Churches in Shimla deck up for Christmas
Surekha Dhaleta, TNN Dec 25, 2011, 05.42AM IST
SHIMLA: All prominent churches in Shimla are decked with their finery to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ with the holy communion service starting at midnight on Saturday. Apart from the founding mainline churches including the historic Christ Church Ridge, St Michael’s Cathedral, Seventh-Day Adventist Church, Baptist Church and Evangelical church of India, a host of independent churches have sprung up over the years in Shimla.
Bazel Dean, who plays more than a century-old pipe organ at the historic Christ Church, said, “Around 2,000 people of the Christian community live in Shimla and amongst these, more than 150 families are aligned to the five major churches.”
“The Christ Church has 78 families associated with it as we have St Michael’s Church Jutogh under the same pastorate. However, 60-65 families are associated with the Christ Church on the Ridge,” said Rev Mushtaq A Malk, presbyter in charge of Christ Church.
General secretary of YMCA Naresh Scott said, “Besides the founding churches, other churches include the Methodist Church, Pentecostal Church, Assembly of Church developed around the 80′s, and the later developments include New Life fellowship, Mukti fellowship, BSS Bathal’s Satsang, Nepali Church and Grace Home in New Shimla, Harvest Ministry, Miracle Church of Jesus Christ, Believer’s Church Shimla, among others.”
According to church historians a large number of families related to the main churches are second and third generation of Christians from Kotgarh in Shimla and Kangra district. Besides them, there also exist Punjabi Christians. Some South Indians are members of the Catholic Church. According to Rev Malk: “Unlike the old churches, the newer institutions work independently and do not have a set constitution, structure and rules. In the main churches, pastoral and management committee approves of everything, and a liturgy is followed like the holy communion.”
Apart from being centres of reverence for the community, some of the mainline institutions have been landmarks in the city and stand testimonials to the history of Shimla. The Christ Church on the Ridge enjoys better footfall as compared to others due to its location and ambience and is visited by people from all faiths.
It is credited to be the second oldest church in North India and was consecrated in 1857, built of stone and bricks in lime mortar by Colonel J T Boileau with neo-Gothic elements. Decorated with fine stained glass paintings and memorial plaques, the church still maintains pews designated for the viceroy, commander-in-chief, and the governor of Punjab.
Built in 1886, St Michael’s Cathedral was the first Roman catholic church in the hill station, and served as the cathedral of a new diocese. The cathedral too has stained glass window said to have been brought from Germany. Made of exquisite stone, the church is built with a partial vocabulary of French-Gothic style.
source: http://10yearitch.com/
About 18kms northeast of Narkanda is the little village of Thanedar. Situated just off the old Hindustan-Tibet road, it is where the apple-farming revolution, if you can call it that, originated. The British had introduced cooking apples in India in the late 19th century but these were not sweet and therefore not coveted by the locals or viable for the market. Samuel Stokes, an American, who came to India in 1904 in search of spirituality stayed on to marry a local girl and made it his life’s mission to help the impoverished people of Himachal. After experimenting with other crops and failing, he decided to give apple-farming a try. He brought a sapling of the red, deliciously sweet variety of apples from Philadelphia and planted them in Thanedar. And the rest, as they say, is history 
! Today, the economy of Himachal is on the up completely because of the flourishing apple industry.
Today morning we checked out of the lovely Tethys Resort and asked for a cab to take us to Thanedar. Continue reading »
On 22nd February 1910, at the Cathedral Church of the Resurrection in Lahore, Bishop George Alfred Lefroy (1854-1922) inaugurated the Brotherhood of the Imitation of Jesus. Reverend Samuel Stokes (1882-1946), an American missionary, became the provisional Minister-General of this Franciscan Brotherhood. Reverend Frederick Western (1880-1951) of the Cambridge Mission to Delhi and Reverend C. F. Andrews (1871-1940) possessed loose personal associations with the Brotherhood. Its intent embraced service to the sick and education for the young.
The Brotherhood was located at Kotgarh in Punjab. It had ties with the Church Missionary Society and the Protestant Episcopal Church of the United States. The Brotherhood collapsed in 1912 when Stokes left it to marry an Indian woman; the later phase of Chritistian religious and missionary activities started to take on a dramatic turn their on.
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