December/January, 1998
No. 032/VI/97
cover story
How Christianity came
to Bali
Once Upon a
New Years Eve
MC-ing a New Year's
Eve party during a
blackout
bali focus:
nusa dua and
jimbaran
The Origin of
Nusa Dua
A fable
People of a
Fertile Sea
The fishers of
Jimbaran beach
Center Stage
Steve Charles revamps
the Candraloka
Amphitheatre
Nusa Dua Nights
How to survive them
The Sacred
Wilderness
Colonial encounters with
Bali's southern peninsula
arts and
culture
Latter Day
Laksamana
A.A.M. Djelantik's
recently launched
autobiography
Kulkul
new Fiction by Gde
Aryantha Soethama
The Rat Pack
Who are Bali's literati?
beyond
bali
An Eddy in The
Counter of Time
Kayaking off the west
coast of Lombok
Slick and Cool in
Sengigi
Round midnight at the
famed Lombok resort
regular
Fashion
Adventure
Into the blue
Food
Jewel of the southren rim
Jungle Drums
Bali Update
On the Road
Home Grown
Made Adi Putra
advertising index for
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On December 25 this year, in Palasari, Abianbase, Tuka, Untal-untal, Blimbingsari and Dalung, the birth of Christ will be commemmorated Balinese-style. Putu Wirata visited a number of these predominantly Christian villages to find out about the history of the Christian religion in Bali.
In
the village of Palasari a bell toll breaks the silence at dawn, causing a flock of
birds to take flight. As the dewy leaves start to glimmer with the first rays of sun, the
people of Palasari dress themselves in traditional Balinese ceremonial costumes, and file
out of their houses in throngs, following the bell chimes to their source. They go in
through a gate which looks like the entrance to a Balinese temple, but which in fact leads
to a high-ceilinged, rather ostentatious building, that echoes with the sound of people
shuffling into pews. The bells have called them here to attend a Mass that is to
proceed in High Balinese, and the date is December 25.
'BALINIZING' CHRISTIANITY
"We use Balinese visual metaphors because our ancestors
are Balinese, and we respect the culture of our ancestors," says I Gusti Ngurah Wisnu
Purwadhy Bernadus, a well-respected figure in Palasari and a lecturer in Agriculture at
Denpasar's Udayana University. Although he is not a Hindu, Wisnu Purwadhy continues to
preface his name with 'Gusti Ngurah', a reference to caste. But the name he was baptized
by is Bernadus. Bernadus, like almost all the Catholics of Palasari, are descended from
Balinese Hindus.
The 'Balinization' of the Christian religion, as evident in Palasari, can also be found in other predominantly Catholic and Protestant communities on the island, such as Blimbingsari in the district of Jembrana, and the villages of Abianbase, Tuka and Untal-untal in the district of Badung. Both Tuka and Blimbingsari even boast gamelan groups which perform every Palm Sunday.
"We are attempting to accommodate local cultural traditions within Christianity - what the missionaries termed 'inculturation' - by taking those parts of Balinese culture that fit comfortably with Christian theology," says Father Shadeg S.V.D, who oversees the Widia Wahana Library in Dalung, a Protestant village in the district of Badung. But this accommodative approach was slow to develop, and what lies buried beneath it is a history of conflict.
INVITATION FROM A KING
Bali's first contact with Christianity resulted from a
letter sent by the King of Klungkung to the Vatican in 1635 expressing his eagerness to
forge ties between the Balinese people and the Catholic Church. In his letter, written on
a lontar leaf, the king wrote: "I would very much like for us to be close allies ...
and would be happy to receive your representatives here to facilitate the conversion to
Christianity of those Balinese people who so desire." The Vatican responded to the
letter by dispatching missionaries to Bali. On the 11 March, 1635, two priests stationed
in the Moluccas - Father Manuel Carualho and Azeuado S.J. - left for Bali. But their
visit did not entail immediate efforts at Christianisation, and there are no records
that any of the people of Klungkung were baptized during the priests' stay on the island.
Not until two centuries later - when the Catholic Church became more fervent about spreading the message of the Bible to all corners of the globe - were more missionaries sent to Bali. In 1866, European missionaries Van Eck and Jacob De Vroom arrived on the island. They chose to settle in the village of Jagaraga in the district of Buleleng. Only after living in Jagaraga for seven years did they succeed in converting their house-boy, who became the first Balinese to be baptised a Christian. His baptism as Nikodemus Nyoman Karangasem shocked his family and resulted in the tragic murder of de Vroom.
It took another sixty years for the next missionary to come to Bali. In 1931, Tsang To Hang, set forth from Makassar, eventually settling in the south of the island. His efforts at converting locals to Christianity sparked more violence, this time more widespread, in Tuka, Buduk, Pelambingan, Untal-untal, Carangsari and Abianbase. The conflicts resulted primarily from Tsang To Hang's confrontational approach, which put him at odds with the deeply-rooted Balinese mores and traditions, and were further compounded by the fact that Balinese society had yet to devise a social code to deal with religious differences within the community. Friction generally emerged around issues of subak (Balinese traditional irrigation system) and banjar (Balinese traditional administrative body) membership, as well as use of the communal cemetery.
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