and there are only a few priests working in the two
dioceses of Arunachal which has a large terrain
of 83743 square kilometers. But the population is
only 13,82,611. The density of population is just 17
persosns per Sqkm (Kerala has a density of 860).
People of Arunachal are not poor. They may not
have proper jobs; there is no industry there. They
get money from the Central government through
various projects. People are found to be proud
and hot tempered. You won’t see a driver from
Assam overtaking a vehicle driven by a native of
Arunachal Pradesh. Most of the menial jobs are
done by the low caste people of Assam. I have
found young boys and girls working as bonded
labours in some of the houses. There are cases
where the poor kids from Assam are sold by their
parents and so they remain here.
The infrastructure in Arunachal is very bad. There
is no proper road and the communication system
is very poor. Most of the villages are beyond the
reach of mobile or land phones. There may be a
PCO for the whole village. Electricity has also not
reached there. There is rampant corruption. Since
nothing is produced in Arunachal, everything is
costly. People are indiscriminately felling the trees
THE LAND OF
THE DAWN-LIT
MOUNTAINS IS
Arunachal Pradesh presents itself as a challenging
AWAITING THE
mission for a priest. There is much to do. The
LIGHT OF THE
Christians did not and do not get basic knowledge
of Christianity. They do not know basic catechism.
GOSPEL.
of the forest. The flow of water through the rivers
and rivulets is drastically reduced and soon there
will be scarcity of water.
They do not have the Bible in their language.
Most of the people are not wedded in the church
and they do not know of the sacrament of
marriage. Men with more than one wife are not
uncommon. In one house I found the head of “a
good catholic” family having 21 children from 6
wives. Due to lack of proper missionary-pastoral
care Catholics are deserting their faith; other
Pentecostal sects snatch them away from the
Church. Missionaries do not face any political or
religious opposition from any group. But a good
missionary has to master the local language to be
really effective. Christians are just nominal ones
without knowledge of ]