Catholic Online Forum

Eighteen Catholic and Protestant bishops staged a sit in to protest an enquiry commission report on church attacks.The report is not judicial findings but some politically motivated statements, alleged Archbishop Bernard Moras of Bangalore, who heads the Catholic Church in the state.

The report is “completely one-sided, biased, propagandist and even communal,” he said, adding that it has been “totally unfair to all Christians.”

“The Christians who were the target of attacks and the victims of the organized mayhem and vandalism have been converted into the perpetrators, while the real attackers and all forces and elements that had directly or indirectly supported have been given a clean chit,” Archbishop Morass bemoaned.

Church attack probe rocks Karnataka legislature

When the house met, the speaker wanted to take up question hour, but Siddaramaiah wanted to move an adjournment motion under Rule 60, saying, “The Christian community has lost faith in the government. They have petitioned the government not to accept the report and ensure that there are no attacks in future. As the interest of a particular religion is involved, the matter should be discussed

wo pastors were arrested in Karnataka for conducting worship at their residential premises.

Pastor Mathew of Indian Pentecostal Church was invited by Pastor Jose of the “Spirit Filled Church “to conduct Sunday worship in his rented House Church in Tumkur district of Karnataka.

As the service progressed, a police officer walked into the church, and asked the pastors to stop the meeting, then ransacked the house church and took away Bibles and other Christian literature on March 6.

The pastors were then arrested and forcefully taken to the local police station

Christians in Mangalore, who witnessed a wave of attacks against them two years ago, have started a 21-day fast and prayer vigil for safety and peace.

“We offer the 21 days of prayers and fasting for the safety” of Christians in Karnataka, said Bishop Aloysius Paul D’Souza of Mangalore who opened the marathon prayer program March 10.

Speaking to the press after the submission of the memorandum about the Justice Somashekar report, bishop Derek said that Justice Somashekar commission was instituted to find out as to who attacked Christians; but the commission practically has come out with an answer that ‘No one attacked Christians’. If the government was really interested in finding the truth it should have conceded to the request of Christians for a CBI enquiry instead of the disappointing commission enquiry.

I am reminded of Richard Widmark's exasperated comment in Judgment at Nuremberg, after hearing one too many excuses, "Nobody was responsible. It was the **** Eskimos that came down and did it."

The outgoing head of the Catholic Church in Orissa has praised Christians of Kandhamal for setting an example of living the faith in a hostile environment

The Orissa High Court today granted bail for a second time to a Hindu legislator convicted of committing murder during anti-Christian violence in 2008.

Catholic Bishop of Orissa: recent violence against Christians social, not religious, in nature

But Msgr. Sarat states: "In the district of Malkangiri there are problems with Naxalite rebels on issues related to land, which are not due to religious persecution, as newspapers and media have reported." He adds: "Our efforts to live in a state of peaceful coexistence with people of different beliefs are bearing fruit. It is a slow process, the scars of those wounds are still there, but we look ahead and our hearts are full of hope. "

'BJP backed Karnataka's anti-Christian strife'

Every one of the attacks and incidents which took place were instigated and pre-planned. They were state-sponsored and were not only supported by the state but were covered up for by the state. The responsibility for this devolves squarely on the home minister B V Acharya and chief minister B S Yediyurappa," stated the report.

The state police have crossed all the limits in ransacking the church, sacred objects and religious symbols like the crucifix. The procurement of the rock pebbles, the arming of the saffron militants with lathis and other deadly weapons and use of these persons against members of the minority community was totally unjustified and criminal.

The expired teargas, the police violence inside the primary school at Kulshekar on 607 young children and a staff of over 35 women teachers and nuns, the assaulting the celebrant priest at Pemannur Church, false arrest of many, inflicted with custodial violence and refusal to afford medical aid to the injured persons which have resulted in permanent damage and disability such as loss of eyesight, damage to the kidneys among others have been ignored and overlooked by the report of Justice Somashekhara report. He also said that Somashekhara was a paid employee by the government and he would want to bring the results in favour of the Government and not the minority community.

Bajrang Dal Activists Allege Conversion, 'Rescue' Orphanage Kids

Sr Christine Misquith, head of Carmel Vocational Institute, Bidar, said that orphans and children from poor families are frequently sent to Stella Maris for providing them better education and opportunities.

She asserted that the orphanage has legal documents validating its mission to provide education to poor children from standard 4 to 7, and has been doing so with the help of grants from state government's minorities and backward classes welfare department.

Thirty-seven groups belonging to all faiths have publicly condemned a pro-Hindu group’s attack on Christian-run homes for poor children in Karnataka.

They deplored the new trend among Hindu fundamentalists to “train their guns” on students, especially those from these poor homes, alleging proselytization.

“There are more than 80,000 students studying in Christian schools in Mangalore. If every student was made a Christian by now India would have become a nation full of Christians”, said Vincent Alva, a Catholic leader.

These children were getting ready with great excitement to return to their homes for vacation. Their tickets were bought paying Rs 25, 000 and they were to leave by VRL bus for Bidar on April 8 at 2.30 pm. The warden brought them to PVS circle at 1.00 pm much ahead of time and they were looking forward to board the bus. Just then the miscreants barged in, asking some inquisitive questions with threatening words to which the children gave no answer as they were shocked beyond words. When the bus arrived, the children got into the bus, some people claiming to be Bajrang Dal members too got into the bus with cameras and more threats blocking the exit. The warden Sr Asha Prima informed her superior and in response a senior sister Sr Maria Jyothi rushed to the spot. Meanwhile the Bajrang Dal group called the police who arrived immediately. The bus with the children and all the rest on board were taken to CWC, at Bondel.

At CWC Sr Maria Jyothi informed the officials that the children were the bonafide students of the orphanage at Stella Maris, Kotekar and produced the required documents and license to substantiate her claim, which she produced within few minutes. The police surrounded the CWC as they would the criminals brought to the Remand Home. The children were not given food and were restless, and highly traumatized by this experience.

Hindu groups to target Xians in North Karnataka

Hindutva right-wing organisations are planning raids on Christian institutions across the state in backward districts such as Bijapur, Bidar and Raichur.

They are intrigued by the large presence of students from Mangalore living in such institutions. They have many questions for which there are no answers from government officials.

children should not suffer poverty, hunger, ignorance and ill health

In the meantime, the assistant commissioner of Mangalore Prabhulinga Kavalkatti went through the rule book and found out that such mass movement of children for educational purpose or otherwise needs to be cleared by the deputy commissioner of Bidar district and a document to that effect was not available with the children’s escort Sister Jyothi Maria.

Stella Maris nuns slam police for declining to lodge FIR

Mangalore, April 12: Corporator Mariamma Thomas accused the Kadri and Ullal police of refusing to register FIR against those who allegedly harassed the children of Stella Maris Orphanage.

Speaking at a joint press meet on Tuesday organised to give clarification about a recent incident in which Bajrang Dal activists disrupted homeward journey of the 41 children on April 8, Mrs Thomas demanded the concerned higher authorities to take appropriate action against those who failed to give protection to the victims of communal hatred.



However, she also said that Mangalore City Police Commissioner Seemanth Kumar Singh later assured to take action against the police personnel who failed to register FIR, even after receiving a complaint.

Bhopal: It's the clearest evidence yet that the BJP-led Madhya Pradesh government has sanctioned religious profiling of Christians.

The Sangh Parivar people might consider social work to be a crime. Helping the poor and educating them was being regarded as conversion. If Catholic insititutions or any other social organizations stopped educating the poor, the Sangh Parivar would get more uneducated goons to support them. They do not want the poor people to become educated. They want the poor to remain poor and join them in spoiling the social fabric, she said.

If any illegal activities were going on in and around Mangalore, then it would be the duty of the police to intervene and take action against them and punish them severely. The Sangh Parivar members had no right to take the law into their hands. These Sangh goons are restricting girls from talking to males. They have created a fear psychosis in the minds of girls and the rule of goons is increasing day by day in Mangalore. She questioned as to why the state govenment was not taking any action against these elements and asked if the Sangh Parivar had been appointed to rule the state.

it is the children who are in the centre of the entire issue, because the main allegations of the so-called self-styled police were that these children were being converted. However, it is pitiable to note that, children are caught in the controversy not because of their own volition but out of circumstances.

Unlike normal children who live under the protective wings of their parents these children who stay in the orphanages, away from their loved ones, have a troubled childhood either due to abusive and alcoholic parents and some of them might be orphans also. Their background is also very complicated most of the time. So many of them are anxious children, anxiety arising out of their troubled family lives, some of them even suffering from compulsive disorders and mild depression and other common disorders these children are usually prone to.

The new head of the Catholic Church in Orissa has dismissed as lies claims by Hindu radical leader Praveen Togadia that he has converted 150,000 Christians to Hinduism.

“He is an habitual liar,” Archbishop John Barwa of Cuttack-Bhubaneswar said yesterday.

Togadia, international general secretary of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP, world Hindu council), also claims that Hindu groups in Orissa have stopped some five million Hindus from converting to Christianity.

Such claims are “full of lies and a ploy to foment violence,” said Archbishop Barwa, who was head of Rourkela, a tribal dominated diocese in northern Orissa, before becoming Orissa Church leader on April 2.

Christian tribals at Dasturipada in Palghar district were attacked with sticks by a group of unidentified men who barged into their homes during Easter celebrations on April 25.

One of the tribals sustained a fracture in his hand, said an eyewitness. The Palghar police have registered a case.

The attack comes three days after a mob disrupted Maundy Thursday prayer service at Devkuppada in the district.

Christians tackle violence together
Madhya Pradesh ecumenical group launches statewide tour to promote unity

Unless we strengthen ourselves and stand united for our rights no one will come to help us,” Father Muttungal said.

The government has failed to identify those who made innocent youths suffer for more than three years,” said the archbishop, who is also the president of Karnataka United Christian Forum for Human Rights.

One of them, Stany D’Cunha from Mangalore, said: “I had to attend court nine times in the last three years because a criminal case was registered against me because I was in a prayer group in our church.”

A grotto of St Antony belonging to a businessman was damaged by some miscreants Sunday night in Valencia near Mangalore.

He said the grotto was built just six months ago and during its inauguration a large number of Hindus and Muslims were present.

“Every day many people, including Hindus pray before this grotto as it is beside the road,” said Saldanha.

Enraged parishioners attacked the policemen after they turned up at around 9pm at St Francis Xavier Church in Velim to talk to Father Romano Gonsalves.

The crowd thought the policemen had come to try and intimidate the parish priest who was raided recently by income-tax and police officials.

Mangalore: Some miscreants pelted stones at the faithful who had gathered on the occasion of Maundy Thursday ceremony in the Bendur church premises on the evening of April 5.


Claret Pinto, aged 48 years, wife of Valerian Pinto and resident of Bendurwell was attending the Maundy Thursday mass along with her children. Some unidentified miscreants threw stones at the devotees during the open-air mass.

A priest in Srinagar, capital of Jammu and Kashmir state, has sought the prime minister’s help after his parish church faced second attack this year.

Some unidentified people tried to burn the Holy Family Catholic Church in Srinagar, Wednesday evening.

So how do we observe the fourth anniversary of the worst violence against the Christian community in India in recent centuries, other than in prayer and protest?

The pursuit of Justice would be a good way, I think. Justice at all levels. And holding the State – not Orissa alone, but the Indian State – to account, learning our Constitutional lessons from developments in Gujarat which saw a near genocide against the Muslim community in 2002, and the violence against Sikhs in Delhi and other cities in 1984.

The Sikhs lawyers and retired judges, and the widows, have taught us the valuable lesson of persistence in the pursuit of justice. Decades later, they have not lost an iota of their zeal. The intensity of their passion to see that justice is done, is remarkable, and is, in fact bearing fruit. They have shown that it is possible to demand, and get, appropriate reparation and relief. They have also networked effectively with civil society, got the highest in the land to apologise, and have held powerful politicians accountable for their actions. The Muslims community, too, has proved the relevance of networking with civil society and using all means, judicial, political, and civil to get justice to the victims. The Supreme Court of India in many epochal judgements effectively ensured justice in Gujarat. The final word is till to be said, and there is hope that political bosses, police officers and even subordinate judiciary will pay for their crimes and their abetment to crime, or impunity, before long.

Explain high rate of acquittal in Kandhamal riot cases, SC asks Odisha

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Friday sought the Odisha government's response to a PIL which alleged that an unusually high rate of acquittals have marred victims' perception of fair trial in the 2008 Kandhamal communal riot cases.