Orissa State is located in east India and is a Hindu dominated state. There are five shepherds from this state in our ministry. From last year, POSCO (a Korean steel manufacturing company) began constructing its steel plant in the state too. In this state, there have been serious violence against Christians by Hindu Extremists.
More than 600 churches have been demolished, 4,000 Christians forced to flee from their villages, and at least 25 killed as a result of violent persecution in the state of Orissa. Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) religious leader, Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati, and four of his associates were murdered in the Kandhamal District of Orissa on Saturday, August 23. Although a Maoist group claimed responsibility for the murders, VHP supporters claimed that Christians were behind the killings. Hindu fundamentalists have launched a series of attacks against Christians in retaliation.
Since Sunday, August 24, churches, schools and other institutions, prayer rooms, and homes of Christians have been ransacked, burned and destroyed. Christians have been assaulted and at least twenty-five have reportedly been killed--some of them burned alive or cut into pieces.
Attacks on Christians have been going on in the Orissa state of India every now and then. In January of 1999, Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two sons were burned alive in this state. Last Christmas, in December 2007, Hindu militants burned approximately 90 churches and 600 homes, killing an estimated 10 persons in the same state.
The present violence is gradually spreading to all the districts having a Christian population and even to the neighboring state Madhya Pradesh. Curfew has been imposed on most of the towns in Orissa state where Christians live.
Please pray that God may protect Christian brothers and sisters in Orissa state. Please pray that God may raise many influential Indian Hindu convert shepherds and pray that India may be changed into a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.
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