January 11, 2010

Christianity grows in former Hindu kingdom's prisons

In 1986, the Rev. Anthony Sharma was arrested for conducting an Easter service in Nepal, then the only Hindu kingdom in the world, and one where converts were punished.

Today, the south Asian state is secular and Christianity is growing, especially in prisons, where some inmates say they are comforted by the message of forgiveness and love brought by Christian ministers.

"Things have changed," says Mr Sharma, who was appointed Nepal's first Roman Catholic bishop by the Vatican in 2007, a year after the fall of the military-backed government of King Gyanendra. This led to the abolition of the monarchy and the end of Hinduism as the state religion.

A symbol of the change is Rajendra Karki, aged 26, who ran a restaurant in Kathmandu until his arrest in 2007. Mr Karki says his wife Sabita hanged herself and although neighbours testified it was suicide, her parents alleged murder and he was charged.

In 2008, Mr Karki received a 10-year sentence and was sent to Bhadra Prison in Kathmandu. Christian prisoners have a room there to hold prayers and he began attending out of curiosity. In 2009, he converted to Christianity.

"Jesus was the son of God and yet gave up his life to save sinners," says Mr Karki. "Christianity says sinners will be forgiven if they repent while Hinduism says sinners will be punished."

After his release, Mr Karki plans to return home in Ramechhap, a district in western Nepal that lacks roads, running water and electricity.

"There are no Christian preachers either," he says. "I will take the word of God there."

Chandramaya Thapa, the daughter of a farmer in Makwanpur district west of Kathmandu, came to Kathmandu in 2007 to enrol in a college. But she was arrested within a month and charged with human trafficking. The 24-year-old says that although she hardly knew the man who tried to sell a friend of hers in India, police arrested her as an accomplice.

"But when you are poor and can't afford a good lawyer, no one listens to you," says Ms Thapa, who is now in the Women's Prison in Kathmandu.

The Women's Prison was the first jail in Nepal to have a functioning chapel. It was built in 2008 by Prison Fellowship Nepal, a non-governmental organisation working with local churches to support prisoners.

"I began going to the chapel to pass the time," says Ms Thapa. "Then I was encouraged by the words of forgiveness and love. I became a Christian in spring 2009 and now am studying for a college degree."

There are 170 women in the prison and Ms Thapa estimates about 30 are Christians.

PFN, founded by a missionary lawyer, Dinesh Neupane, built a second chapel in 2009 in Jhapa Prison in eastern Nepal.

"Earlier, prayers used to be clandestine," says Dinesh Neupane. "Prisoners were unwilling to say they were Christians. Now the fear is gone."

Bishop Sharma estimates about one million of Nepal's 28 million people are Christians. Of the nearly 8,000 prisoners, around 400 are Christians.

Nakhu Jail in Lalitpur town, near Kathmandu, holds Ram Prasad Mainali, a Hindu militant whose National Defence Army planted a bomb in a church in 2009, killing three women. Mr Mainali, now awaiting trial, is reading the Bible.

"Though I was tortured after my arrest, no Hindu ever came to visit me," the 37-year-old says. "But the Christian missionaries say they have forgiven me and I have abandoned the pursuit for a Hindu state."

Sudeshna Sarkar, ENI