Posted on 06/01/2019 12:25:29 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
The recent elections brought bad news for Christians, and you probably heard about that. But there’s some wonderful news for the Christians of India as well. Prepare to be encouraged.
First, however, let’s look at the bad news.
The BJP, the current ruling party in India, led by Prime Minister Modi, won the national elections handily. This is bad news for millions of Christians in India.
The BJP is not just a Hindu party. It is a militantly Hindu party. It wants India to be a Hindu nation, meaning, exclusively Hindu. Prime Minister Modi has even spoken of his desire to see Christianity eradicated from India within the next few years.
These are frightening, sobering sentiments. We cannot take them lightly.
And while the BJP may not be physically persecuting Christians, militant Hindus throughout the nation have been given a free hand. This has resulted in many Christians being beaten and others being killed. (I know this firsthand through my direct contact with Christian leaders in India.)
As pointed out by Rob Schwarzwalder, “Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been reelected. By a huge margin. That’s ‘an absolute tragedy.’ That’s what Dean Curry, head of the anti-persecution ministry Open Doors, calls it. Modi is a Hindu nationalist deeply hostile to Christianity and to Christians.
“Since he came to power in 2014, India has become the tenth worst country in the world for following Jesus. It was 28th on Open Doors’ World Watch List back then. What countries are worse? Iran’s ninth. India’s only slightly better than the Iranian theocracy. Pakistan’s fifth. Afghanistan’s second and North Korea’s first.”
Indeed, “Modi’s government so dislikes Christianity that it will hurt its own people to keep Christians away. It has been getting rid of Christian ministries that have for many years served India’s many needy people. In 2017, Compassion International was forced to close ‘589 Indian-staffed development centers caring for more than 145,000 children.’ Why? Because “India’s Ministry of Home Affairs put it on a list of organizations needing prior approval before transferring funds into the country” — but wouldn’t approve the grant.”
The list of concerns goes on and on.
We need to pray for a change of heart in the Indian government, and we need to petition President Trump to speak out against Modi’s aggressive, anti-Christian actions.
My Indian friends truly believe that one strong word from the White House would put a major stop to Modi’s hostile designs.
But there is good news from India as well. Really good news.
First, the gospel continues to spread powerfully in that vast nation of more than 1.3 billion souls. As reported by Dr. Ralph Wilson, “the percentage of Christians has increased substantially from 2.5% a decade ago to about 5.8% today. That represents a huge increase in the growth rate. Something is happening!”
And in some states, the growth is much greater, with Christians representing as much as 10-15 percent of the total population.
This is truly unprecedented.
Second, this surge in Christian population was in evidence in the election results in the state of Andhra (that is, Andhra Pradesh, a state I have visited annually since 1993).
Back in 2009, the chief minister of Andhra, Y. S. Rajasekhara Reddy, died in a helicopter accident. Reddy was a compassionate and committed Christian, and I remember my friends in Andhra being shocked at how many Christians came forward to mourn his death. They had no idea there were so many believers in Andhra.
My friends were also amazed to see how greatly loved Reddy was by millions of Hindus who lived in Andhra.
Now, his son, Jagan Mohan Reddy, also a committed Christian, has been elected to be Andhra’s new chief minister. And the party he founded, founded, the YSR Congress Party, won by a landslide. And I mean landslide.
As reported on Wikipedia, “In the 2019 National and State election held in April-May 2019, YSJR won 151 of the total 175 assembly seats and 22 of the 25 Lok Sabha seats in Andhra Pradesh.”
This is absolutely remarkable, and it is certainly a cause for rejoicing, especially when each state in India has so much autonomy.
This, then, is incredible news for the Christians in Andhra Pradesh. And it is important news for the Christians of India as a whole, since Mr. Reddy wields considerable influence as the chief minister of a major state, while his party has become a significant party.
Let’s pray for his safety (he is being sworn May 30, so perhaps as you read this article) and for the safety of Christians throughout the country.
God has great plans to bless the nation of India!
Good news, though I have to point out that one of the biggest states for Christianity is Goa, which is kind of an odd, outlier case. Goa was a Portuguese protectorate until quite recently, and as such was a strongly-Catholic center, and still is. As such, it’s faith is not the result of the Christian ministries working in India, but of colonization. Without that outside pressure, Goa is likely going to fade (eventually) back into being just another state. Rather than trying for converts out in the hinterlands, where missionaries run the risk of running afoul of the proselytizing laws, I would say efforts should be made to restrengthen the power base in Goa, and radiate out from there.
Two errors in this article
1. Modi has never said he wanted Christians to be eradicated from India
2. India is not a nation but a collection of 28 distinct nations, more different from each other in language, religion, race and culture than European nations.
I agree. You get a bigger harvest by planting your seeds where the ground is most fertile.
If Modi cared about India, he would focus on dealing with Islam. Christians have never staged terrorist attacks in India.
I think Goa will come out strong Catholic. I’ve forgotten which Catholic it is that they are trying to move to saint-hood. My information is five or six years old, though.
thank you for the encouraging word. I had heard about the militant Hindu party and am still concerned. But this is indeed good news. Pun intended.
And he is focused on dealing with Islam. This article makes a false claim
So your plan is sheep stealing.
1) I know Goan Catholics. I don’t imagine that Goa is immune to the problems of the FrancisChurch, but believe me, there is strong faith, not just the residue of imperialism. If what you say about Goa is true, why wouldn’t all of India have been Anglican?
2) Many Indian Catholics are from churches founded by St. Thomas, and are therefore far older than you can imagine. Some, but not all, of these churches recognize the Catholic Church. Their existence is an utter blow to the pagan and restorationist about the supposed invention of Catholicism/Orthodoxy by emperor Constantine.
India is a democracy that persecutes a very small, but growing Christian population.
China has a much larger Christian population that may end up with government control in the next 25 years.
Which country will be our ally in 50 years?
“Christians have never staged terrorist attacks in India.”
Christian missionaries desecrate sanctum of Khasi tribe when ceremony was in progress
May 31, 2019
India isn’t Anglican because England didn’t really want India as a colony; more as a piggy bank. They didn’t really care about the natives, they just wanted what they could wring out of the country.
And I can imagine quite a lot of age, having lived in India for four years myself, and being married to an Indian.
“Prime Minister Modi has even spoken...”
Let’s hear/read what he had to say:
English translation of Prime Minister Modi’s speech in the Central Hall of the Parliament in New Delhi — YouTube
Hindu Vivek Kendra, YouTube, Published on June 1, 2019
Post the announcement of the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the newly elected Members of Parliament of the pre-poll alliance, National Democratic Alliance, met in the Central Hall of the Parliament in New Delhi, on May 25th, 2019, to elect their leader. Narendra Modi was unanimously elected. This video is the English translation of his acceptance speech. This is not an official BJP video, but an effort of Hindu Vivek Kendra, a member of the Sangh Parivar.
We have done the translation and the dubbing to the best of the resources available to us. So, while there may be small disconnect if some of the translation as well the voice of the artist, please ignore them, and see the message that Modiji is conveying.
Video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MSXkXQg_VXQ
I used to have a friend from Goa. He said that India made a big effort to move Hindus into Goa and dilute the Portuguese/Christian influenced heritage. This was told to me in the 90s. I would imagine the trend has continued since then.
If the best you can come up with is that some Christians disrupted a ritual they described a Satanic (I notice the article did not go into detail on the ritual), without killing or injuring anyone, then my original assertion stands.
Well one thing a country as a piggyback is what they typically mean by colonialism and imperialism. But you said it exactly, as to why go is Catholic and the rest of India is not Anglican. And that’s why go it will stay Catholic, because go with wasn’t use as a piggy bank by the people who made go a Catholic. Of course there were capitalists and fascists in Goa. And not everybody who helped promote Catholicism as in heaven at this moment. But the gowans did recognize that there was a intent to love the Goins among those who did the most successful conversions. And that’s why I go what is Catholic.
Goins. Gowans. Gos. Love transcribing software.
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