Indian Christianity

HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY IN INDIA : M. M. NINAN
Meanwhile the work expanded with summer schools from 1915, training classes for pastoral and
evangelistic ministry from 1918, schools both for boys and girls, medical work, and the continuation of
the translating and printing of Christian literature. Girls’ education and women’s work was pioneered by
two long-serving missionaries – Edith Chapman and Marjorie Clark. In a society which originally
regarded girls as not worth educating, by 1953, these ladies had trained nearly 80 Christian girls as
certified teachers and leaders of women’s work in the villages.
Taking the message to others
The north east of India was the first to see the door close on the Western missionary presence. The
rebellion of the Mizo National Front against rule from Delhi beginning in 1966 made the Indian
government very sensitive to foreign influence in the territory and the last BMS missionaries had to leave
in 1968. The establishment of the Union Territory of Mizoram in 1972 restored stability but the Western
missionary era there had effectively ended.
However, the year the missionaries were leaving, the Zoram Baptist Mission was formed to co-ordinate
the missionary outreach of the Baptist Church of the Mizo District. By 1989, the mission had 88 home
missionaries working among non-Mizos in Mizoram, 50 working in other parts of India and 18 in training.
This represented a Baptist communicant membership of just over 41,000 supporting more than 580 full
time workers.
An inspiration
The Mizo Church is a powerful illustration of a poor rural community taking on the Christian principles
and responsibilities of stewardship and evangelism instilled by Lorrain and the other pioneer
missionaries.
Mizoram Presbyterian Church was established and founded by a Welsh Missionary named Rev. D.E.
Jones in 1897. The first missionary who came to Mizoram was Rev. William Williams, a Welsh
missionary who at that time was a missionary in Khasi Hills, North East India (now Meghalaya). He came
into Mizoram in 1891 and preached the Gospel among some of the villages. On January 11, 1894, F.W.
Savidge and J.H. Lorrain, commissioned by Arthington Aborigines Mission, reached Mizoram. They
stayed for four years. On August 31, 1897, Welsh Calvinistic Methodist's (later changed Presbyterian
Church of Wales) missionary David Evan Jones set foot on Mizoram and founded the Church.
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