India (MNN) — Persecution in India has trended upward for years. But today, June 9, India’s minority Christians were called on not to endure silently but instead to make a public stand in pursuit of peace. A group called the National Christian Front organized nationwide protests against the systemic violence done against them.
“The thing about India is that in the constitution, you do have freedom of religion: to share your faith, live your faith, and even have people join your faith,” says Greg Musselman with Voice of the Martyrs, Canada.
But in many regions, that freedom is subject to anti-conversion laws that often open the door for mob rule.
(Photo courtesy of Voice of the Martyrs Canada)
“It’s like they said, ‘You know, we’ve had enough of this, and it’s time to stand up together, and it’s time to band together,’” Musselman says of the Christians protesting today. Other minorities and organizations also feel the brunt of these laws and support the call for true religious freedom in India.
A report states that after the protests, a memorandum will be sent to India’s president to emphasize the issue further.
“As the violence has increased against our brothers and sisters and minority communities, they said, ‘We want to draw attention to it and to put pressure on the BJP,’ which is a radical Hindu government that states that if you are Indian, you are Hindu,” Musselman says.
“That’s going to bring a profile, and it’s going to put pressure, we pray, on the Indian government, that they will start to do more to protect their citizens.”
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“Let’s pray that the church in India would be unified,” Musselman says, “that the persecution, the opposition that they’re facing would actually —and it does in many cases — [bring] the believers of all different denominations and styles of worship together.”
Pray for respect and peace in the protests, that onlookers will recognize the difference Jesus makes.
“Ultimately, that is what we want to see happen, is that the gospel of Jesus Christ will go forward in India, even through something like a protest saying that ‘we have the right to be able to share the message,'” Musselman says.
Header image is a representative stock photo of a church in Hyderabad, India. (Photo courtesy of Paul Silvan via Unsplash)
