Post by JEM on Jan 28, 2014 3:42:03 GMT
4 AZARIAH OF INDIA THE LOTUS AND THE CROSS
“Through all the ages to come the Indian Church will rise up in gratitude to attest the heroism and self denying labours of the missionary body. You have given your goods to feed the poor. You have given your bodies to be burned. We ask also for love. Give us friends”
The year was 1910. The place: Edinburgh. The occasion, the first ever World Missionary Conference . The speaker Azariah, an Indian student work secretary in his thirties , vigorous, clear-spoken already much respected. To say such things in that year required immense courage, for the “missions” dominated the Indian Christian scene.
The western missionary very seldom regarded the Indian as in any sense his equal, and certainly did not open either his house or his heart to an Indian colleague. Azariah could only speak with any hope of his words being heard because he was not pleading for personal equality but was concerned primarily about the mission of the Church. Only in true colleagueship could the Gospel be effectively proclaimed.
These things were profoundly true of Azariah. In some parts of his life he had been very close to his European colleagues, and he had been encouraged by them to believe that India itself, the Indian people, had insights into the Gospel which a westerner could not have. In short he saw that Indians must take much more responsibility for proclaiming and interpreting the word of Christ to their own people. His whole life was to prove how right he was.
He was born in 1874 in Tinnevelli [ now known as Tirunelveli ] and his parents were members of the Anglican Church. His enduring love of the Bible he gained from his mother. His parents dedicated him without reserve to Christ, with a dream that one day he might be a pastor to his own people. From a mission run boarding school he went to Madras Christian College, but he did not see his own future in terms of the ordained ministry. Instead he became the YMCA Secretary for South India, thus beginning 10 years of arduous student work. His brilliance as an organiser and speaker made a swift rise in responsibility inevitable and by 1907 he had visited Japan, for the World Student Christian Federation conference and was that year elected Vice-Chairman of the Federation. His future seemed clear.
But already the currents which were to swing him in a very different direction had begun to affect the pattern of his life.
His colleague in YMCA and student work was a notable American Christian, Sherwood Eddy, and with him he developed a deep friendship which changed his attitude to the many patronising missionaries that he met. It was Eddy as much as anyone. Who persuaded him that India had her own contribution to make to the the life of the Church. It was with Eddy, too that he went on a mission to Jaffna in Ceylon. And discovered that the Jaffna church was sending Tamil missionaries to India. He was appalled to remember that his own church in Tinnevelli, rich in money and resources, was not engaged in mission to any effective extent. By 1903 he was largely responsible for the Indian Missionary Society in Tinnevelli.
Bishop Whitehead of Madras, a man who shares Azariah's vision and found no problems with close friendship with him, chose Dornakal - a huge rural area described as having the most drunken and degraded devil-worshippers in India” – as the scene of the Society's work. Azariah offered to join the team himself. Most of his friends saw this as a deplorable waste of his gifts. Azariah heard it as the call of God. And turned away from the student world on which he had already made such impact, In 1909 he was ordained and three years later appointed assistant Bishop of Madras.
To many people this was going much too far. India it was thought was not yet ready for Indian bishops. The white community was horrified. As usual God was ahead of them. The Government opposed the idea. Some missionaries wrote that they would never serve under an Indian. One senior missionary sent him on his way with the hope that “ you will do as little harm as you can to the Church.” !
Dornakal was to be Azariah's home for the rest of his life, On his appointment there were 6 clergy and 8,000 Christians in an area as large as Wales. Within 5 years both numbers had doubled. By 1920 the diocese had been extended to include an area as large as England and Wales, with 90,000 Christians.
Azariah was never free from problems – of discipline, inadequate training, of too few clergy. His main anxiety was not that the church did not grow. But that it grew so fast. This was the land of “the mass movement” where not only whole families, but whole villages entered the Church, and it was a constant concern to provide adequate pastoral care and training..
But Azariah's twin articles of faith served him well. They were always trust the Holy Spirit and always trust men”.
The outcaste movement had it's own positive results. The depraved Malas and Madigas were often so completely changed in character and their villages transformed, that their caste masters began to follow them into the Church. Azariah with his passionate zeal for evangelism would make them put their hands on their own heads, reminding them of their baptism, and then make them repeat the Pauline injunction “ Woe is me if I preach not the Gospel” The new Christian from the beginning was expected to be a witness to his faith.
The Church grew and it was an Indian church in which missionaries served but they did not lead.
In politics Azariah was a convinced Nationalist. Although he denounced all forms of violence. His demand was simple. “We ask the right to make our own mistakes” His attitude to church government was the same, bur not on political grounds. Maturity came only with responsibility. His vision however was of the Church, not of a group of denominations. Throughout his life he laboured for unity as well as for a Church which Indians would regard as their own.
The cathedral he built in the still remote town of Dornakal was completely Indian in style, architecture and decoration. The lotus the symbol of Indian spirituality and the cross, the sign of Christ, appear everywhere.
Yet it was a Christian church without compromise. Acceptance of Christ was a step into a new life, and the growing Christian community, not merely changed but transformed, was proof of Christ's renewing power.
The need for unity was underlined by Dr Ambedkar, who led a political movement of India's outcastes but refused to bring them into the Christian Church . He declared “This is to move them from one set of divisions into another life of division.” To Azariah, an Indian member of the Church of England, an Indian who called himself Swedish Lutheran or American Baptist was talking nonsense. He worked throughout his life for the united Church in South India.
It was born, the “Church of South India” in 1947, a little less than 3 years after Azariah's death in his beloved Dornakal.
“Through all the ages to come the Indian Church will rise up in gratitude to attest the heroism and self denying labours of the missionary body. You have given your goods to feed the poor. You have given your bodies to be burned. We ask also for love. Give us friends”
The year was 1910. The place: Edinburgh. The occasion, the first ever World Missionary Conference . The speaker Azariah, an Indian student work secretary in his thirties , vigorous, clear-spoken already much respected. To say such things in that year required immense courage, for the “missions” dominated the Indian Christian scene.
The western missionary very seldom regarded the Indian as in any sense his equal, and certainly did not open either his house or his heart to an Indian colleague. Azariah could only speak with any hope of his words being heard because he was not pleading for personal equality but was concerned primarily about the mission of the Church. Only in true colleagueship could the Gospel be effectively proclaimed.
These things were profoundly true of Azariah. In some parts of his life he had been very close to his European colleagues, and he had been encouraged by them to believe that India itself, the Indian people, had insights into the Gospel which a westerner could not have. In short he saw that Indians must take much more responsibility for proclaiming and interpreting the word of Christ to their own people. His whole life was to prove how right he was.
He was born in 1874 in Tinnevelli [ now known as Tirunelveli ] and his parents were members of the Anglican Church. His enduring love of the Bible he gained from his mother. His parents dedicated him without reserve to Christ, with a dream that one day he might be a pastor to his own people. From a mission run boarding school he went to Madras Christian College, but he did not see his own future in terms of the ordained ministry. Instead he became the YMCA Secretary for South India, thus beginning 10 years of arduous student work. His brilliance as an organiser and speaker made a swift rise in responsibility inevitable and by 1907 he had visited Japan, for the World Student Christian Federation conference and was that year elected Vice-Chairman of the Federation. His future seemed clear.
But already the currents which were to swing him in a very different direction had begun to affect the pattern of his life.
His colleague in YMCA and student work was a notable American Christian, Sherwood Eddy, and with him he developed a deep friendship which changed his attitude to the many patronising missionaries that he met. It was Eddy as much as anyone. Who persuaded him that India had her own contribution to make to the the life of the Church. It was with Eddy, too that he went on a mission to Jaffna in Ceylon. And discovered that the Jaffna church was sending Tamil missionaries to India. He was appalled to remember that his own church in Tinnevelli, rich in money and resources, was not engaged in mission to any effective extent. By 1903 he was largely responsible for the Indian Missionary Society in Tinnevelli.
Bishop Whitehead of Madras, a man who shares Azariah's vision and found no problems with close friendship with him, chose Dornakal - a huge rural area described as having the most drunken and degraded devil-worshippers in India” – as the scene of the Society's work. Azariah offered to join the team himself. Most of his friends saw this as a deplorable waste of his gifts. Azariah heard it as the call of God. And turned away from the student world on which he had already made such impact, In 1909 he was ordained and three years later appointed assistant Bishop of Madras.
To many people this was going much too far. India it was thought was not yet ready for Indian bishops. The white community was horrified. As usual God was ahead of them. The Government opposed the idea. Some missionaries wrote that they would never serve under an Indian. One senior missionary sent him on his way with the hope that “ you will do as little harm as you can to the Church.” !
Dornakal was to be Azariah's home for the rest of his life, On his appointment there were 6 clergy and 8,000 Christians in an area as large as Wales. Within 5 years both numbers had doubled. By 1920 the diocese had been extended to include an area as large as England and Wales, with 90,000 Christians.
Azariah was never free from problems – of discipline, inadequate training, of too few clergy. His main anxiety was not that the church did not grow. But that it grew so fast. This was the land of “the mass movement” where not only whole families, but whole villages entered the Church, and it was a constant concern to provide adequate pastoral care and training..
But Azariah's twin articles of faith served him well. They were always trust the Holy Spirit and always trust men”.
The outcaste movement had it's own positive results. The depraved Malas and Madigas were often so completely changed in character and their villages transformed, that their caste masters began to follow them into the Church. Azariah with his passionate zeal for evangelism would make them put their hands on their own heads, reminding them of their baptism, and then make them repeat the Pauline injunction “ Woe is me if I preach not the Gospel” The new Christian from the beginning was expected to be a witness to his faith.
The Church grew and it was an Indian church in which missionaries served but they did not lead.
In politics Azariah was a convinced Nationalist. Although he denounced all forms of violence. His demand was simple. “We ask the right to make our own mistakes” His attitude to church government was the same, bur not on political grounds. Maturity came only with responsibility. His vision however was of the Church, not of a group of denominations. Throughout his life he laboured for unity as well as for a Church which Indians would regard as their own.
The cathedral he built in the still remote town of Dornakal was completely Indian in style, architecture and decoration. The lotus the symbol of Indian spirituality and the cross, the sign of Christ, appear everywhere.
Yet it was a Christian church without compromise. Acceptance of Christ was a step into a new life, and the growing Christian community, not merely changed but transformed, was proof of Christ's renewing power.
The need for unity was underlined by Dr Ambedkar, who led a political movement of India's outcastes but refused to bring them into the Christian Church . He declared “This is to move them from one set of divisions into another life of division.” To Azariah, an Indian member of the Church of England, an Indian who called himself Swedish Lutheran or American Baptist was talking nonsense. He worked throughout his life for the united Church in South India.
It was born, the “Church of South India” in 1947, a little less than 3 years after Azariah's death in his beloved Dornakal.