22,000 Indian Christians Peacefully Protest Rising Persecution at Historic Delhi Gathering

Leaders demand the government crack down on violence against the church: “We are not asking for anything out of the ordinary.”

India’s church is exhausted by the surge of anticonversion laws and accusations of illegal proselytization. They’re tired of mobs driving out Christians from their villages and the possibility that many face property destruction and personal violence. Perhaps most significantly, they’re angry at a government that passively enables these actions at best and actively foments them at worst.

Last week, 22,000 Christians across the denominational spectrum and from around the country gathered together in their nation’s capital to demand better.

“This protest is basically to call the attention of the government to the increasing violence against Christians and our institutions. These attacks are without reasons and basis,” Youhanon Mar Demetrios, a Delhi-based priest with the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church told CT. “So, we are calling upon the government to ask how the protection of the Christians and their institutions will be guaranteed. We are not asking for anything out of the ordinary.”

Major national media outlets like Outlook and The Indian Express and the YouTube channel India Speaks, among others, covered the protest.

Thousands of young people, church leaders, human rights activists, educationists, lawyers, musicians, and other professionals from more than 80 denominations and Christian organizations gathered at the February 19 event at Jantar Mantar, a historic observatory. The protest was organized by the Delhi and National Capital Region Christian leaders across the denominational spectrum. Many attendees wore white to symbolize peace or wore their traditional attire and sported black armbands as a mark of protest.

“This coming together of all the denominations is not ...

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from Christianity Today Magazine
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