[BokerokyBan]

An interesting article on the issue of muscular church planting and evangelical missionarying that is going on around the world, but especially in zones of focused attention by many Western church groups. These zones invariably focus in on India, partly because it is an open society and it's easy to hide heinous and aggressive conversion tactics behind the veneer of developmental aid, and partly because places like China and Arab Gulf a quite hostile to aggressive Christian groups and have stiff punishments and aren't shy of using them.

I wonder whether many Americans and Europeans who donate to their churches even know how their money is (mis)used in mission trips and church plantings half way across the globe.

Suhag A. Shukla, Esq.: The Question Of Evangelism In India

Like America, India's shores accepted and sheltered the religiously persecuted -- from Jews arriving 2500 years ago, to early Christians bringing the message of Christ, not to Hindus, but to their brethren, the Cochin Jews. Later came the Parsis from Iran. Others came not to escape but on their own free will -- Arab Muslims to trade, and others from far away lands seeking India's spirituality. Each one of these newcomers sought to live and let live, mixing in, as the legend goes, like sugar in milk.

But since the 12th century, starting with the Islamic invasions and colonizing European missionaries to today, India faces a different kind of religious visitor -- one that seeks not to sweeten the milk, but curdle it.
At the end of the day, numbers and statistics, though illustrative, fail to address the very real human factor on the losing side of the proselytization and conversion equation. Conversion, when born from genuine faith, belief, study, or religious experience, can be beautiful. But, conversion begot by aggressive or predatory proselytization is a form of violence.