A church in Nepal has been forced to shut down after a campaign of harrasment by high caste Hindus, sources have told Morning Star News.
The US-based organisation reports that high caste Brahmins have disrupted worship at the Pakhluwa Eternal Life Church in Palpa in the country’s west and accused pastor Tufani Bhar of converting villagers, the pastor said.
Church members had abandoned their building and resorted to meeting in homes, but the Brahmins issued threats to anyone found meeting anywhere, including in houses.
“It is shocking that we are not allowed to meet in homes and pray,” Bhar told Morning Star News.
Bhar, who established the church about nine months ago, said he had tried everything possible to preserve the fellowship but was unable to withstand the opposition. Church attendance dwindled from 30 to 15 to 18 people before disbanding last weekend due to fear.
Bhar visited a few members secretly on 3rd November, which was his last visit to Palpa.
“I was too disappointed to see the Christians scared and thus did not go last week, on November 10 [Saturday, the scheduled worship day],” he said. “The Hindu-Brahmins are resorting to every method possible to scare us, threaten us and not let us meet.”
The Brahmins had reportedly initially objected to the use of guitar and drums in the church service.
“We resorted to worshipping silently without the use of any instrument,” Bhar said. “But then they objected to the Lord’s Supper that we partake of once a month.”
Prohibited from taking the Lord’s supper, the church began travelling from Palpa to the mother church in Butwal, about 50 kilometres away, to partake of the sacrament each month.
Opposition rose steadily to the point that the Brahmins refused to let the church meet for worship, Bhar said.
“The chairman of the ward [a smaller unit of the municipality] said that they will not let Christians fellowship,” the pastor said.
Previously there had been no opposition in his 38 years of ministry in Butwal and nearby areas, he said, but Hindu extremist groups from India have influenced Nepal’s Hindus.
“Before there was no persecution, but [Hindu extremist group] Shiv Sena from India has been working among the Nepalese people and radicalizing them,” he said. “They want Nepal to become a Hindu nation, but we have all religions in our country, and not just Hinduism.”
Bhar started the mother church, Eternal Life Church, eight years ago and had established four branches, including the Pakhluwa Eternal Life Church.
Meanwhile, authorities arrested a Christian woman from Australia along with four local Christians in Gulariya on 12th November, according to reports.
Katiya Graham was arrested after someone informed police that she was evangelising door-to-door with the other four Christians, Pastor Hari Prasad Regmi told Morning Star News.
Local media reported that she was charged with spreading Christianity.
Authorities sent Graham to Kathmandu that day for deportation, and Sweta Manandhar, Shreejan Manandhar, Tej Bahadur Shahi and Dal Bahadur Taruna are in police custody, Regmi said.
Bishnu Hari Upadhaya, director of the Department of Immigration, told media, “Nepalese law strictly prohibits such acts. Currently we are investigating whether the charges filed against her are true.”
Authorities found Bibles, diaries, pamphlets and videos related to Christianity among the accused, a Bardiya District spokesman reportedly told media.
Separately, on 4th November in Butwal, police arrested four women, including two from Japan, on charges of carrying out forceful conversions. The women were accused of evangelising door-to-door.
Authorities sent the two Japanese women, identified as Yasura Owa and Makihikula, to Kathmandu, and they were deported. The two Nepali women, Pushpa Ghimire and Tirthamaya Ghale, were released on 8th November, Pastor Regmi told Morning Star News.
