Buddhist Nationalism and Burmese Christianity

Abstract

Buddhist nationalists in Burma have characterised Christianity as a Western religion and accused Christians in the country of being more loyal to the West than to the motherland. This essay, however, argues that Christianity is not Western, but global, and that Christians in Burma are not followers of the West, but Burmese who remain as loyal to their homeland as do their fellow Burmese. It is stressed in this article that the indigenous form of Christianity after the exodus of the missionaries from Burma in 1966 has proved that Burmese Christianity should be seen not as a Western religion, but as a part of world Christianity. This article also contends that a combination of social change, political milieu, tribal religion and the cross-cultural appropriation of the gospel has contributed to religious conversion among the ethnic Chin, Kachin and Karen from tribal religion to Christianity.