Conversion in Indonesia

During the long, unhappy dictatorship of Sukarno, Christian missionaries in Indonesia were plagued by Communist troublemakers and Moslem terrorists, and subjected to periodic harassment by a capricious government. Today, the predominantly Moslem nation--in which Christians number less than 10% of the 110 million population--is the scene of an explosive evangelical revival that the U.S. journal Presbyterian Life calls "one of the largest movements toward Christianity in modern decades." In the 20 months since the anti-Communist revolution, Roman Catholic and Protestant churches have won an estimated 250,000 converts.

In East and Central Java alone, 65,000 persons have been converted. In the Karoland region of North Sumatra, 16,000 have joined Christian churches. Thirty new congregations with a membership of 5,000 have been founded in one section of West Borneo. In Djakarta, 50 new Bible-study groups have sprung up--and so great is the demand for Bibles that a shortage has developed. The U.S. National Council of Churches has launched a drive for $300,000 to help Indonesian Protestants assimilate their new members.

Many converts are disillusioned ex-followers of Communism, and the highest conversion rates occur in areas that, before Sukarno's downfall, were most heavily infested with Reds. Says a Baptist missionary in Djakarta: "When Communism failed in its promise to provide these people with an inner conviction, they switched to Christianity." Less sanguine, some church leaders suspect that all too many of the converts have switched less out of faith than fear; public opinion still links atheism with membership in the banned, decimated Indonesian Communist Party.

For the most part, though, missionaries are accepting the conversions as a genuine response to the message of Christ. The Rev. Addison J. Eastman, mission director of the National Council of Churches' Asia department, believes that many of the converts are inspired by "a personal faith, and real hope that the Christian church can provide a base from which to work for humane social progress."

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