Around 1510, the Italian merchant Ludovico di Varthema was accompanied in southeast Asia by two Christian guides from Sarnau (probably Shahr-i Naw, the Persian name for Ayutthaya). They told him that there were many Christians in Sarnau, even "great lords", that they were white men and that they owed their allegiance to the Great Khan of Cathay. Varthema also recorded that the King of Pegu employed 1,000 Christians soldiers recruited from the Ayutthaya Kingdom and that they wrote their script from right to left. Although it is probable that these accounts are exaggerated to impress westerners, it is possible that these first Christians in Thailand were descendants of Nestorians who had fled China after the fall of the Yuan dynasty in 1368. They would likely have used the Syriac script.[2]
The Laos Mission founded its first church, Chiang Mai Church, now known simply as First Church, Chiang Mai, in 1868. After a brief period of evangelistic success, the mission underwent a time of persecution in 1869, during which two converts were martyred. This persecution was abated in 1878 by the Edict of Religious Toleration.[3] Parishes and congregations experienced sporadic numerical growth. The activities of missionaries were predominantly in itinerant preaching, medical institutions and educational facilities as well as the introduction of technologies, methodologies and institutional culture which have been generally well received by the Thai people. They were occasionally able to mobilize large numbers of Thai helpers. Since World War II control of Christian organizations was slowly turned over to Thai Christians and the institutions integrated as private institutions in an increasingly centralized Thailand.
Relations between Christian organizations and the central government have improved. In the 1980s, Thai royal budget for programs of Christian groups appeared for the first time. Evidence of this support includes 15,000 Baht given by the Department of Religion to District 14 of the Church of Christ in Thailand for youth outreach[4] as well as waiving of the cost of tickets on trains for missionaries and for Thai pastors of the denomination.
Christians made and are making substantial contributions to health care and education in Thailand. Facilities such as Saint Louis Hospital, Bangkok Mission Hospital, Camillian Hospital, Bangkok Christian Hospital were once considered to be among the best in the country. Major Christian schools dot the map of Thailand. European and American missionaries introduced the printing press, western surgery, smallpoxvaccinations, taught foreign languages and wrote linguistic dictionaries. Thai and Western Christians in the past 50 years, especially those in the Church of Christ in Thailand denomination, have been heavily engaged in administrative reform of church organizations, ecumenical and interreligious dialogue, social development projects, enculturation or adaptation of the Gospel for Thai culture and have been active in providing leadership in the Thai democracy movement, refugee relief, and improving the status of women, the handicapped and children.
Interreligious dialogue is evidenced by such programs as the Saengtum Seminary, the Sinclair Thompson Lecture Series of Payap University, a Thailand Church History Project coordinated by the Rev. Dr. Herbert Swanson in the 1990s and an Institute for Interreligious Dialogue at Payap University. In November 2007, Bangkok's Assumption Cathedral became the venue of ecumenical pilgrimage of trust, when Christians from different backgrounds gathered to pray together. Among those present were religious leaders of the Catholic Church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Thailand, the Church of Christ in Thailand, the Russian Orthodox Church and also young people from Laos, the Philippines, Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia who came specially for the prayer meetings.[5] Similar programs of worship have been held annually at First Church (Chiang Mai) and elsewhere across Thailand.
Non-denominational efforts and inter-agency coordination have involved such agencies as the Church's AIDS Ministry, Voice of Peace, Lamp of Thailand, World Vision, Worldwide Faith Missions, Christian Children's Fund, McKean Leprosy Hospital (now McKean Rehabilitation Institute), Klong Thuy Slum Ministries, and the Christian Development Fellowship. Thailand has served as the destination of choice in Asian Christian gatherings and has served as the headquarters of the Christian Conference of Asia since the handover of Hong Kong.
There are many sources for estimating the affiliation of Thai people in Christian denominations. The primary sources are from the government population data and from the membership records of the individual denominations. Reliable data on determining religious affiliation are not based on objective standards in all cases. The most objective report that counts individuals is government census data. Less objective standards would seek to include theological criteria in the counting of members such as belief, baptism, confirmation as well as age criteria such as persons over age 12, 15, 18 or adulthood. None of these standards of various denominational data discriminate based on gender, health or ethnicity.
Government data are based on the National House Register in which heads of households register the members of the household with the local District Office. At birth, persons declare their religious affiliation in this manner. A national census is taken of this data every 10 years. As of 2000, the latest [national census data][6] currently available, 486,840 people were registered as affiliates of Christian denominations or under 1% (0.7%) of total population (60 million). Comparisons of this data to determine whether Christians in Thailand are predominantly a certain gender, age or are from urban/rural areas does not show any remarkable variation from the near 1% figure, although the age group of 10-14 shows the highest (1.0%) ratio of Christians to national population. There may be limitations to this approach to verifying religious affiliation, such as inconsistent reporting, the change of religion to Christianity of young people under their parent's house register, reversion of young people to Buddhism and local administrative bias towards Buddhism. However, no available evidence currently demonstrates these limitations. Religious denominations each report different sets of affiliation data. The next official census is scheduled for 2010.
Evangelical Fellowship of Thailand data come from the individual organizations that work under its auspices, since membership in the EFT is open to church organizations. It was recognized by the Department of Religion as a Christian denomination in Thailand on June 19, 1969, as a locus for a plethora of small groups that had been in Thailand at least since 1929 when the Christian and Missionary Alliance established its presence in Thailand.[7]
The Church of Christ in Thailand, founded in 1932, is a member of the World Council of Churches, Christian Conference of Asia and World Reformed Alliance. The CCT generally only counts adult baptized members as reported by its districts, which the CCT then reports at its annual General Assembly meeting. In 2008,the CCT reported 120,000 members divided into 19 districts.[8] Of the parts of the Church of Christ in Thailand, 52,601 were of Baptist origin.[9] Southern Baptist Convention and Seventh-day Adventists have other criteria.
The earliest Catholic missionaries in Siam were Friars Jeronimo da Cruz and Sebastiâo da Canto, both Dominicans, who came in 1567. They were killed by the Burmese in 1569. Later, the Franciscans and Jesuits arrived.[10] The 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries were marked by alternating periods of toleration and persecution of missionaries by the Siamese rulers.[citation needed]
By the beginning of the 20th century, there were about 23,000 Catholic adherents, 55 churches and chapels, representatives of monastic orders, and social and educational institutions (orphanages, schools and a seminary and college).[11] Many Catholic missionaries arrived in the first half of the 20th century.[10]As of 2019[update], Thailand has about 400,000 Catholics.[12] On 22 October 1989, the catechist Philip Siphong Onphitak and six companions (nuns and laymen), who had been executed by Thai police during the Franco-Thai War of 1940 on the suspicion that they were French spies, were beatified as the Martyrs of Thailand.[13][14]
The Thailand Bible Society was officially established in 1966, though its organized work began in 1828. Part of the Bible in Thai was first published in 1834. The New Testament in Thai was printed for the first time in 1843. The first full text of the Bible in Thai came out in 1883.[24] In 2005, the Thailand Bible Society distributed 43,740 copies of the Bible and 9,629 copies of the New Testament in Thai language.
The mission is headed by Father Oleg Cherepanin (by 2008 information)[25] and serves not only Russian tourists and residents in Thailand, but also local believers of Thai origin.[27]
The Russian Orthodox Church has translated into the Thai language the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom, the Orthodox Book of prayer and a book about the history of Russian Orthodox Church. In July, 2008, the representative office of Russian Orthodox Church was officially registered by Thailand authorities as a foundation named the "Orthodox Christian Church in Thailand."[28]
The Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew and the Holy and Great Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of the Eastern Orthodox Church also have plans to establish their parishes in Thailand.[29] They have often organized Church services and Divine Liturgy for their members in Thailand with the help of the Embassy of Greece in Bangkok.[30]
Freedom of religion
Due to ethnic violence in the south, in 2023, the country was scored 3 out of 4 for religious freedom.[31]
Christianity is the predominant religion in the Philippines, with Roman Catholicism being its largest denomination. Sizeable minorities adhering to Islam, Dharmic religions, and indigenous Philippine folk religions are also present.
Protestant denominations arrived in the Philippines in 1898, after the United States took control of the Philippines from Spain, first with United States Army chaplains and then within months civilian missionaries.
The Christian Conference of Asia is a regional ecumenical organisation representing 15 National Councils and over 100 denominations (churches) in New Zealand, Australia, Bangladesh, Burma, Cambodia, East Timor, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Laos, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Taiwan and Thailand.
The Church of Christ in Thailand (C.C.T.) is a Protestant Christian association. It is the largest Protestant denomination in Thailand and is considered to be the largest by group of Protestant members in Thailand.
Christianity is the predominant religion in Portugal, with Catholicism being its largest denomination.
More than 70% of the population of Botswana is Christian. Most are members of the Anglican, United Congregational Church of Southern Africa, the Methodist Church of Southern Africa, and African independent churches. Anglicans are part of the Church of the Province of Central Africa. The Roman Catholic Church includes about 5% of the nation's population.
The Laos Mission was founded in Chiang Mai, northern Thailand by the Rev. Daniel McGilvary and Mrs. Sophia McGilvary in April 1867. It was established as a mission of the Board of Foreign Missions, Presbyterian Church in the United States.
The term Eastern Protestant Christianity encompasses a range of heterogeneous Protestant Christian denominations that developed outside of the Occident, from the latter half of the nineteenth century, and yet retain certain elements of Eastern Christianity. Some of these denominations came into existence when active Protestant churches adopted reformational variants of Eastern and Oriental Orthodox liturgy and worship, while others are the result of reformations of Orthodox beliefs and practices, inspired by the teachings of Western Protestant missionaries.
Religion in Sweden has, over the years, become increasingly diverse. Christianity was the religion of virtually all of the Swedish population from the 12th to the early 20th century, but it has rapidly declined throughout the late 20th and early 21st century.
Christianity is the most prevalent religion in the United States. Estimates from 2021 suggest that of the entire U.S. population about 63% is Christian. The majority of Christian Americans are Protestant Christians, though there are also significant numbers of American Roman Catholics and other Christian denominations such as The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Eastern Orthodox Christians and Oriental Orthodox Christians, and Jehovah's Witnesses. The United States has the largest Christian population in the world and, more specifically, the largest Protestant population in the world, with nearly 210 million Christians and, as of 2021, over 140 million people affiliated with Protestant churches, although other countries have higher percentages of Christians among their populations. The Public Religion Research Institute's "2020 Census of American Religion", carried out between 2014 and 2020, showed that 70% of Americans identified as Christian during this seven-year interval. In a 2020 survey by the Pew Research Center, 65% of adults in the United States identified themselves as Christians. They were 75% in 2015, 70.6% in 2014, 78% in 2012, 81.6% in 2001, and 85% in 1990. About 62% of those polled claim to be members of a church congregation.
Protestants in Thailand constitute about 0.77% of the population of Thailand. Protestant work among the Thai people was begun by Ann Judson in Burma, who evangelized Thai war captives who were relocated to Burma. Protestantism was introduced to the country of Thailand in 1828 through the work of Karl Gutzlaff and Jacob Tomlin, the first two resident Protestant missionaries in Thailand.
Christianity in Russia is the most widely professed religion in the country. The largest tradition is the Russian Orthodox Church. According to official sources, there are 170 eparchies of the Russian Orthodox Church, 145 of which are grouped in metropolitanates. There are from 500,000 to one million Old Believers, who represent an older form of Russian Orthodox Christianity, and who separated from the Orthodox Church in the 17th century as a protest against Patriarch Nikon's church reforms.
Christianity in Angola has existed since 1491. Today 80% of Angolans practise some form of Christianity.
Eastern Orthodox Christianity in Thailand has been represented since 1999 by the Representative Office of the Russian Orthodox Church, including the orthodox parish of Saint Nicolas in Bangkok.
Characteristic of Christianity in the 19th century were evangelical revivals in some largely Protestant countries and later the effects of modern biblical scholarship on the churches. Liberal or modernist theology was one consequence of this. In Europe, the Roman Catholic Church strongly opposed liberalism and culture wars launched in Germany, Italy, Belgium and France. It strongly emphasized personal piety. In Europe there was a general move away from religious observance and belief in Christian teachings and a move towards secularism. In Protestantism, pietistic revivals were common.
Christianity in the 20th century was characterized by an accelerating secularization of Western society, which had begun in the 19th century, and by the spread of Christianity to non-Western regions of the world.
The predominant religion in Honduras is Christianity, with Catholicism and Evangelicalism being its main denominations. The country is secular and the freedom of religion is enshrined in the nation's constitution.
Christianity in Taiwan constituted 3.9% of the population, according to the census of 2005; Christians on the island included approximately 600,000 Protestants, 300,000 Catholics and a small number of members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Boon Mark Gittisarn was a 20th-century Thai Protestant pastor and preacher who was influential in introducing Pentecostalism to Thailand.
↑ Church of Christ in Thailand. Documents of the 30th General Assembly of the Church of Christ in Thailand, October 21-24, 2008, Payap University, Chiang Mai
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