Bengal the "white man's grave": the fruits of mission
Rome (AsiaNews) - Bangladesh is the second largest Muslim country after Indonesia: 150 million inhabitants on an area encompassing less than half of Italy, without any natural resources and plagued by floods, cyclones, earthquakes. A tolerant Islamic country, without many signs of anti-Christian persecution, indeed the only one that admits foreign missionaries, also because they are dedicated to the evangelization of tribal animists (3% of total population).
The young Church of Bangladesh, very much alive, was initiated in 1500 by the Portuguese, but founded in 1855 by PIME missionaries and American missionaries of the Holy Cross, as documented by archival sources. A century and a half history, with many examples of premature deaths (many died at the young age of 26-30 years!), great efforts, sacrifices and sufferings for the Gospel. "We're not heroes, but not far off either" said a missionary in 1930 to a British government committee that visited the countryside of Bengal, describing the missionaries there "all heroes." Their adventure story begins in Bengal, described by the English colonists as "white man's grave." The first four missionaries write: "We are like pygmies who must move mountains."
Hindus and Muslims were insensitive to the proclamation of the Gospel, the mission focused on the Aborigines, the primitive forest people (Santal, Oraon, Munda, Pahari), bringing them schooling, health care, modern agricultural methods, alliterating unwritten languages, ethnological research. Above all bringing peace between the ethnic groups and tribes. Among these people who were considered "savages" the Church was born. It was the first historic phase of the mission: to occupy the whole territory and found Christian communities uniting them in parishes and dioceses.
When India became independent (1947) two states were born, one Hindu (India) and one Muslim (Pakistan and then Bangladesh). Thus the second satge of mission developed: to give the local church solid structures and local personnel. In the first century of mission, thanks to the work of the PIME six dioceses were born, three in India (Krishnagar, Jalpaigury and Dumka-Malda) and three in Bangladesh (Dinajpur, Rajshahi and Khulna), now all with local bishops.
In recent decades, Bangladesh has rapidly changed: the textile industry was born through foreign investment, an economic and social revolution that caused the mass migration of youth to the cities and in particular the capital Dhaka, which rose from one million inhabitants in 1980 to 12 million today! Thus begins the third phase of the mission, the current one: from the countryside and forests to the cities, to prevent young Christians from losing contact with the community of the baptized. But the local church, despite a good number of priests and nuns, does not have either the staff, the resources or the missionary spirit to start the mission among non-Christians in the troubled city environments. Bishops are asking for the help of the missionaries.
In Bangladesh popular culture which tends to imitate the fashions of the West is changing fast. The Church risked losing many Christian families because in the capital, 25 years ago, there were only three parishes. Since 1985, PIME has founded three parishes (Mohammadpur, Mirpur and Kewachola) in Dhaka and is establishing two more (Utholi and EPZ), with exorbitant costs too to buy land. But Providence always helps. Today in Dhaka there are ten other parishes in construction, 80,000 Catholics and 12 million inhabitants. In Dhaka the PIME missionaries also work among street children in the slums and has started ecumenical meetings with Protestants and inter-religious dialogue with Muslims, Hindus and Buddhists.
In Bangladesh there are only 400,000 Catholics out of 150 million inhabitants, one million Christians. PIME is present in four dioceses: Dinajpur, Rajshahi, Dhaka and Chittagong. W are less than forty, helped by five "Fidei Donum" priests of two dioceses in Colombia (Sonsòn-Rio Negro and Santa Fe de Antioquia), some ALP (PIME Lay Association) volunteers and the congregation "Missionaries of the Immaculate "born of PIME in 1936 in Milan.
GHEDDO P "Mission Bengal - 155 years of the PIME in India and Bangladesh", EMI 2010, pp. 510, plus 32 pages of photographic documentation, in Euro 20.00.
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11/09/2013
