I’m here in Hyderabad,India where the Transform World India Conference begins tomorrow. Instead of the 500 participants expected, they have had to close registration at 850. The event is to be opened tomorrow afternoon by the Chief Minister (equivalent to State Governor in US) of Andhra Pradesh. He is a Christian.
Last week I spent a several days with Greg and Mala helping them to work though issues in tying together the Freedom Firm UK charity trust and US nonprofit organizations with their India Freedom Firm organization. We had a great day of team building with four Indian, 3 American and one Irish, staff members of their team working our way through the wonderful basis for purposeful unity given in Philippians 1 and 2. They were highly motivated and appreciative. Here are excerpts from an email I just received from Joseph D’Souza, leader of OM Indian and the Dalit Freedom Network:
Below is the link to the BBC coverage of the Nagpur 14th event which you may have been following. There is a video link on the news page. Have a look at it as this has been shown for nearly 12 hours every couple of hours on the 14th. This certainly will be one of the backdrops to the Transform World India 2006 Conference.
In terms of the Kingdom this is the major event after what happened in 2001 even though the turn out of people was disappointing. The symbolism of 528 people getting openly baptized in front of the local and world press has caught the imagination of Dalits in the land. The connection of Ambedkar (a Dalit and writer of India’s Constitution) and Jesus has been made with the kind of media local and international this event got. This has been our prayers for several years. This was the celebration of the 50th anniversary of Ambedkar exercising his right to religious freedom-even though Buddhism- when he and his followers lost all of the benefits of affirmative action. The BBC put it in world headline news on TV and radio and it is all over the place. Some attack from the upper caste sections in society and the Church. We expect a counter attack from the spiritual enemy! Therefore we covet your prayers.
JosepH






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