Christianity

WHEN Pastor Jimmy Parade took over at the Indonesian Reformed Evangelical Church in Bandung, on the island of Java, five years ago, around 180 people came to services each week. Now the church—in a nondescript building in an outdoor shopping complex—is packed with around 450 each Sunday. “People keep coming,” Mr Parade shrugs.

The Philippines remains to be the bastion of Christianity in Asia with 86.8 million Filipinos—or

This handbook discusses the global expansion of Christianity and the challenges it faced along the way. It is a valuable resource for Christians and for the wider audience of scholars and students wanting to think more comprehensively about how Christianity was born in Asia, lost and gained ground, grew and changed across the vastness of this greatest of continents, and now faces many possible futures. It maps the history and current state of Christianity in Asia, providing insight into how Asian culture and its diverse religious traditions have significantly transformed Christianity to adapt to Asian life and expectations. This handbook, as a whole, offers ideas that may enhance old generalizations about the Christian Church, helping Christians ambitiously think through the reality of a truly global Christianity.

Hindus were the largest religious group in the Asia-Pacific region as of 2010, with about 1 billion adherents. While the number of Hindus is expected to grow to nearly 1.4 billion by 2050, Muslims are projected to grow even faster and become the largest religious group in the reg

The 21st century has often been touted as the “Asian century,” largely because of the remarkable resurgence of China as an economic power. There are nonetheless other developments afoot, foremost among which is the rising numbers of individuals who identify as Christians. Apart from the Philippines, Timor Leste, Asian Russia, Cyprus, Armenia, and Georgia, Christians are still a minority in the forty-eight countries that the United Nations classifies as “Asia,” a vast region that stretches from the Urals and the Caspian Sea to Papua New Guinea. However, over the past two decades, a marked increase in Asian Christians, especially in Korea, India, and China, has led to predictions that by 2025 their numbers, now estimated at 350 million, will escalate to 460 million. Yet for many Asians, Christianity is still tainted by a “foreign” past because it is associated with the European arrival in the late 15th century and with the imposition of colonialism and the influence of the West in the 19th and 20th centuries. A historical approach, however, shows that such perceptions are countered by centuries of local adaptations of Christianity to specific cultural contexts. Although the processes of “accommodation” and “adaptation” have a complex history, a long-term view reveals the multiple ways through which millions of Asian men and women have incorporated “being Christian” into their own identities.

Christianity traces its beginning to the miraculous birth, adult ministry, death and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth, known as Jesus Christ. Over 2000 years ago in Palestine (today's Israel), Jesus was born into a humble Jewish family. His mother was a young peasant woman named

Guide to Christianity, the world's largest religion, including beliefs, celebrations, guides to the different Churches and famous Christians.

Christianity is steadily on the rise in Asia, and some believe China could become the world's largest Christian nation by 2030. Masako Fukui reports.

Christianity: Christianity, major religion, stemming from the life, teachings, and death of Jesus of Nazareth (the Christ, or the Anointed One of God) in the 1st century ad. It has become the largest of the world’s religions. Geographically the most widely diffused of all faiths, it has a constituency of more

CHRISTIANITY: CHRISTIANITY IN ASIA Christianity in Asia consists of a wide range of phenomena. It includes the mission churches, denominati

To the amazement of many in the West, Pope Francis has been an enormously popular visitor to Korea, attracting some 800,000 to the main ceremony of his visit. But why are Americans and Europeans so…

Christian news and views about Asia. The best articles from Christianity Today on Asia.

Hudson Taylor may have entered China’s provinces in 1865, but the gospel got there 1500 years earlier. The missionary finds it hard to meet the eyes of the new convert. He’s been asked the question he dreaded.But if the missionary works in East Asia, he doesn’t need to feel ashamed on behalf of Christians in …

Indeed, at the beginning of this century 64% of all Christians lived in Europe and North America. Even today Asian Christians now make up only

There are three times more Protestant Hispanics in the United States than Episcopalians.

Christianity in Asia has its roots in the very inception of Christianity, which originated from the life and teachings of Jesus in 1st century Roman Palestine. Christianity then spread through the missionary work of his apostles, first in the Levant and taking roots in the major