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Between 1980 and 1988, the Christian proportion almost went double, increasing from 10 percent to nearly 19 percent. Today the Christians account for about 10% of the Singapore's population; nearly 60% of them are Protestants. The growth of Christian proportion was greatest in Chinese community. Most of the converts were young and well-educated with the professional job and high income. One of proselytizing persuasions was the education, especially the widespread use of English along with the great work of those missionaries. Most converts joined evangelical and charismatic Protestant churches, undoubtedly, praying in English. Moreover, one-third of the members of Parliament belonged to Christianity, dominated by well-educated English-speaking Chinese. With this elite, classy and social status of Christian society, it automatically helps attract more converts.

As to the social role, Christianity gives great devotion to society through several organizations. As a matter of fact, Christianity is divided into two groups:

The Catholic Church

In Singapore, the Catholic Church was set up in 1819, with 12 Catholics in its missionary group. By 1829, there were about 200 Catholics. After that, the Catholic community kept growing larger by establishing schools for boys and girls separately. The oldest Catholic Church in Singapore is Cathedral of the Good Shepherd, located on Queen Street, and designed by J.T. Thomson, a great colonial architect. This cathedral is also a home for the present archbishop, and has become a national monument since 28th June, 1973. Dated back in 1972, the late Pope Paul VI announced Singapore a separate Archdiocese, apart from the former Malacca-Johor Archdiocese. So then the jurisdiction belonged to Singapore's archbishop's hand.

In the 1980s, there were good and bad changes for the Catholic Church. The good change is that Christianity was included in the education as a compulsory subject in every secondary school. This project was controlled by the government, although secular, but was concerned about the religious activities that could result in unpredictable consequences to the society in general. About the bad change, the government restricted the unusual activities of some Christian groups, such as the Jehovah's Witnesses who opposed military service, and in 1988 the government arrested a group of Roman Catholic social activists because they were infiltrated by Marxists and kept it secret. What the government later acted was introducing the Maintenance of Religious Harmony Act as to harmonize different religions to tolerance, and avoid hatred between the chaotic acts of inter-religious proselytism.

There are thirty Catholic Churches in Singapore today. The Church possesses twenty primary and seventeen secondary schools, one pre-university school and one junior college, along with the Mount Alvernia Hospital, Assisi Hospice, five places for the aged and chronically ill, and one children's home.

Protestant Churches

Soon after Raffles landed in Singapore, he donated a piece of land to the first Protestant missionary in order to establish the London Missionary Society. In the first decade, many distinctive groups helped strengthen the Protestant Churches in Singapore by their contributions which went to the Western mercantile community, the Peranakan community from Malacca, foreign missionaries, and Christian immigrants from China and India. After that, several seminaries and colleges were established.

In order to enlarge the community, many organizations were set up to fulfill the Christian social needs. The years of each organization's establishment are as follows:

• In 1948, established the National Council of Churches of Singapore
• In 1953, introduced the Christian Counseling in the prisons
• In 1956, born the Singapore Council of Christian Churches, and the St John's Home for the Aged
• In 1969, appeared the Christian Counseling Service and the Samaritans of Singapore
• In 1972, established the Lee Kuo Chuan Home for the Aged
• In 1976, set up the Christian Anti-Drug Rescue Endeavor
• In 1980, established the Evangelical Fellowship of Singapore
• In 1983, appeared Ling Kwang Home for Senior Citizens

Although the Christian community has been strongly blended by the labor of love, yet the Evangelical Christians crossed the line by trying to get more Malay converts. Their actions offended the Muslim community in such a way that the government had to cease their performances of missionary in order to prevent resentment, and future conflict among the people in the society. The government's main concern was to maintain Singapore as a secular state under ethnic and religious harmony.

Related Articles about Religion in Singapore:

• Buddhism 
• Islam 
• Christianity
• Hinduism
• Other Religions
• Back to Religion Page

This article is authored and copyrighted by
Royal Exclusive Travel

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