India (MNN) — Anti-Christian violence is escalating in northern India, with attacks on believers rising over 550 percent in the past decade.

According to data compiled by the United Christian Forum (UCF), a Christian movement, the number of reported incidents targeting Christians catapulted from 127 cases in 2014 to 834 in 2024.

“We’re seeing this rise of Hindu nationalism in these areas,” Mission Cry’s Jason Woolford says.

“They’re imprisoning, martyring, and bringing Christians up on charges for simply telling people about the Lord Jesus Christ.”

(Photo courtesy of Mission Cry)

Mission Cry sends used Bibles and Christian books from the US to believers around the world. More about that here. Contacts in India tell Woolford about “church services [being] disrupted, attacks on people while they’re worshiping; vandalizing [of] Christian institutions, and these are getting more frequent,” he says.

“They’re being livestreamed and publicized to intimidate Christians from going to church and worshiping God.”

Hindu nationals seek to “purify” India by making it entirely Hindu. More about that here. Many pastors and evangelists have been beaten and jailed, and several are martyred each year. Still, the Church continues to grow.

“Pray for our people on the ground, the ones going into these areas and risking their lives to distribute the Word of God and to train students up in the ways of the Lord,” Woolford says.

“They’re willing to risk anything and everything they have for the sake of discipling and giving people a chance to ask Jesus into their life.”

Mission Cry partners train and equip evangelists in northern India, a hotbed of persecution. Send them critical resources by helping Mission Cry fill and ship a container.

“We’re talking about tens of thousands of people being reached just off one container with distribution of books and then the training of many, many more,” Woolford says.

“We’ve sent two containers there already this year. There are some very strategic and ‘special ops’ things that we’re working to get done. We would ask you to continue to give and support Mission Cry and these containers.”

 

Header and story images courtesy of Mission Cry.