ICC Note: Yesterday, Christians in India gathered for a day of prayer along with Pope Francis. This is the second annual prayer vigil organized encourage Christians in India in their faith all over the country. Believers prayed for faith, courage, strength as they endure their hardships along with those who are currently imprisoned.

10/02/2018 India (ICN) – Christians in India observed 1 October as a special day of prayer for the Christian communities present in India and will pray throughout October, in communion with Pope Francis. “It is the second year in which a special prayer vigil is organized at a national level, to entrust Indian Christians to God in times when they are still touched by violence and persecution”, explained one of the organizers of the day. “Indian Christians desperately need to resort to continuous, ardent, coherent prayer, full of faith, for the persecuted Church and against the forces of evil, as Pope Francis asks”, he said.

The Indian Christians praying in October will invoke divine protection on all the communities of baptized present in India. They will pray for the release of the faithful who are still held in prisons, that God may give them perseverance and faith in facing injustice, persecution, pressure to abandon faith. They will also pray for falsely incriminated Christians, in various states of India, on the basis of the so-called anti-conversion laws in force.

Another special intention is to ask God for the grace to forgive persecutors, recalling that “the prophet Daniel did not hate his persecutors, but humbled himself and sought the mercy of God, to give a testimony of true love”.

The Indian organization ‘Persecution Relief’, among the organizers of the day of prayer, counted 40 cases of violence against Christians in India from August to September 2018.

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