arizona republicsat, october 30, 1999
By Uli Schmetzer Chicago Tribune
NEW DELHI, India - The -mob arrived armed with knives and clubs while the Rev. Joy Punnose addressed the 120 missionaries gathered in the small town of Dohad in northern Gujarat, an Indian state where Christians have become almost daily targets for Hindu mobs.
The kicks, punches and slaps that followed were not unusual in the northern part of this country, the so-called Hindu belt where dozens of Christian churches went up in smoke this year, where an Australian missionary and his two sons were burned alive, where another priest was beaten to death, and where nuns have been gang- raped, congregations terrorized and priests made to walk naked through village streets.
Amid this climate of religious intolerance, Pope John Paul 11 has scheduled a five- day visit beginning Thursday. Hindu radicals are threatening to stage protest rallies and hold an- anti-Christian march all the way from the former Portuguese enclave of Goa, where the pope lands, to the capital, New Delhi
Ten days before the pope's protesters burned his effigy, outside the capital's Red Fort. Radical Hindu leaders demanded that he apologize for barbarities committed against Hindus by the Catholic Inquisition in Portuguese Goa four centuries ago. They say that be must also pledge there will be no more "forced" conversions of Hindus Christianity. And he must never say during his homilies while in India that Jesus Christ is the only way to salvation.
"Why impose restrictions on his Freedom of speech? Why should the pope be muzzled and forced to become the mouthpiece (of India's two main militant Hindu organizations asked New Delhi Roman Catholic Archbishop Alan de Lastic, an Indian.
Over the past several weeks, Hindu organizations have rekindled their campaign of persecution against Christians, who they say' have converted lower-caste Hindus and illiterate tribes by force or false, promises. The hate campaign has coincided with the election victory of the 24-party coalition led by the Hindu Nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party.
The BJP disassociates itself from its militant Hindu allies, who were surprisingly quiet during the election campaigning and the monthlong voting process.
This. week, Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee apparently persuaded leaders of a number of Hindu groups not to bum the pope in effigy during the pontiff's visit and to tone down their, protest rallies. The degree of his success in reining the zealots during the pope's trip will indicate whether the BJP can control its militant supporters.
I When he lands in Goa, a mainly Roman Catholic enclave, the pontiff comes into a political and religious maelstrom that has changed radically since his last visit in 1986. Then, he traveled all over India and, was cheered and venerated as a holy man by millions of Hindus.
Since then, however, Hindu tolerance has been eroded by militants who see the BJP's rise to power as their chance to rid the country of other religions and the Christian missionaries who, are %backed by funds from the West. Christian converts are 2.9 percent of India's population, while 15 percent of Indians are Muslim.
Not surprisingly, the Vatican has planned the visit of the fragile 79-year-old
pontiff minimize
to ,, pub
lie exposure g hi four day's in - During his
New Delhi, the pontiff will venture into the city on three short trips, including a final meal at the Nehru Stadium, the most vulnerable security site on his urban itinerary
During each of these trips, the pope will be in his fortified vehicle, the "Popemobile." Anxious to avoid a mishap, India has mobilized paratroopers and elite forces to guard the papal routes.
Even as arrangements for the pope's visit were finalized, the attacks on Christians continued. Villagers in Orissa and Gujarat states this week appealed to authorities for protection. They- complained that Hindu rioters who burned their homes and prayer houses had been released by police and carried off irf triumph by cheering mobs.
Rev. Purmose of the Filadelfia Fellowship Church of India, a small Protestant sect, said he was beaten "black and blue" in one attack. He said his Bibles were taken away and his fellow missionaries slapped and kicked amid death threats by their assailants.
In Jalandhar in the state of Punjab, three Hindu militant organizations distributed leaflets last weekend warning of a global Christian conspiracy whose aim was the conversion of 50,000 Hindus in India every week. Hindu organ
izations this week claimed the papal visit was the start of a Catholic millennium campaign, heavily funded by the church, to convert all Hindus to Christianity.
One of the largest of the. Hindu organizations opposing conversions is the World Hindu Council, although many Indians question its motivation.
"The World Hindu Council (VHP) is just a ruse to gain cheap publicity. The VHP is opposing the pope's visit to arouse communal sentiments. They are trying to mislead the masses," said Professor Bipin Chandra, a Hindu historian at Jawaharlal Nehru University