Christian churches in India have found the most fertile ground for expansion among Dalits

Christianity in India
The first Christians in India, according to tradition and legend, were
converted by Saint Thomas the Apostle, who arrived on the Malabar
Coast of India in A.D. 52. After evangelizing and performing miracles
in Kerala and Tamil Nadu, he is believed to have been martyred in
Madras and buried on the site of San Thomé Cathedral. Members of the
Syro-Malabar Church, an eastern rite of the Roman Catholic Church,
adopted the Syriac liturgy dating from fourth century Antioch. They
practiced what is also known as the Malabar rite until the arrival of
the Portuguese in the late fifteenth century. Soon thereafter, the
Portuguese attempted to latinize the Malabar rite, an action which, by
the mid-sixteenth century, led to charges of heresy against the Syro-
Malabar Church and a lengthy round of political machinations. By the
middle of the next century, a schism occurred when the adherents of
the Malankar rite (or Syro-Malankara Church) broke away from the Syro-
Malabar Church. Fragmentation continued within the Syro-Malabar Church
up through the early twentieth century when a large contingent left to
join the Nestorian Church, which had had its own roots in India since
the sixth or seventh century. By 1887, however, the leaders of the
Syro-Malabar Church had reconciled with Rome, which formally
recognized the legitimacy of the Malabar rite. The Syro-Malankara
Church was reconciled with Rome in 1930 and, while retaining the
Syriac liturgy, adopted the Malayalam language instead of the ancient
Syriac language.

Throughout this period, foreign missionaries made numerous converts to
Christianity. Early Roman Catholic missionaries, particularly the
Portuguese, led by the Jesuit Saint Francis Xavier (1506-52), expanded
from their bases on the west coast making many converts, especially
among lower castes and outcastes. The miraculously undecayed body of
Saint Francis Xavier is still on public view in a glass coffin at the
Basilica of Bom Jesus in Goa. Beginning in the eighteenth century,
Protestant missionaries began to work throughout India, leading to the
growth of Christian communities of many varieties.

The total number of Christians in India according to the 1991 census
was 19.6 million, or 2.3 percent of the population. About 13.8 million
of these Christians were Roman Catholics, including 300,000 members of
the Syro-Malankara Church. The remainder of Roman Catholics were under
the Catholic Bishops' Conference of India. In January 1993, after
centuries of self-government, the 3.5-million-strong Latin-rite Syro-
Malabar Church was raised to archepiscopate status as part of the
Roman Catholic Church. In total, there were nineteen archbishops, 103
bishops, and about 15,000 priests in India in 1995.

Most Protestant denominations are represented in India, the result of
missionary activities throughout the country, starting with the onset
of British rule. Most denominations, however, are almost exclusively
staffed by Indians, and the role of foreign missionaries is limited.
The largest Protestant denomination in the country is the Church of
South India, since 1947 a union of Presbyterian, Reformed,
Congregational, Methodist, and Anglican congregations with
approximately 2.2 million members. A similar Church of North India has
1 million members. There are 473,000 Methodists, 425,000 Baptists, and
about 1.3 million Lutherans. Orthodox churches of the Malankara and
Malabar rites total 2 million and 700,000 members, respectively.

All Christian churches in India have found the most fertile ground for
expansion among Dalits, Scheduled Castes, and Scheduled Tribe groups
During the twentieth century, the fastest growing Christian
communities have been located in the northeast, among the Khasis,
Mizos, Nagas, and other hill tribes. Christianity in India offers a
non-Hindu mode of acculturation during a period when the state and
modern economy have been radically transforming the life-styles of the
hill peoples. Missionaries have led the way in the development of
written languages and literature for many tribal groups. Christian
churches have provided a focus for unity among different ethnic groups
and have brought with them a variety of charitable services.

Tribal Religions
India Table of Contents
Among the 68 million citizens of India who are members of tribal
groups, the religious concepts, terminologies, and practices are as
varied as the hundreds of tribes, but members of these groups have one
thing in common: they are under constant pressure from the major
organized religions. Some of this pressure is intentional, as outside
missionaries work among tribal groups to gain converts. Most of the
pressure, however, comes from the process of integration within a
national political and economic system that brings tribes into
increasing contact with other groups and different, prestigious belief
systems. In general, those tribes that remain geographically isolated
in desert, hill, and forest regions or on islands are able to retain
their traditional cultures and religions longer. Those tribes that
make the transition away from hunting and gathering and toward
sedentary agriculture, usually as low-status laborers, find their
ancient religious forms in decay and their place filled by practices
of Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, or Buddhism.

One of the most studied tribal religions is that of the Santal of
Orissa, Bihar, and West Bengal, one of the largest tribes in India,
having a population estimated at 4.2 million. According to the 1991
census, however, only 23,645 people listed Santal as their religious
belief.

According to the Santal religion, the supreme deity, who ultimately
controls the entire universe, is Thakurji. The weight of belief,
however, falls on a court of spirits (bonga ), who handle different
aspects of the world and who must be placated with prayers and
offerings in order to ward off evil influences. These spirits operate
at the village, household, ancestor, and subclan level, along with
evil spirits that cause disease, and can inhabit village boundaries,
mountains, water, tigers, and the forest. A characteristic feature of
the Santal village is a sacred grove on the edge of the settlement
where many spirits live and where a series of annual festivals take
place.

The most important spirit is Maran Buru (Great Mountain), who is
invoked whenever offerings are made and who instructed the first
Santals in sex and brewing of rice beer. Maran Buru's consort is the
benevolent Jaher Era (Lady of the Grove).

A yearly round of rituals connected with the agricultural cycle, along
with life-cycle rituals for birth, marriage and burial at death,
involves petitions to the spirits and offerings that include the
sacrifice of animals, usually birds. Religious leaders are male
specialists in medical cures who practice divination and witchcraft.
Similar beliefs are common among other tribes of northeast and central
India such as the Kharia, Munda, and Oraon.

Smaller and more isolated tribes often demonstrate less articulated
classification systems of the spiritual hierarchy, described as
animism or a generalized worship of spiritual energies connected with
locations, activities, and social groups. Religious concepts are
intricately entwined with ideas about nature and interaction with
local ecological systems. As in Santal religion, religious specialists
are drawn from the village or family and serve a wide range of
spiritual functions that focus on placating potentially dangerous
spirits and coordinating rituals.

Unlike the Santal, who have a large population long accustomed to
agriculture and a distinguished history of resistance to outsiders,
many smaller tribal groups are quite sensitive to ecological
degradation caused by modernization, and their unique religious
beliefs are under constant threat. Even among the Santal, there are
300,000 Christians who are alienated from traditional festivals,
although even among converts the belief in the spirits remains strong.
Among the Munda and Oraon in Bihar, about 25 percent of the population
are Christians. Among the Kharia of Bihar (population about 130,000),
about 60 percent are Christians, but all are heavily influenced by
Hindu concepts of major deities and the annual Hindu cycle of
festivals. Tribal groups in the Himalayas were similarly affected by
both Hinduism and Buddhism in the late twentieth century. Even the
small hunting-and-gathering groups in the union territory of Andaman
and Nicobar Islands have been under severe pressure because of
immigration to this area and the resulting reduction of their hunting
area.