It comes naturally for us to form our identities in terms of our social, cultural, economic, religious, ethnic realities. Along with our multiplicities of identities comes our understanding of the other, who do not share our identities. Normally we rival the other, ridicule, ignore or talk them down. The 33 articles in this volume urge us to respect the other, enable and empower the other. The other makes us what we are. To some extent, they provide us with our own identities. The book, emerging from a seminar organized on the quasquicentennial (125 years) of Jnana Deepa, Institute of Philosophy and Theology (Nov 24-28, 2015), urges us to befriend the other and treat them with gentleness, kindness and compassion. It looks on the other from Christian perspectives, drawing from philosophical, theological, psychological, sociological and multidisciplinary perspectives.

Contents

Editorial: Befriending the Other

1. Inaugural Address and Homily: Befriending the Other
    His Grace Salvatore Pennacchio

2. Guest of Honour Address: On “Befriending the Other" 
    His Excellency Oswald Cardinal Gracias

3. Understanding Christ as the Only Saviour Today
    Rt Rev Bishop Thomas Dabre

4. Jesus as the Man for Others
    Rt Rev Valerian D’Souza

5. Evangelization as Befriending and Building Relationships
    Rt Rev George Palliparambil, SDB

6. Challenge to Discover Christ within Cultures
    Jacob Parappally, MSFS

7. Befriending the Other and Another: Trinities and Trilogue
    Francis Gonsalves, SJ

8. Raimon Panikkar’s Diatopical Hermeneutics for Befriending the Other: Meister Eckhart’s World of Holistic Thinkingand the Bhagavadgita’s Experience of the World of Wholeness
   Francis X. D’Sa, SJ

9. Befriending the Other: Building Solidarity through Reconciliation
    Joseph Mattam, SJ

10. Pre-Christian Inter-Personal Values Practised by Africans as a Means of Befriending Others: Cultural-Religious Contexts
     Teresia Tarimo, HSS

11. Friends for a Purpose: South Africa’s UDF as a Model for the Environmental Movement
     Peter Knox, SJ

12. Befriending the Other: A Paradigm for Re-Building Relationships
      Eugenia Thomas, HSS

13. Befriending the Other as Nature’s Recipe for Greater Stability and Prosperity
      Job Kozhamthadam, SJ

14. Befriending Nature: The Leaf That Smiles
      M. Arif and Rehana Arif

15. Befriending the Other: Use and Abuse of Social Media
      P. T. Joseph, SJ

16. Intellectual Challenges to Christianity
      Isaac Padinjarekuttu

17. The Otherness in the Other
      Victor Ferrao

18. Befriending the Complex Other with Multiple Identities: Towards Creative Dialogue to Befriend the Other in Their Otherness
      Kuruvilla Pandikattu, SJ

19. Psychospiritual Perspectives on “The Other”
      Konrad Noronha, SJ

20. Growing as a Person: From Befriending the Self to Befriending the Other
      Keith D’Souza, SJ

21. Befriending Water: A Pathway to Sustainable Development
      Arjen Tete, SJ

22. Beyond an Unscientific Bias towards a Scientific Knowing for the Authentic Befriending of the Religious Other
     Chae Young Kim

23. Walking, Meditating and Rising to Befriend the Other: Transforming the Subjective and the Objective to Transpositional Subjectobjectivity
      Ananta Kumar Giri

24. Holistic Befriending of the Other in Buddhism
      Noel Sheth, SJ

25. Mysticism: A Way for Christian Muslim Befriending
      Midhun J Francis, SJ

26. Befriending the Other: Vatican II and the New Orientations
      Kurien Kunnumpuram, SJ

27. Befriending of Science-Religion: The Pursuit of Fulfilment and Happiness According to Sri Aurobindo
      Kamladevi Kunkolienker

28. “Be Human to Nature”: A Call from the World of Sciences
      S. Stephen Jayard

29. Science and Theology: Befriending Each Other Epistemically
      Augustine Pamplany, CST

30. Collapse of Quantum Wave Function and Its Interpretations: Befriending Consciousness According to Quantum Mechanics
      Gregory Mathew Malayil, CMI

31. Mirror Neurons: Neurological Appraisal of the Other as Other
      Roy J. J. Pereira, SJ

32. Befriending the Other: Highlights of the Conference
      George Cordeiro, SJ

33. Epilogue: Befriending the Other for Our Collective Survival
      Kuruvilla Pandikattu, SJ

Our Contributors

Dr Kuruvilla Pandikattu SJ (born 1957-) is a professor of Physics, Philosophy and Religion at Jnana Deepa, Institute of Philosophy and Theology, Pune, India. Currently, he is the Dean, Faculty of Philosophy, JD. Author of more than 45 books and 180 articles, Pandikattu is a Jesuit priest belonging to Dumka-Raiganj Province, India. He has been involved in science-religion dialogue and inter religious collaboration. The main topics of his research are anthropology, eschatology, life-management and transhumanism. He may be contacted at kuru@kuru.in (personal) or kuru@jdv.edu.in (professional). Site: www.kuru.in. ORCID: 0000-0001-9815-370