India (MNN) — On Wednesday, more than 30 people were killed and 60-plus injured in a religious festival stampede in Uttar Pradesh, northern India.
Kumbh Mela is the world’s largest religious pilgrimage, occurring every 6 and 12 years on a rotation between four different cities in India. However, this year’s Maha Kumbh Mela only happens once every 144 years.
Kumbh Mela 2019 (Photo courtesy of Ninara/Flickr: https://tinyurl.com/4zzh9ktv)
The monumental festival continues through the end of February. It’s estimated over 100 million attendees have come this year for the rare celebration to bathe in the Ganges River for salvation.
According to the festival’s special executive officer, a barrier near the river broke, causing a crowd rush.
Mission India’s Regan Miller says, “A lot of people are searching for hope in places that they’re not finding hope. So things like bathing in the Ganges River and hoping that will cleanse them of their sins, that’s already a disheartening thing to hear about. Then to see that a festival that emphasizes cleansing of sins would end in such a tragedy like this as well is just really sad to see.”
The Kumbh Mela pilgrimage and festival highlights the deep spiritual needs in a country like India with 1.4 billion people — 95% of whom have never heard the Gospel.
Earlier last year, a Mission India church planter met Madhuri, a woman from Uttar Pradesh who often went on pilgrimages.
Madhuri and her teenage daughter, Rahana. (Photo courtesy of Mission India)
“She kind of just felt like this void still as she used to go on all these pilgrimages,” Miller says, “but she thought that the wrath of her gods would fall on her family if she didn’t appease them.”
But Jesus changes everything. Madhuri’s teenage daughter was diagnosed with cancer, and the church planter shared the Gospel with Madhuri and her daughter and taught them to pray in Jesus’s name.
Miller says, “Her daughter ended up being completely healed of cancer! It was just a complete miracle!
“After [her daughter] being healed through prayers, Madhuri couldn’t help but receive Jesus as her Savior. Her daughter is now excited to share the Gospel with others too because she saw what it did in her own life.”
Just as Madhuri did, pray for the people of India to seek true salvation — not in pilgrimages and rituals — but in Jesus Christ.
Please especially be in prayer for those whose loved ones died in the festival stampede, and that God would grant healing to the injured.
You can give in support of Mission India’s Church Planter Training, and sign up for their daily email prayer prompts.
Header photo: Kumbh Mela 2019 (Photo courtesy of Ninara/Flickr: https://tinyurl.com/mtj3kr5n)
