The Flourishing Kathmandu Church

Premier Screening at All Souls – Miami Beach on April 29th from 4:00-6:30PM
​Our upcoming film The Flourishing Kathmandu Church is the culmination of two years of effort, starting with Nepal’s mega-earthquake(s) in April 2015. The community there is thriving as we see from the baptisms, services, Christmas in Kathmandu, and various denominations we feature in the film. To many it is surprising there are Christians in Nepal at all, let alone a growing flock. Why is the community growing in Nepal, a place where Christianity faces so many seeming obstacles including the cultural and political? We want to know. And after all the time we’ve spent there, we are still wondering. 

TheoEco is planning studies to establish baselines so we can put some hard numbers to rules of thumb like “1% of the population” and inflated estimates of “millions of Christians” in Nepal. It is important to know so we can measure the impact Christianity might have on places like Nepal - plus, we in the west might just be inspired by our brethren on the other side of the world. 

Many observers believe it is simply the Holy Spirit at work. Nepal is a remarkably fertile place to imagine early Christianity because there was almost no Christianity present until 1952 when the early missionaries came with the mountaineers assaulting Mt. Everest. Nepal is largely rural and we have accompanied swelling groups of parishioners follow visiting pastors on their way to small churches in far-flung Himalayan villages. Walking with these groups one gets a glimmer of what it might have felt like in early Christian times and places. 

Many of the villages seem straight out of the first century with economies to match. Stone and mud structures with traditional cooking methods, as well as farm animals and extended families living together; traditional households one can imagine in the rural society of Christ’s day. There is also a recent history of armed conflict and a Hindu polytheism not unlike that of the Romans in many respects. Kathmandu a 21stcentury Jerusalem? Perhaps the analogies aren’t so audacious.

“The Flourishing Kathmandu Church” brings all this together and TheoEco is committed to learning more. We are partnering with The National Theological College in Kathmandu and the churches there in our efforts to research the growth and makeup of Christianity as it develops. 

What we find in Kathmandu in particular are brothers and sisters who enjoy worshiping together with three hour services the norm. Most are Hindu and Buddhist converts though there are many born Christian now. The Hindu and Buddhist deities and practices simply didn’t work for these believers; not that they didn’t try first before converting. We have narratives in our film that recount first-hand how people are healed and demons are driven out. We observe God’s love as something found in the Christian teachings and scriptures.

These are often uncomfortable accounts for Westerners to hear as we find it difficult to believe that these stories don’t have a more modern explanation, even though the gospel is full of such first-hand reports. In Nepal, and in our film, the Christians bare witness to these things happening.
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Come see for yourselves.