Author: David Kostinchuk <dkost@mb.sympatico.ca>
Publication: The Skeptic Tank
Date: February 26, 20000
URL: http://www.skeptictank.org/rapeindi.htm
The Concise Oxford Dictionary defines rape
as: 1. take by force. 2. commit rape on. fig. forcible interference with institutions,
country, etc.
The rape of India is done in a model similar
to a military model used to invade, occupy, control, or subjugate a population
of a given country. Intelligence is considered essential to invading a country;
language, religion, culture, etc. are some of the variables considered. Division
among the given population is considered essential to gain political control
once inside the country. Religion can be the key variable to accomplish this.
Division of wealth, social status, ethnic diversity, etc. are also variables
that influence division of the population of a given country.
At the present time North India is considered
the core target of evangelists in their effort of world evangelism. They justify
this to Christians by using derogatory remarks like " 900 million Hindus
are spiritual bondage" (Baptist Press 10/99) or "900 million people
lost in the hopeless darkness of Hinduism" (Baptist Press 11/99)
North India is a major population and political
center. It is also considered the religious hub of India, the most socially
deprived, has the lowest literacy rate, having the smallest percentage of
Christians in its population as well as having immense research done on the
population. The evangelists consider Hindus in North India as being the most
accessible target in their plan for world wide evangelism. In addition there
is the added incentive of having a Muslim population of 140 million.
The AD2000 movement uses terms such as "spy
out the land and its inhabitants" to get an accurate complete picture
of opportunities and challenges of India. They have coined the terms PLUG,
PREM and NICE to describe their goals and methodology. PLUG refers to the
target group. People in every language, urban center and geographic division.
PREM refers to the techniques to use. Offering prayer, research must be done
and utilized effectively on the target group, an evangelist must be the catalyst
to provoke change and action and to encourage ministries and their efforts
to convert non Christians. NICE refers to how the work is to be done. Networking,
taking initiative when the movement is slowing down, using an evangelist to
speed action in evangelizing and to encourage existing groups and cohorts
in their efforts to convert people to Christianity. ( http://www.ad2000.org/uters3.htm
)
The Gospel For Christ and The Indian Missionary
Association have put together books to help evangelists evangelize India.
The evangelists are also using information from The Anthropological Society
of India's work on ethno-graphic studies which has been considered essential
in facilitating the evangelism efforts. This has been used to such a degree
that the diverse language groups of India have been divided into PIN codes.
( These are similar to ZIP codes in the USA that divide the country into mailing
districts.) The ability to send evangelists that are familiar to language,
culture, etc. greatly facilitates the speed at which evangelism is able to
develop and is cost effective since tactics can be formed at the home base
which saves costly mistakes in the field.
ad2000 ( http://www.ad2000.org/uters2.htm
)
The Christian Broadcasting Network has a splinter
group that is called The Joshua Project. Their target is 2.2 billion people
in 1685 groups that are divided into Affinity Blocks and Gateway Clusters.
Affinity groups are groups of people who have bonding of language, religion,
politics and culture. Usually there is one culture that is dominate in the
block. People clusters are people that are closely related in name or culture
so they are clustered together. These groups usually consist of populations
of over one million. There goal is to have at least one hundred Christians
or more in every group of over 10,000 people. Joshua Project ( http://www.ad2000.org/
)
There are too many evangelist groups in India
to cover in this article however; I will discuss a few of them to give a picture
of how they proliferate.
The Indian Prayer + Fellowship Association
has a goal to reach all non Christians to start cell groups. They have contacted
over 16,000 houses, made almost 900 home contacts and over 1700 personal contacts.
Their goal is to start cell groups than attach a full gospel group or plant
a church if needed.They also supply tracts, literature etc. Indian Prayer
And Fellowship Association ( http://www.geocities.com/athens/troy )
Partners International has the goal of training
indigenous people to evangelize others. They are training a Christian who
has converted to Christianity every 13 minutes. They claim planting a church
every ten hours in Asia and Africa. ( http://www.partnersintl.org/aboutpi/welcome.html
)
The southern Baptists plan to have 4,700 southern
Baptists working with millions of international partners. Their goal is to
have 15,000 career missionaries, 50,000 volunteers, and 1,000 southern Baptist
college grads every year. The length of service for the college grads is to
be two years. ( Baptist Press 11/22/99)
The evangelists strategy for North India includes
treating Indian missions and Indian evangelists as equal considering that
India has a strong GNP and a growing middle class. Due to the large population
base the evangelists strategy includes dividing up the population base into
smaller target groups such as women estimated to number 487 million or girls
under 15 which is estimated to number 158 million. They plan to use literacy
programs o target the illiterate which is estimated to be 48% of the population.
They also plan to supply the Indian church with tools such as translators,
humanitarian relief, etc. so the churches can become self sustaining and would
not need outside assistance. ( http://www.gem-werc.org/mmrc9812.htm)
The evangelists India outreach teams -hbi
ministries international India provide schools, orphanages, medical centers
etc. In a six week period outreach teams ministered to 19,000 children and
taught Hindu and Muslim students in Christian schools. ( http://www.gospel.net/hbi/iot/
)
Dr. Houtsma of World Outreach Ministries stated
that he has helped train 160,000 national ministers to continue his work when
he leaves. He is targeting Jammu, Vyara, Ludhiana, etc. ( http://www.wo.org/
)
One of the variables in training indigenous
missionaries is the decreased cost to support missionaries. A foreign missionary
cost at least $66,000 a year to support. Native missionaries cost approximately
$600 a year. This greatly decreases the cost of evangelizing. Christian Aid.
( http://www.christianaid.org/ )
Native missionaries now do 90% of the work
in starting churches. These people are more effective in converting people
because They understand the language, customs, culture, etc. In addition recent
converts are often more zealous in their efforts to convert people to their
way of thinking. Hundreds of thousands of zealous converts can also have a
sever profound influences on the political system that is in effect.
The reader of this article should be aware
of the fact that these students could be influenced toward Christianity by
their teachers. In addition orphanages can be the breeding ground for future
evangelists. In an orphanage children could be brainwashed and conditioned
during school and after school. The children in an orphanage can have their
social life controlled after school so they only socialize with evangelists.
These children have no family or other people outside of the evangelists to
look after their welfare so they can easily be programmed.
It is interesting though sad to see the results
that might occur as the evangelists enter their last stage of evangelism in
India. You can see considerable backlash against evangelism as stated in the
newspapers. Evangelists cry to the politicians, civil right groups and newspapers
in the West.
Some questions must be asked though. Do evangelists
have the right to disrupt society, culture, religion, and the family of people
in other countries? Do people have the right to combat the attack on the culture,
etc. of their country?
I would welcome any comments or feedback on
this article.
