France’s Catholic bishops become partners of the state’s anti-cult agency. A Chhattisgarh village invokes tribal self-government law to bar pastors. The Madras High Court rules that conversion by inducement, and ghar wapsi alike, disqualifies a body from foreign funding. Russian courts heard 716 “illegal missionary activity” cases in 2025, up 66%, while the Orthodox Church trains activists in “counter-sectarian mission”. In Israel, Yad L’Achim pushes door-to-door Witnesses out of Petah Tikva; in Iran, a pastor’s wife must serve 13 years for “deviant proselytising”. The common thread: majority institutions joining the regulation of outreach, and money replacing belief as its legal object.
Proselytism and Religious Outreach Worldwide: Conflicts, Policies, and Trends – 19–26 June 2026
This week’s briefing centres on India’s regulatory escalation: new FCRA Rules 2026 (22 June) explicitly bar foreign funds for religious conversion, reinforced by the Timothy Initiative UAPA case and seven pastors sentenced in Madhya Pradesh. The Vatican consistory (26–27 June) saw Pope Leo XIV restate the witness-vs-proselytism line. Adventists publicly questioned their own evangelism’s cultural sensitivity.
Proselytism and Religious Outreach Worldwide: Conflicts, Policies, and Trends – 3-10 April 2026
News from Nigeria, India, Pakistan, Turkey. – Iranian Christian converts detained by US Immigration. – Catholic Church: more detailed data revealing the scale and geographic breadth of the 2026 Easter baptism surge. – Provincial council will address the pastoral challenge of welcoming, forming, and integrating the unprecedented number of neophytes entering the French Church. – The “missionary-as-provocateur” frame.
Proselytism and Religious Outreach Worldwide: Conflicts, Policies, and Trends – Weekly Briefing – 21-27 March 2026
India has entered an accelerated phase of what might be called the “juridification of conversion.” – The “public Islam” controversy in Britain as a template. – The structural asymmetry of persecution coverage. – The centennial of World Mission Sunday in October 2026 will likely generate a significant volume of Catholic reflection on the theology and ethics of mission.
Vatican and World Council of Churches study warns of conversion ‘obsession’
17 May 2006 — “Freedom of religion is a fundamental, inviolable and non-negotiable right of every human being in every country in the world,” states the report of the 12-16 May meeting in Lariano/Velletri, near Rome, that launched the cooperative study. “Freedom of religion connotes the freedom, without any obstruction, to practise one’s own faith, […]