Gudrikia, May 27, 2025: Archbishop John Barwa of Cuttack-Bhubaneswar has blessed a church built at the site where a Protestant Christian was burnt alive during the 2008 anti-Christian violence.

“The perpetrators of violence had planned to eliminate Christians from this region, but they have failed in front of our God’s mighty hand,” said the Divine Word prelate during homily at the opening of the Archangel Michael Catholic Church of Gudrikia, a substation under the Padangi parish.

The prelate thanked God for giving them a new church, which he said was a house of His blessings, unity, love and fraternity. “Let us witness our deep faith in God through our daily life. May Archangel Michael intercede for us to encounter difficulties and threats to remain firm in our Christian faith,” Archbishop Barwa added.

Fourteen priests and seven nuns were among more than 500 Catholics who attended the May 26 blessing ceremony.

Mathew Nayak, a government teacher of Udayagiri and a member of the Church of North India was caught by an armed mob during the 2008 violence. They dragged him on the road towards the Catholic church and poured kerosene on his body before burning him alive for refusing to give up his Christian faith.

Benansio Pradhan, a touring catechist of Padangi parish, said the new church at the site of a Kandhamal victim has given hope to the Christians in the eastern Indian state of Odisha.

“It gives me great courage and hope that God has never abandoned us. A firm faith in Jesus is built once again in the lives of hundreds of people,” he told Matters India after the church blessing.

He also said they have waited 17 years to get closer to “our church where our dear Christian teacher was burnt alive.”

Padang parish priest Father Sebastian Thottamkara took the initiative to build the new church.

“The faith of the people has revived after the 2008 anti-Christian violence. People have given voluntary work to build the church. The 2008 communal violence could neither suppress nor silence the faithful to witness Jesus in their daily life,” the priest told Matters India.

The Gudrikia is among 11 substations of the Padangi parish which has 45 Catholic families surrounded by Hindus.