Kandhamal victims honored at GCIC event

Amidst their tears and feeling of voidness, there was still hope in Christ for over 200 persecuted Christians who celebrated the "Life and Forgiveness" event organised by the Global Council of Indian Christians (GCIC) on Tuesday.

At least 33 widows of martyrs from Kandhamal violence were honored in the event at the United Theological College in Bangalore. The event was part of the Fourth National Persecution Meet (2009).

Delivering the keynote address, Swami Agnivesh, President of the World Council of Arya Samaj and winner of the Right Livelihood Award (2004), said he was happy witnessing the victims having decided to embark on a journey of forgiveness rather than hatred and violence.

Jesus message of forgiveness have always echoed in the lives of many persecuted Christians specially Mrs. Staines, the widow of Graham Saines, he said. "True Christianity was not in books or churches but in the lives of ordinary people like the Kandhamal widows," he added.

He exhorted them to continue the path of forgiveness and to let law take its course and allow justice to be served. The crimes against minorities are crimes against humanity, he declared.

Swami Agnivesh along with other dignitaries including Bangalore Baptist Hospital, Bishop Sampath Kumar, Senior Pastor T. T. Joseph, Dr. A.G. Ashok were honored for their relentless service in the field of human rights.

The same day, the Christian advocacy group also released an election manifesto urging voters to elect a government that will maintain "secular polity built upon democratic norms and scrupulous adherence to rule of Law."

"We appeal to all the citizens of our country, who are about to go to the polls, to exercise judiciously their right to elect those representatives who will facilitate the emergence of a nation that we want to be through a responsible and accountable governance," the manifesto read.

In the statement, the advocacy group noted that the "August 2008 violence killed at least 127 people and destroyed 315 villages, 4,640 houses, 252 churches and 13 educational institutions, besides rendering more than 50,000 homeless."