Christianity
According to Christian traditions, Thomas the Apostle first arrived in Sri Lanka (as well as India) during the 1st century. After his arrival, small Christian settlements were recorded to have been established on Sri Lanka's coastline. However, the population of Christians in Sri Lanka didn't dramatically increase until the arrival of Portuguese missionaries during the 15th century. In the 17th century, the Dutch took over Sri Lanka and Dutch missionaries were able to convert 21% of Sri Lanka's population to Christianity by 1722.
In 1796 the Dutch were displaced by the British and in 1802 Ceylon became a Crown colony. Anglican and other Protestant missionaries arrived at Sri Lanka during the early 19th century, when the British took control of Sri Lanka from the Dutch. Under British rule missionary work was undertaken by English societies: Baptist, Wesleyan Methodist, the CMS and SPG. The Salvation Army is also strong in Sri Lanka.
Even so, Christianity has heavily declined in Sri Lanka ever since the end of colonial rule. By the 1980s, the population of Christians (mostly concentrated in the northwest of Sri Lanka) reached 1,283,600, 8% of Sri Lanka's population. Of these Christians, about 88% are Roman Catholics and the rest are Anglican and Protestant.
Read more about this topic: Religion In Sri Lanka
Famous quotes containing the word christianity:
“There are many definite methods, honest and dishonest, which make people rich; the only “instinct” I know of which does it is that instinct which theological Christianity crudely describes as “the sin of avarice.””
—Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874–1936)
“Wherever there are walls I shall inscribe this eternal accusation against Christianity upon them—I can write in letters which make even the blind see ... I call Christianity the one great curse, the one great intrinsic depravity, the one great instinct for revenge for which no expedient is sufficiently poisonous, secret, subterranean, petty—I call it the one immortal blemish of mankind....”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“I believe that men are generally still a little afraid of the dark, though the witches are all hung, and Christianity and candles have been introduced.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)