Dear friends:

       Merry Christmas and a blessed New Year of 2008. You may have seen a small news item of Hindu mobs attacking Christians as they celebrated Christmas in India's Orissa province, a reminder that in our world peace has not yet come. Four BCM churches were burned, one of our pastors badly beaten, another pastor's home burned with everything he had along with 13 church families' homes. Several pastors were missing. We have just received word that all are safe, but in hiding. There is a current curfew and the army maintaining order, but the Christian community is expecting more violence as soon as the curfew is lifted. One disturbing element of the news coverage here:  Hindu leaders were repeatedly quoted as saying that the attacks were the Christians' fault for supposedly trying to 'accost' and 'attack' a major anti-conversion leader as he was walking, a blatant lie we have over and over again, not just in India, but in other countries where Muslim mobs have attacked Christian neighborhoods, only to have international news blithely repeating the propaganda that the Christians had somehow provoked the attacks. Nigeria is one place we've had friends on the ground, their Christian publishing house burned to the ground in attacks, while CNN was reporting 'inter-sectarian fighting' between Christians and Muslims, even though the Christians were not armed at all. In Orissa, the Christians were poor farmers, the 'defenders' who attacked and stirred up the mobs, the anti-conversion leader's own personal militia, yet every news coverage we've seen quotes as the anti-conversion party's propaganda that the attacks were justified.

      Pray that God will give these Christians the courage to stand strong in their faith. Pray for our BCM pastors and churches who once again have lost so much. This is the same province where we had a BCM missionary almost beaten to death a few months ago, where an Australian missionary and his two young sons were burned alive in their car a few years ago by anti-conversion mobs. The Orissa government has pushed through a law requiring government permission (which they won't grant) to change religions. What is not brought out is the economics behind it all. The Hindu caste system simply won't work if the untouchables and lowest caste don't remain subservient peasants to support the higher castes. Freedom in Christ means a loss of lifetime serfs for the Hindu upper-classes, and that will destroy their power and economic base, which is why they are determined not to see Christianity advance in India. As we celebrate our own holidays, let this reminder prompt us to pray for our brothers and sisters in Christ suffering for their faith around the world.