Archive for the ‘Hindu’ Category
Posted by Christopher Coen on February 23, 2012
A Baptist organization is hoping to lead Nepali-Bhutanese refugees in Dallas away from their Hindu cultural roots. Segue Refugee Partners Ministries will help out the refugees as a prelude to their agenda.
Will they be honest and upfront with the refugees and tell them what the plan is?
…Matthew Johnston and Elizabeth Hall lead Segue Refugee Partners Ministries, the nonprofit organization… They have been connecting with Bhutanese refugees for more than a year…Segue’s vision is to build partnerships and relationships between these Bhutanese refugees and American Christians who are willing to relate and help out in whatever way they can. The refugees have a variety of needs, from help them deal with insurance-related issues regarding health care to finding jobs in the city. The hope is also to lead the refugees from a Hindu background into a relationship with Jesus Christ… Read more here
Posted in Baptist, converting refugees, Dallas/Fort Worth, faith-based, Hindu, Nepali Bhutanese | Tagged: bhutanese, dallas, nepalese, Nepali, refugees, religious conversion, resettlement, Segue Refugee Partners Ministries | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on December 29, 2011
According to the Global Frontiers Missions website, they are a Christian missionary group targeting those whom they call “THUMB people” – so-called “Tribal” people, Hindus, nonreligious people (the so-called ”Unreligious”), Muslims, and Buddhists (apparently they see little value in other people’s cultures, although I suspect they enjoy foreign foods). The organization seeks to “multiply”, that is, to evangelize and “discipline” refugees and immigrants to the point that they can “go back” and “spread” — among their own people – the group’s brand of faith. The organization recently branched out to target refugees, immigrants and international students in Houston and Clarkston, GA, but also operates in Jacksonville, Los Angeles, New York City, and the Twin Cities. They find that young people’s minds are apparently more pliable for religious conversion, and that they can use children to get at the parents. OneNewsNow has the story:
A missionary organization is focusing on spreading the gospel in two communities in the United States that are very diverse.
Houston, Texas has drawn immigrants from many countries, and according to Grant Haynes of Global Frontiers Missions(GFM), Clarkston, Georgia has done likewise…
…“We help teach English. We help run an Internet café where people can learn typing skills and take the job skills that they have in their countries to come up with a resume that helps make sense in this country and [helps] them with job placement,” Haynes details. “We help their kids with after-school programs.”
He adds that GFM has found that the younger set especially is becoming bilingual, and many are open to the gospel… Read more here
and
Nathan Harper has moved to the Atlanta area to join Global Frontier Missions in ministering to a large concentration of immigrants and refugees…
…The ministry will also be reaching out to children, which Harper says is a good avenue to reach the parents. Global Frontier Missions has a similar project in Houston and is hoping to utilize the same approach to present the gospel to immigrants elsewhere in the United States… Read more here
Posted in Atlanta, Buddhist, children, Christian, churches, converting refugees, faith-based, Hindu, Houston, Islamic | Tagged: Clarkston, cultural imperialism, Global Frontiers Missions, missionaries, Nathan Harper, neocolonial, refugees, religious conversion, resettlement, Sugar Land | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on October 3, 2011
A series of robberies, physical assaults and even a BB gun shooting have recently created fear among Bhutanese refugees resettled to Erie, Pennsylvania. Joel Tuzynski, the executive director of the Multicultural Community Resource Center has written an opinion piece in the Erie Times-News about the issue.
…Erie has been fortunate to be the new home to several hundred new arrivals of the Bhutanese Nepali community…
…Their transition from an Eastern tradition into Erie has become a very difficult journey because some of the “criminals in our midst” have seen these people as “easy marks.”
There have been a series of robberies, physical assaults and even a BB gun shooting, that have recently created fear and wondering among the Nepali regarding their new home.
These attacks upon young Nepali men and women, who are naive to the ways of the modern world, trusting of others, and non-violent by choice, are verging upon what we fear is becoming “ethnic intimidation” at this point.
Erie Mayor Joe Sinnott and Erie Police Chief Steve Franklin are trying to work with the Nepali community about reporting and solving these crimes.
…when a young man is robbed in broad daylight outside of our MCRC [Multicultural Community Resource Center] — a program that exists to welcome and assist them — it is time to call the public’s attention to this situation, which has reoccurred too often.
The physical assaults, robberies and intimidation, must stop, as it is a violation of basic civil rights guaranteed to all people under our Constitution.
We call upon our neighborhood watches, the police SWAT teams, local, state and federal officials and other concerned citizens to help us stop this targeted, criminal, uncivilized, mean-spirited, ill treatment of our newest neighbors, the Nepali community… Read more here
This case gets back to the issue of using refugees to boost the number of inhabitants of US cities with declining populations. Erie’s population was 138,440 in 1960, which declined to 101,786 in 2010. Is it ethical to use these people — as part of a humanitarian program — to boost declining population levels, when many of these places are also particularly unsafe for refugees during their vulnerable time of transition?
Posted in Catholic Charities, dangerous neighborhoods, Erie, Hindu, International Institute of Erie, intimidation of refugees, Nepali Bhutanese, police, population levels, using refugees as pawns to boost, safety | Tagged: BB gun, bhutanese, catholic charities, erie, ethnic intimidation, International Institute of Erie, Joel Tuzynski, MCRC, mugging, Multicultural Community Resource Center, nepalese, Nepali, physical assaults, police, refugees, resettlement, robberies | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on August 23, 2011
An article in The Roanoke Times tells the case of a retired Southern
Baptist couple and the Nepali refugees they have assisted. It seems as if the couple have good hearts, and they have obviously been enormously helpful to the Nepali community. While claiming that they don’t proselytize (the act of attempting to convert people to another opinion and, particularly, another religion) the couple have begun Christian services for the Hindu Nepalis.
…By the time Diana and Jim Martin heard about the July 29 fire at Westover Manor apartments, the building was about to be condemned.
The morning after the fire, the Botetourt County couple stood in the Westover parking lot next to their matching minivans. They were surrounded, as they usually are, by a couple dozen Nepali refugees who live in the southwest Roanoke complex — including one family of four that was displaced by the fire…
…Before the Nepalis became their calling, the lifelong Southern Baptists knew nothing about ritual cremations or eating goat stew, the kind you chew carefully before spitting out the bones.
A retired social worker, Diana had never owned a passport or traveled outside the country — unless you count the Canadian side of Niagara Falls. She concedes that she still struggles to adapt to some of the customs, including Hindu funerals and ritual cremations: “They put chrysanthemums in the body’s mouth!”
But the couple sealed their commitment when they traded in their cars for minivans so they could haul refugees around to appointments and classes, to doctor visits and radiation treatments, and — in several cases, with four more soon to deliver — to the birth of a child. Their gas bill is $500 a month…
…They met the Nepalis three years before the fire, in the same Westover complex. New volunteers for Commonwealth Catholic Charities’ Refugee and Immigration Services, the Martins were assigned as mentors to an Iraqi woman and her two sons…
…On a recent afternoon, Diana’s list is several items long and growing by the minute: drop off eye medication for a man with allergies, buy $97 worth of groceries for a woman whose food stamp card had been deactivated, deliver her standard birthday gift of four helium balloons to a girl…
“Dinah, you come to my home! Come to my home!” exclaims 4-year-old Salina Kadariya, on the stoop of a Mountain Avenue apartment building where several Nepali families have gathered to greet Dinah Mom. Salina wants a princess backpack for school; all the girls do…
…”Servant evangelism” is her term for what they do, an experience she doesn’t believe is easily replicated in modern America — or even on exotic foreign mission trips. “We’re showing our love by serving them, doing what Jesus did,” she says, adding that they don’t proselytize.
They do pick up more than 75 adults and children every Sunday for the Nepali-led Christian service they began in their Jefferson Center space.
Most of the Roanoke Nepalis are Hindu, including many of those attending the church. As Lutjen put it, “For many of them, they’ve got so many gods, they’ve just added Jesus to the list.”
Indeed, most are religiously inclusive, according to translator Laxman Bhandari, a Nepali refugee who arrived in 2009 and lives in southwest Roanoke’s Terrace Apartments with his wife, Lalita.
Though he admires the social work the Martins do, he doesn’t attend their service, preferring the Indian-founded Hindu temple in Roanoke County. “We lost everything — our country, our land. The only wealth we came here with is our culture and religion,” Bhandari said.
“We will celebrate with other religions, as long as there is mutual respect.”… Read more here
Posted in apartment house fires, Baptist, converting refugees, faith-based, Hindu, Iraqi, Nepali Bhutanese, Roanoke, volunteers | Tagged: Commonwealth Catholic Charities' Refugee and Immigration Services, evangelism, Hindu, Nepali, proselytization, refugees, resettlement, Roanoke, Southern Baptist, Westover complex | 3 Comments »
Posted by Christopher Coen on June 14, 2011
I submitted a question for George Rupp, president and CEO of the IRC, for his interview today by the PRM’s Assistant Secretary Eric Schwartz.
“Why does the IRC partner with local churches in their attempts to convert Bhutanese refugees to Christianity, for example, IRC’s partnership with The Word at Southern Hills church in Abilene, Texas?”
Unfortunately this comment seems to have magically disappeared from the list of submitted questions (funny how that works). Yet, I base the question on a news article from Abilene that I linked to in January. Personally I think that these refugees’ Hindu and Buddhist beliefs are serving them just fine and I don’t understand why our government and its contractors, therefore we as a society, are partnering to give these new Americans a new religion, which they haven’t requested.
So then I submitted another question, which this time they actually posted:
“A 2007 State Department PRM monitoring report for the IRC office in Baltimore indicates that the IRC and another resettlement contractor frequently placed refugees into an East Baltimore apartment complex that had evidence of questionable maintenance and security standards (housing that is safe, sanitary, and in good repair is supposedly a State Department refugee contract requirement). Monitors also noted that the IRC had failed to give a three-member Meskhetian Turk refugee family a crib and other supplies for their infant son. I note, again, that these items are listed as “minimum” required items in the State Department contracts. Why does the IRC fail to meet so-called “minimum requirements” of their obligations to refugees in the public/private partnership?”
The State Department did not select this question for use in the interview — of course — yet this question was also based on a document – one of the State Department’s own monitoring reports – so it’s not like I just make this stuff up. Again the State Department doesn’t want to discuss the issue.
I think there’s an obvious problem here when our government feels free to filter out substantive questions that it may not feel comfortable with, or which may not convey the message it wishes to control, but isn’t the supposed intent of our constitutional democracy to allow public input? I think we need to be concerned when a part of our US Department of State feels free to disregard that fundamental principle.
Posted in Abilene, Assistant Secretary of the PRM, Baltimore, Buddhist, children, Christian, churches, Eric P. Schwartz (former Asst Sec.), furnishings, lack of, Hindu, household items, missing or broken, housing, substandard, Meskhetian Turks (Ahiska
Turk), neglect, Nepali Bhutanese, openess and transparency in government, PRM, public/private partnership, State Department | Tagged: Abilene, Assistant Secretary of Population Refugees and Migration, Baltimore, Buddhist, censorship, Christian, constitution democracy, Conversations with America, conversion, Eric Schwartz, George Rupp, Hindu, International Rescue Committee, IRC, Meskhetian Turk, monitoring report, Population Refugees and Migration, PRM, public/private partnership, refugee, refugee resettlement, refugee resettlement agencies, refugee resettlement program, resettlement, State Department, The Word at Southern Hills | 4 Comments »
Posted by Christopher Coen on April 11, 2011
Just five days after I posted the story on a passenger van accident in Georgia involving refugees killed and injured there was yet another passenger van crash in Georgia involving refugees — on Wed. April 6, 2011. The Bhutan News Service reports that this time a Bhutanese refugee returning from a chicken processing plant in an automobile allegedly collided with a van carrying seven passengers while attempting to overtake the van. The van was also returning Bhutanese refugees to their homes in Atlanta after working at the chicken processing factory. The drive of the car is apparently missing.
A few resettled Bhutanese were injured when an overtaking car hit and veered off a van on Tuesday morning at 4:30 am local time. Of them, one is critical.
According to the report, Rohit Dhakal, 32, was seriously injured when a car driven by another resettled fellow of Beldangi-II allegedly collided with a van carrying seven passengers while overtaking…
…“He is critically injured and being treated in the hospital now,” Hemu told Bhutan News Service…
…The driver of the van, who received minor injuries, is reported to have told Hemu that the vehicle over-turned a number of times before its [tire] got blown off… Read more here
The former Bhutanese refugee who met with a car accident recently in Atlanta, GA has been in coma for four days.
According to Narad Sharma, a close relative who has been taking care of the victim since he met with an accident, the victim has been undergoing medical treatment at Grady Health System in South-east Atlanta.
“He underwent head surgery on the same day of accident, and has been scheduled for the next one tonight”, says Sharma adding the victim may have to undergo series of surgeries…the victim is out of danger but he may have brain haemorrhage that can have long term complications…
…Rohit met with an accident last Wednesday when he was returning from his work as the van driven by Amit Thapa, a fellow worker at the Chicken factory was overtaken by another speeding car. Read more here
Oddly, AccessNorthGA has an article from April 6th which reports that the crash occurred near Gainesville in northern Georgia, but that it happened after the van’s (a minivan) driver struck a curb, lost control, and then hit a tractor-trailer. That article lists a different first name for the van driver, although the same last name, and gives the accident time as 3:30am, though the Bhutan News Service said it occurred at 4:30am.
GAINESVILLE - At least one person was injured early Wednesday when a minivan and a tractor trailer collided on the southside of Gainesville.
Gainesville Police Officer Joe Britte said the accident happened when the driver of the minivan struck a curb as he tried to turn from Athens Highway onto the southbound Interstate 985 entrance ramp.
“It struck the curb then lost control of the vehicle and struck the tractor trailer,” he said.
.
“It struck the curb then lost control of the vehicle and struck the tractor trailer,” he said.
Britte said the driver of the minivan, 22-year-old Mahendra Thapa, was injured in the incident. He
said the driver of the tractor trailer, Grady Tritt, was not.
Britte said the accident, which occurred around 3:30a.m., is still under investigation.
Posted in Atlanta, Georgia, Hindu, meatpacking industry, Nepali Bhutanese, passenger van roll-over, safety, transportation | Tagged: achey, Amit Thapa, Athens Highway, Atlanta, Beldangi, Bhutan, Bhutan News Service, Bhutanese refugees, brain haemorrhage, chicken processing, Gainesville, Gainesville GA, georgia, Grady Health System, Grady Memorial Hospital, Grady Tritt, head surgery, human rights, International Rescue Committee, IRC, Narad Sharma, Nepal, Nepalese refugees, Nepali-Bhutanese, passenger van crash, Perdue, refugee, refugee resettlement agencies, refugee resettlement program, resettlement, Rohit Dhakal, Rohit Sharma Dhakal, Sibsoo | Leave a Comment »
Christopher Coen
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A Baptist organization is hoping to lead Nepali-Bhutanese refugees in Dallas away from their Hindu cultural roots. Segue Refugee Partners Ministries will help out the refugees as a prelude to their agenda. 
