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National Council of Churches in India (NCCI)
Empowering Local Congregations towards Dalit Liberation
National Council of Churches in India (NCCI) in cooperation with the United Evangelical Lutheran Church in India (UELCI), the Church of North India (CNI), the Church of South India (CSI) and the Integrated Rural Development of Weaker Sections in India (IRDWSI) together have organized a National Methodology Workshop of Empowering Local Congregations towards Dalit Liberation in Nagpur during 20-22 August 2005. The main agenda is to provide a biblical, sociological, inspirational lead for the Church in India as a whole to undertake programmes of service to the weaker sections in the society in helping them to resist oppression by any or other force. The Church in India assumes responsibility in terms of the mandate of Jesus Christ who has served the poor and oppressed with liberation of the oppressed as the most important way of building up a harmonious society where justice and equity rule the sound relationships.
The Church has already been assured of positive response by the hierarchical bodies in India that they must engage in this service of liberation of the oppressed. In doing so they should not seek conversion as a reward but they must render the services of helping the poor to come out of their oppression without seeking any reward. The local congregation is trained to help the poor people in every non-violent following the examples of Jesus Christ.
Towards
this end several scholars and activists in the services of the Church are
invited to make relevant presentations in terms of biblical theology and social
reality and also present some case studies of those cases of oppression and
liberation in our country. For three days about 100 delegates from all over
the country representing all the Protestant and Orthodox churches in India
assembled and reaffirmed their responsibility towards the poor. They divided
themselves to different discussion groups and made recommendations to the
plenary as to how best to ensure the liberation of the oppressed in the country.
Representative, leaders of local congregations who are exposed to the challenges
of liberation and equipped with methodology of liberation. These leaders represented
about fifty congregations in India at present and others will be covered by
workshops to be conducted later.