©Interativo Gospel - Chritmas in the Orissa India

For the First Time in Three Years, Christmas Is Celebrated in Orissa India

Bodimunda village in Kandhamal, Orissa, India, celebrated Christmas for the first time in three years. And in Barakhama village several miles away, a strong police posse kept watch as 2,000 Christians prayed a little distance from where a 500 strong group was "observing" events that led to death and mass destruction in December 2007, and then again for seven weeks from August 23, 2008.

This has been reported to the ASSIST News Service by John Dayal, an Indian Christian activist and campaigner for Dalit rights who was formerly a journalist with the Delhi edition of the Indian newspaper, the Mid-Day and a leader of the All India Christian Council, the United Christian Forum for Human Rights and is associated with numerous Christian groups, such as the Dalit Freedom Network.

"Christmas will never be the same ever again in this part of Orissa which at the peak of the violence saw 54,000 internally displaced Christians - over 30,000 of them in government refugee camps and the rest in forests or far away from home," said Dayal, who is also All India Catholic Union National president. "But the people would not be denied celebrating the birth of Christ - many of them had faced death when asked to leave their faith, drink some cow urine and become Hindus if they wanted to live in their villages.

"Midnight Mass had become a memory, but this time two Catholic priests, a religious brother, the head of the Mother Teresa Sisters in Orissa and their friends decided to challenge the fear and the 'Kui' group of the dreaded Lambodhar Kahar and celebrated the Christian festival as it should be."

Fonte: blackchristiannews