Tag Archive for ‘Christianity in India’ at Asian Window

Tag Archive for 'Christianity in India'

Catholic India running out of would-be priests

Published

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on December 10, 2009

in Education, Faith, India and Religion

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From the National:

Christian leaders in India agree that young and educated Catholic men are showing less interest in becoming priests.

“Until some years ago, brighter young men willing to join the priesthood were plenty in India. But now, for various reasons, as their preference is changing, it threatens to pose many crises for the community in the future,” said Father Udumala Bala, the deputy secretary general of the Conference of Catholic Bishops of India (CCBI), based in Bangalore.

“The number of students in many seminaries has been falling recently and it points to a future crisis. But the number of brighter, intelligent and educated [in general studies] students in seminaries has seen a sharper fall, which is more worrisome,” he said. “We need to set up proper infrastructure at the grass-root level and campaign for the promotion of the vocation across the country … and we have already taken steps in this direction.” More:

India, exporter of priests, may keep them home

Published

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on December 30, 2008

in India

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As families have fewer children and the Indian economy offers more career options, the West may need to look elsewhere to fill its empty pulpits. Laurie Goodstein from Aluva, India, in International Herald Tribune:

Students at St. Paul's Minor Seminary in the Irinjalakuda Diocese in India taking a ministry trip.

In the sticky night air, next to a grove of mahogany trees, nearly 50 young men in madras shirts saunter back and forth along a basketball court, reciting the rosary.

They are seminarians studying to become Roman Catholic priests. Together, they send a great murmuring into the hilly village, mingling with the Muslim call to prayer and the chanting of Vedas from a Hindu temple on a nearby ridge.

Young men willing to join the priesthood are plentiful in India, unlike in the United States and Europe. Within a few miles of this seminary, called Don Bosco College, are two much larger seminaries, each with more than 400 students.

As a result, bishops trek here from the United States, Europe, Latin America and Australia looking for spare priests to fill their empty pulpits. Hundreds have been allowed to go, siphoning support from India’s widespread network of Catholic churches, schools, orphanages, missionary projects and social service programs.

Who was Sister Alphonsa?

Published

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on October 12, 2008

in Religion

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[Updated]

Sister Alphonsa, an Indian Roman Catholic nun, was canonised on Sunday, October 12 at a ceremony at The Vatican. She was beatified in 1986 by the late Pope John Paul II on a visit to India.

The nun from Kerala who died in 1946 at the age of 36 was India’s first woman saint to be canonised. She became a saint ahead of the Albanian nun Mother Teresa of Kolkata who was beatified in 2003.

Sister Alphonsa

From The Hindu: “My childhood friend was a saint”

“She used to come here along with her father,” says Lakshmikutty of Kudamaloor. Though 99, she has a sharp memory, especially when it comes to recalling the times she spent with her childhood friend Annakkutty. More:

Also in The Hindu: A role model for humility

Alphonsa’s room was very close to the school. She used to stand at the window of her room to see her little friends. When they saw her, they rushed up to her to see her charming innocent smile and also to request her prayers. Her little friends called her “our smiling sister.” After her death, it was the children of the convent school who started decorating her tomb and burning candles around it. More:

In The Times of India: Biography of Sister Alphonsa prepared by the Vatican

From her birth, the life of the Blessed was marked by the cross, which would be progressively revealed to her as the royal way to conform herself to Christ. Her mother, Maria Puthukari, gave birth to her prematurely, in her eight month of pregnancy, as a result of a fright she received when, during the sleep, a snake wrapped itself around her waist. Eight days later, the 28 of August, the child was baptised according to the Syro-Malabar rite by the Fr. Joseph Chackalayil, and she received the name Annakutty, a diminutive of Anne. She was the last of five children. More:

‘Indianised’ Bible

Published

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on July 26, 2008

in Religion

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A new version of the holy text depicts Virgin Mary in sari and Joseph in a loincloth and turban. From The Times:

Barefoot and wearing a sari, with a bindi on her forehead and a naked baby on her shoulder, the woman in the picture is unmistakably Indian. So is the man behind her, clad in a loincloth and turban.

They could be any poor family in an Indian village, or at one of the country’s teeming railway stations. This, however, is no ordinary family.

The image is one of the Virgin Mary with Joseph and the baby Jesus in the first “Indianised” version of the Bible, published by the Roman Catholic Church last month.

The New Community Bible is part of an attempt by the Vatican to attract more converts in the world’s second-most populous country as congregations decline in Europe and North America.

Sisters and goddesses

Published

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on June 28, 2008

in India and Travel

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Legend has it that it was the apostle, Thomas, the doubting one, who brought Christianity to Southern India – and now, aside from the odd jealous spat, the Virgin Mary and goddess Bhagavati are worshipped with equal fervour. William Dalrymple in The Guardian:

On the edge of the jungle lay a small wooden temple. It was late evening, and the sun had already disappeared behind the palms. The light was fading fast, and the hundreds of small clay lamps lined up on the wooden slats of the temple all seemed to be burning brighter and brighter, minute by minute.

The oiled torsos of the temple Brahmins were gleaming, too. They had nearly finished the evening ceremony – surrounding the idol of the goddess Bhagavati with burning splints as they rang bells, chanted and blew on conch shells. The ritual prepared the goddess for sleep.

Only when it was over, and the doors of the inner shrine were sealed for the night, were they able to tell me about the goddess they served. Bhagavati is the pre-eminent goddess in Kerala, the most powerful and beloved. In some incarnations, it was true, she could be ferocious: a figure of terror, a stalker of cremation grounds who slaughtered demons without hesitation or compassion.

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