A mob of indigenous people vandalized the church and even injured a top police officer
The inside of Sacred Heart Church in Narayanpur village in the Bastar district of India’s Chhattisgarh state, which was attacked on Jan. 2 following a conflict between indigenous people following animist religion and those following the Christian faith. (Photo: supplied)
An irate mob attacked a Catholic church in a village in India’s Chhattisgarh state in the latest violence linked with ongoing strife between indigenous people following the animist religion and those following the Christian faith.
Hundreds of villagers armed with wooden sticks and iron rods marched into the Sacred Heart Church at Edka village in Narayanpur district in the state’s forested, mineral-rich southern region on Jan. 2.
The attackers smashed the church’s glass windows, destroyed the church’s altar, crucifix, statues, and strew around consecrated hosts, besides smashing the furniture.
The mob also vandalized a Marian grotto and the presbytery in the village.
“A tense situation prevails here,” said Father Jomon Devasia, the parish priest of Sacred Heart Church.
“The mob destroyed everything, the Church and the presbytery,” he said.
The priest lamented that the more than five decades old Church was rebuilt five years back and now everything inside it had been destroyed.
The violence broke out when a group of indigenous animist people was protesting earlier clashes in which some of their people were reportedly injured. The protest turned violent and a mob barged into the compound of the church.
Members of the mob began to pelt stones at the church and then they broke open the church doors.
Police personnel accompanying the protesters tried to stop the mob from attacking the church. Some of them were reportedly injured while doing so.
District Superintendent of Police Sadanand Kumar sustained head injuries.
Church sources said the social strife had its roots in the non-Christian indigenous people insisting that their Christian counterparts give up the Christian faith and return to their traditional animist practices. But those following Christianity refused to comply, leading to clashes.
More than 1,000 indigenous people following the Christian faith were driven out of their homes in the villages near Narayanpur in the past couple of months, Church sources said.
Many were assaulted, their houses were forcibly occupied, crops were destroyed and domestic animals were killed, alleged victims of the co-coordinated attacks.
Archbishop Victor Henry Thakur based in the state capital Raipur said the attack has nothing to do with Hindus opposing religious conversion to Christianity.
“The attacks have nothing to do with religious conversions as has been made out. It is a clear case of law and order problem,” he said.
“The state police did not initiate action against groups that unleashed violence against Christians earlier. Now, they are fearlessly attacking us,” Archbishop Thakur told UCA News.
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