Bishop VS Azariah's appeal for 'friends' still relevant

The landmark 1910 World Missionary Conference caught the imagination of the churches in both West and East.

Most of the 1,200 Protestant representatives were from North America and Northern Europe. However, 17 of them were from 'Global South' and that included Bishop VS Azariah from India.

Notably, one of the best-remembered speeches of the entire 1910 Conference at Edinburgh was that of Bishop Azariah who appealed for "friends". As a delegate of that historic Conference, Bishop Azariah spoke on the theme 'Native Church and Foreign Mission'.

Azariah addressed the gathering and said, " I do not plead for returning calls, handshakes, chairs, dinners and teas as such. I do on the other hand plead for all of them and more if they can be expressions of a friendly feeling, if these or anything else can be the outward proofs of a real willingness on the part of the foreign missionary to show that he is in the midst of the people to be to them not a lord and master but a brother and a friend…..We ask for love. Give us friends."

The appeal to the international missionary leaders and their mission agencies to "give us friends" became an historic call especially in the backdrop of Indian independence movements and growing foreign missions sans Indian natives.

Two years later, in 1912 Azariah was consecrated as the first bishop of the Anglican Church in India. Azariah's call for friends struck a chord with the listeners. He argued that for the Church to be indigenous, it must be friendly with its people. He was very critical of a Church with a Western face.

To further evangelism, Azariah founded the Indian Missionary Society (1903) and the National Missionary Society (1905). Through these, he sought to replace European with indigenous missionaries. Azariah's efforts established autonomous missionary societies that sent Indian missionaries throughout India and abroad to evangelize 'foreigners'. The IMS solely belonged to Indian congregations and was completely independent from foreign control, even in financial matters.

Azariah also strongly resisted Christian denominationalism. At the Lausanne Conference in 1927, he said, "Unity may be theoretically a desirable ideal in Europe and America, but it is vital to the life of the Church in the mission field. The divisions of Christendom are a sin and scandal in non-Christian lands unlike Christian countries."

He argued that a unified church would be a more genuine expression of a native Indian Christianity than one divided. In fact Azariah was greatly instrumental in the unity of Protestant denominations in South India, which later brought into formation the Church of South India.

Recollects Rev. Vineeth Koshy of the National Council of Churches in India, "VS Azariah had created deep impressions through his challenging speech at the Edinburgh 1910 Conference. His passionate plea for friendship on equal terms and the sharing of responsibility is still very relevant today. What is more important is he had the courage to speak his mind."