and Nayar’s Hindu ceremony claimed that the marriage “maligns the spiritual sanctity of the religion and Indian mythology.”
The court case may be a mask for the original intolerance. But there is a little more to the complaint’s spiritual wrinkle than simple prejudice.
posted March 27, 2007 at 1:31 pm
In Christian marriage, if either the man or the woman is not a Christian, it is hoped and prayed for that they will become a Christian. No coersion is encouraged. It’s in the New Testament. Though a Christian shouldn’t eagerly seek a marriage to a non-Christian, God knows our hearts well. (Look at Solomon.)Oh that other religions were so understandable.
posted March 27, 2007 at 3:00 pm
People like Hurley do make a mockery of Hindu marriages. Her Hindu marriage was just an excuse to have a lavish party and something exotic, like going to Hawaii and doing a Hoola dance.Westerner’s like Rev. Laurie Sue have limited ideas about love. But frankly, unless you are sincere about the Hindu faith, do no get married the Hindu way.Hinduism does not need any tourists. They just soil the environment.
posted March 27, 2007 at 6:10 pm
It is too bad when a couple would have to give up one of the partner’s religions in order to get married. I see no problem with wanting to uphold both traditions. As with most faiths it appears that religion to these people is more about cultural identity not spirituality.
posted March 27, 2007 at 8:16 pm
Dilip… You know all this because….? What? You’re God and you know every thought every person has? Or are you just another bigot who thinks you have the right to say who can and cannot get married and where?
posted August 12, 2008 at 7:24 am
she should have married a muslim end off. plain and simple.
posted March 21, 2010 at 1:50 pm
Hindu marriage is very horrible….Hindu gods have huge love for all.. so all hindu gods have many wife.. which is now practised in west…long live lustful hinduism…lol