Spreading the Gospel in Indonesia: Organizational Obstacles and Opportunities

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On 26 October 1969, Indonesia was “dedicated for the preaching of the Gospel by Elder Ezra Taft Benson.” The Church initiated its standard missionary program. Door-to-door tracting began in Jakarta on 20 January 1970.[1] Plans to send one hundred or more young full-time missionaries to the island of Java were abruptly halted on 11 April 1970, when Indonesian authorities ordered LDS meetings and door-to-door proselyting stopped until the Church was granted official recognition. Nine days later on April 20, the Central Government’s Department of Religious Affairs granted the necessary clearance through the good offices of an Indonesian official, Siang Silalahi, who was a Brigham Young University graduate but not a Mormon.[2]

This government action did not remove all of the official obstacles. Only a limited number of church officials and full-time missionaries could receive passport visas. Holding church meetings and proselyting door to door required official clearance from each of the five provincial governments on the island of Java and the numerous local governments. A simultaneous complication was a wholesale government reorganization and reform, primarily spurred by an abortive coup by the Communist Party in 1965. During this transitional period, Indonesian officials were not certain of their authority and many seasoned administrators had either been killed or removed from office.[3]

Nevertheless, branches were soon established across the island of Java: Jakarta on 5 January 1970; Bandung on 23 August 1970; Bogor on 23 November 1970; Jogjakarta on 28 September 1971; Solo on 27 June 1972; Semarang on 16 October 1972; Surabaya on 8 May 1973; Malang on 30 October 1973, and Jebres on 16 April 1978. An English-speaking branch with largely an expatriate membership in Jakarta was given separate status on 1 April 1978. 

About a year after the arrival of the first full-time missionaries, some Protestant churches began publishing and distributing anti-Mormon tracts. In several large cities on the island of Java and the important regional cities of Bandung, Semarang, and Surabaya meetings in Protestant churches denounced the LDS church and its missionaries. The Catholic Church in an official 1975 history attributed part of the mounting hostility between Moslems and Chris tians to the “missionary activities” of “several fanatical Christian groups as Jehovah’s Witnesses and Mormons.”[4]

In the middle 1970s the Indonesian government began to enforce its policy of replacing foreign missionaries with Indonesian nationals. On 24 October 1979, when six missionaries departed, Mission President Lester C. Hawthorne stated: “They will be the last group of missionaries to serve a full two years in the Indonesian Jakarta Mission.” The next day, October 25, six missionaries were transferred back to the United States and five to the Philippines because the government refused to extend their visas. In the past, a number of missionaries had traveled periodically to Singapore to renew short-term visitor visas, a costly operation but the only alternative if the Church desired to continue its standard missionary effort. In early 1980, even this possibility was closing out. David M. Kennedy, Special Representative of the First Presidency, was finding it difficult to secure any modifications in the government’s policy that foreign missionaries should be replaced.[5]

On 1 August 1978, the Minister of Religious Affairs issued Ministerial Decree No. 70 which eliminated any possibility for the LDS church to carry on its current missionary program. This decree, applying to all religious organizations to guarantee “the maintenance of national unity, security, and stability,” forbids religious proselyting when it: 

1. Directs its efforts towards a person or persons who already belong to another religious faith. 

2. Utilizes persuasion and/or material incentives (money, clothing, food/ beverages, medicines) to attract persons of other religious faiths.

3. Distributes pamphlets, bulletins, magazines, books and other materials in regions [communities] and at the homes where people with other religious faiths live. 

4. Involves visiting people who already adhere to other religious faiths in their homes for whatever reasons. 

On 15 August 1978, the Department of Religious Affairs issued Ministerial Decree No. 77 regulating “Foreign Aid to Religious Institutions in Indonesia” and including all forms of aid: “people, material, and financial support.” It requires the Minister of Religious Affairs to approve and/or recommend the use of such aid and specifically restricts expatriate missionaries who conduct the religious training of Indonesian nationals. 

Part of the reason for these two decrees grows from Indonesia’s chronic religious instability. Santri (radical conservative Muslims) resented the recent successes of both Western and Indonesian Christian proselytizers in the Muslim communities; they believe Christians are “poaching” and have the unfair advantage of international private and government resources for establishing schools, hospitals, and welfare institutions. This resentment has periodically flared into violence. Deaths and property loss accompanied widespread rioting in 1962, 1964, and 1967. An understanding in the early 1970s between the santri and the predominantly Javanese Officer Corps which controls the government reduced the incidence of riots and violence. Nevertheless, this alliance is uneasy. Muslim groups periodically single out small Chinese business concerns or isolated Christian sects for abuse. The Catholic and large Protestant churches have established their own political bases and are less susceptible to persecution.[6]

Fortunately, the LDS church has escaped attack; however, it is vulnerable. A large percentage of its new converts are the unpopular Chinese; the Church has made little effort to establish relationships with powerful contacts; and it is small.[7]

The institutional obstacles restraining the growth of the Church in Indonesia are comparatively well understood, but not the social obstacles. Approximately 300 missionaries have labored in Indonesia since its opening in 1969, converting about 2000 persons or three per missionary. On its rolls in late 1980 there were at the most 500 active members, an attrition rate of about 75 per cent. Mission President Hawthorne told me in a personal interview in June 1980: “People are baptized but they never again appear at the church door. We take a lot of time making sure the people baptized understand the gospel. However, they do not retain their interest. I believe they fear the heavy church responsibilities.” 

At this juncture the missionary program in Indonesia in its present form has been a costly proposition, with few conversions to repay the investment of time and funds. Although the Church’s financial records are confidential, central church funds supply at least 85 percent of the Indonesian Mission’s budget. Added to this cost must be individual family and ward financial expenses for the support of full-time missionaries from abroad. 

At the same time, the Church cannot easily write off proselyting in Indonesia. It is the fifth largest nation of the world after China, India, Russia, and the United States of America. It has bounteous natural resources, including high quality petroleum reserves. Its present government has managed to maintain political stability while accelerating planned correction of population imbalances. Destitute people are relocated from the densely populated islands of Java, Madura, and Bali to less-populated islands, like Sumatra, Sulawesi, and Kalimantan. Family planning has been introduced to reduce an excessive rate of increase (now 140 million; 235 million by 2000). 

Population pressures have created a population of twelve to seventeen mil lion landless or near-landless peasant farmers many of whom once supported the Communist movement. Accelerated development programs for the “poorest of the poor” have temporarily defused the threats of agrarian and urban revolt.[8]

Thus, Indonesia represents both a hopeful and challenging example of the Third World. The Church’s future in cultures and societies significantly different from its own history or organizational design is still not decided. How will it teach the gospel to non-Western people who are abysmally poor but have high expectations? Since World War II, the Christian population has increased at an annual rate double that of its population, now numbering over ten million persons or eight percent of the population.[9] During the period of the LDS church’s operation in Indonesia, at least three million joined a Chris tian church.[10] The Indonesian Council of Churches, which sponsored a 1977 study by Frank Cooley, partitions the Indonesian Christians into the following parts: Catholics 25 percent, Protestants (Council of Churches) 52 percent; the Protestant churchs and missions (not part of the council) around 10 per cent, and noncouncil Pentecostal churches roughly 10 percent.[11]

The growth of the Catholic church has been spectacular. Within 75 years it has increased from a localized membership of 250,000 to a widely dispersed one of 3,000,000. In 1974, the last year for which figures are available, there were 660 parishes in thirty-three dioceses and apostolic prefectures. Sixty-one percent of its ecclesiastical personnel are Indonesians including one cardinal, four of seven archbishops, nine of thirty-one bishops, 507 of 1,557 priests, 268 of 480 brothers, and 2,801 of 3,784 nuns.[12] It has several thousand schools, owns and operates an elaborate complex of hospitals and health clinics, welfare and relief institutions, carries out a variety of economic development projects, and owns and operates a large mass media enterprise including daily newspapers and publishing houses. It seeks to provide for its members a total environment, meeting all of their socio-economic needs in a way reminiscent of the nineteenth-century Mormon Church. 

To a lesser extent, other well-organized Protestant churches conduct a simi lar range of broad social programs, but usually within a more limited region. The Catholic-Protestant success in winning converts has sparked similar Islamic, Hindu, and Buddhist efforts including daycare centers and recreation facilities, home visits, job placement, and competitive sports. Christian churches and groups no longer have a monopoly on performing “good works.” For these groups, religion encompasses social, economic, and political spheres. 

Clearly the LDS Church in Indonesia must reevaluate its organizational position and practices. The Indonesian government is not likely to reverse its policy of Indonesianizing foreign-based churches. Religious tensions will increase as competition for members and domains of influence increase between Islam, Catholicism, Protestantism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, and Kebatinan mysticism, a belief system rooted primarily in Javanese society.[13]

According to Islamic law, Muslims cannot change their religion; strict interpretations of the law invoke the death penalty, and have within the last decade been carried out in Indonesia. Prior to Indonesia’s independence in 1949, Islam was a strong political force and, since independence, has been the single most complicating factor in its political life, even overshadowing Communism.[14]

Equally interesting and complicating is the phenomenal and sustained growth of Hinduism and Buddhism since 1967. Both of these religions experienced the beginnings of revivals during the 1950s and 1960s, not unlike “pockets” of Christian communities. Like Javanese mystic groups, they regard themselves as “the living embodiment of the religion and culture of the glorious days of the Majapahit,”[15] a Javanese-Hindu kingdom which reached its pinnacle in the fifteenth century and which provides much of the emotional power behind Indonesian nationalism. Clashes between newly converted Balinese Christians and their Hindu kin have marred the new transmigration resettlements, particularly on the island of Salawesi. 

Politically, mystical groups have also grown, numbering many current military and administrative leaders among their adherents and incorporated as a religious category in the 1980 census. 

Because of its association with the Chinese community, Confucianism in Indonesia will continue to experience difficulties. Nevertheless, this group, now numbering some 3.5 million, is growing in influence and acquiring status. 

The upsurge in Christian growth is partly traceable to the political upheavals that followed the aborted Communist coup of September-October 1965. Muslim youth groups, with the backing of the army, moved to eradicate the rebelling Communists, killing a quarter to half million supposed Communist sympathizers of the abangan alone (an Indonesian term for the common people, largely living on Java who embrace a Hindu-Javanese set of beliefs). Some Muslim groups were openly working for the establishment of an Islamic republic; Indonesians were forced to identify themselves with one of the legally reorganized religions, still the case under the Suharto government. However, in protest against the killings and pressure to conform to Islam, many abangan opted to join Protestant and Catholic churches, especially those living on Java, much to the dismay of the Islamic community. 

More, however, is involved than an influx of “protest” Christians, even though this phenomental growth brings its own problems to Christian churches. Baptist scholar Dr. Avery T. Willis, Jr., an evangelical missionary and social scientist, who participated in the large-scale investigation undertaken from 1968 to 1976 by the Indonesian Council of Churches on the place of the Christian churches in Indonesia’s future notes the importance of the philosophi cal underpinnings of the Indonesian state embodied in pancasila, or the five basic principles as emphasized by the post-Sukarno government. In brief, Pancasila emcompasses: (1) Ketuhanan Yang Maha Esa (the absolute unity of God, implying a belief in a supreme being of God) ; (2) Kemanusiaan Yang Adil Dan Beradab (humanitarianism based on justice and civility); (3) Persatuan Indonesia (national unity of Indonesia, the essentiality of nationalism); (4) Kerakyatan (rule by the people or democracy), and (5) Keadilan Social (social justice). All major religious organizations in Indonesia have prepared detailed statements/studies on how their basic prin ciples and guidelines for social action fit within the context of pancasila. The Indonesian Council of Churches has made a particular effort in this regard. Willis’s analysis concludes: 

(1) The guarantees of religious freedom inherent in the state ideology, pancasila, allowed Christianity to become a viable alternative in the Indonesian situation. The New Order’s clarification of pancasila, thus continuing to guarantee religious freedom, opened the door even wider for Indonesians to become Christians. 

(2) The decree of the government that all Indonesians must embrace a religion was the primary political factor in church growth. . . . 

(3) The massacre of approximately 500,000 persons caused others to look for both a physical and a spiritual protector.

(4) The government did not allow Moslems to prohibit Christian missionary activity. 

(5) The identification of Christians with the government enhanced their image and gave them influence. During the fight for independence, Christians had vindicated themselves on the battlefield. During the struggle of the mid-1960s, Christian students in the streets and Christian intellectuals in pivotal positions helped defeat the Old Order and establish the New Order. 

(6) Nationalists, including leaders of the New Order, sought allies in the political struggle, and so looked with favor on members of their groups becoming Christian.

(7) The churches grew rapidly during times of political instability, 1945-53 and 1965-69. The conflict of ideologies and power groups produced pressures on people which aided or slowed growth. When pressures were extreme, many waited until a more advantageous time to make their decisions. 

(8) The rate of growth in the churches, which had been rather stable up to 1965, fluctuated drastically after that, in direct proportion to political factors operative during the period in each particular locale. 

(9) Political instability of the period caused people to look for something stable upon which to rebuild their lives. 

(10) The government’s emphasis on the five-year development plan and the utilization of Indonesia’s resources focused public attention on modernization. The progress of Western nations was favorably contrasted with that of Islamic nations. Christianity was viewed as an ally in modernization and progress.[16]

Social conditions are favorable to LDS Church growth in Indonesia and the gospel does not conflict with pancasila. Many Indonesians are not content with the present state of affairs. They arc seeking new meaning and purpose in life and, because of their religious groundings, will expect to find in it religion. The restored gospel will be favorably received, especially when the gospel is presented within the socio-economic context of Mormonism’s past. For ex ample, Muhammad Hatta, co-founder with Sukarno for Indonesian Proclamation of Independence and the nation’s first vice president, requested from me a copy of Leonard J. Arrington’s Great Basin Kingdom. He was particularly knowledgeable about Mormon cooperative propensities and felt that this kind of socio-economic behavior was badly needed in Indonesia’s development efforts. 

Any group which is judged as threatening the officially recognized religions or the stability of society can be prohibited and dissolved at the recommendation of the Minister of Religious Affairs, the Public Prosecutor, or the Minister of Home Affairs. The activities of Indonesian religious bodies are governmentally supervised and regulated. However, the Church has made no effort to show its relationship to pancasila. It has traditionally refused to become identified with other Christian churches cither Catholic or Protestant. As a consequence many Protestant bodies do not regard the Mormon Church as a Christian church at all. The Church may no longer have the option of remaining aloof from classification but must decide to identify itself as Catholic, Protestant, or mystic. This last option may not be open; but if it were, it would be a bureaucratically confusing and possibly useful approach. 

President Spencer W. Kimball has spelled out the context for worldwide missionary work including Indonesia: “The ‘grand and glorious objective’ of the church is to assist ‘to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.’ ” The Church will accomplish this objective by: 

• proclaiming the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ to every nation, kindred, tongue, and people; 
• perfecting the saints by preparing them to receive the ordinances of the gospel and by instruction and discipline to gain exaltation. 
• redeeming the dead by performing vicarious ordinances of the gospel for those who have lived on the earth.[17]

Socially and culturally, Indonesia’s diversified peoples should be receptive to this promise. However, more than faith in God’s guiding hand is required to achieve it. Sizeable numbers of missionary entrepreneurs are needed who have the facility to translate the gospel message across complex cultural barriers. Indonesia’s geography, geology, and history have produced several societies which developed largely in isolation for hundreds, even thousands, of years. The island nation’s two or three hundred distinctive ethnic groups have their own language, social structure, customary law and folkways (adat), belief system, political system, and sense of identity. Since the beginning of this century and more rapidly since independence, growing nationalism has united these groups. Bhinneka Tunggal Ika (diversity becoming unity) is a national motto, but is still far from being a reality. Modern Indonesia is characterized by an extraordinary emphasis on education, self-discipline, sacrifice for social progress, and respect for the living and the dead. Many Indonesians keep genealogical records and family histories. Unlike Western societies, Indonesia is almost completely untouched by secularism. 

One scholar has called the Mormon community “a neo-Judaic people so separate and distinct that new converts must undergo a process of assimilation roughly comparable to that which has taken place when immigrants adopt a new and dissimilar nationality.”[18] Such a process is probably not as necessary in the deeply religious culture of Indonesia. One Indonesian intellectual has designated Mormons as the “Ahmadiyah of Christianity,” a persecuted Islam movement established in the Punjab, British India, in the nineteenth century.[19] Increasing secularization in the United States may handicap the propagation of the gospel; but Indonesia’s diverse communities, most with patriarchal organizations that are still strong, face problems of a different nature. 

What may be required to make the gospel a meaningful part of Indonesian life? The first requirement is the need to develop managed organizational imperviousness, meaning that an organization can “protect, in their existing forms, [its] values, [its] possessions, [its] beliefs, [its] people. . . . [It] is not easily shaken from its routines. It is not distracted from its objectives. .. . It does not push panic buttons.”[20]

Historically, Mormonism had such “selective imperviousness.” The re markable Mormon colonization of the Rocky Mountain West is readily recognized but the specific information about the organizational skill and practices involved has been largely forgotten.

These organizational principles and practices were not unique. They can be found in the building of the Roman and British empires, the spreading of Catholic monastic orders and missionary efforts, the conducting of multi national corporate activities, the infiltration of Communism into political regimes, and the explosion of charismatic religions in Third World societies. 

Each example includes achieving selective organizational imperviousness by establishing a network of self-duplicating centers, characterized by consider able self-governance, centrally established doctrine, and a centrally established method for its diffusion. Each center functions as a focus of control and diffusion while it is strongly linked to headquarters.[21]

Basic policies and goals are selected systematically through consultation. Implementation is carefully monitored, with the primary purpose of binding the network of outposts into a corporate whole. The headquarters serves primarily to train, manage, support, deploy resources, and monitor. The central message specifies both the religious content and the method for its diffusion including face to face witness by individuals and groups supplemented by the mass media. Selecting and training leaders at regional and field levels gets priority. 

As part of the organizational dynamics, accommodation to (not compromise with) the host culture(s) is planned for. Adherents demonstrate a readiness to be “different people” and pay the consequences. The organization selects special growth and development activities for specific target groups at the “right time.” The system includes ways of integrating new members, an internal social support, a clearly designated spiritual home (Rome, Mecca, Salt Lake City), and a positive and orderly program for winning adherents.[22]

Building selective organizational imperviousness into Church operations in Indonesia will require the Church to respond to the requirements imposed by the Indonesian environment. The Catholic church in Indonesia has been remarkably successful. Catholic women, youth, students, teachers, priests, nuns, and brothers have their own national organizations, each one designing and packaging its message to appeal to its particular audience and fit local practices while remaining culturally and organizationally Catholic. Equally impressive are recent organizational activities of the Protestant charismatic religions, particularly those from Baptist backgrounds, which have adopted organizational practices reminiscent of the earlier LDS Church. 

Possibly the time has come to professionalize at least the mission-president level to get leadership supplemented by a thorough knowledge of Indonesian language(s), cultures, and histories. A Catholic priest who devotes his life to one region in Indonesia has a distinct advantage over a transitory Mormon missionary. He knows his social situation and how to capitalize on advantages of social and political change. 

Indonesia also requires missionaries capable of filling several different roles—proselyter, human developer, social changer, skill transferrer. Such persons are hard to find, and even harder to develop in the contemporary church where American organizations demand intense specialization. The missionary model of the nineteenth-century Church combines the zeal and enthusiasm of youth in apprentice relations with the ability and wisdom of age.[23] The activities of the Ezra Taft Benson Agriculture and Food Institute at Brigham Young University are a good portent of such increased Church involvement. However, it could be some time before such a program would translate into action in Indonesia. 

Another useful lesson to learn from successful churches in Indonesia is their high-quality action research. Progressive Islamic groups have followed suit. The Indonesian Council of Churches not only conducts action research in Indonesia but at theological centers in the United States and Europe. The Church could profit from studying the results of completed research as well as developing its own research capacity. A center on contemporary Indonesian studies at Brigham Young University where Indonesian, American, and other scholars could work together would, if properly managed, produce a reservoir of good will within one decade to facilitate missionary efforts. Strategic planning, a recent corporate practice, has quickly been adopted by larger Christian churches to strengthen their missionary efforts. The 1968-76 Indonesian Council of Churches study provides a basis for such planning, and several of the more progressive denominations have profitably used these re search findings to determine where the greatest gains may be made with the least effort. For example, the gospel has something important to offer the poor, the disadvantaged, and the illiterate but, in its present “delivery package,” excludes these groups and appeals to already Christian educated elites. To participate in the Church’s branches and programs demands a high level of learning, social skills, and financial resources. The expense even of attending church meetings is prohibitive for many Indonesians. Strategic planning could suggest ways to solve these and related problems. Increasingly, the missionary effort must be made by Indonesians who usually cannot bear the cost themselves. As the nation progresses economically, the Church will also become more self sufficient; but for many years, the Church in Indonesia will require large subsidies from the central treasury. However, Indonesia will, for the foreseeable future, have a large population of expatriate Americans, an unusual source of talent that the Church should find ways to tap more effectively. 

The Indonesian government, aware of its bureaucratic inadequacy to eliminate mass poverty has invited organized religions to sponsor humanitarian programs. Several Christian churches, by initiating such projects as farmers’ cooperatives and low-lift primary irrigation systems, have created a fund of good will which has permitted them to expand their missionary efforts. The Mennonites, with few missionaries and limited resources, were singled out for their charity work. In the slums of Calcutta, Mother Teresa has received world acclaim. Others are making similar efforts in Indonesia. Quaker groups still exercise significant influence in meeting human needs in Vietnam and also in Indonesia. 

If service to our brothers and sisters is really service to our God, Indonesia offers an arena for a genuine contribution. In addition, the Church could also profitably reexamine its refusal to cooperate with other social and religious associations and groups. In Indonesia, that means the prestigious and influential Indonesian Council of Churches.

The Church is socially and politically vulnerable despite sizeable investments of time and money. If it wishes to continue to grow in Indonesia, fresh missionary approaches and different organizational forms will be required. Success or failure here will have profound implications for further missionary activities elsewhere in Asia and other Third World countries. Furthermore, the Church has too much to offer Indonesians, spiritually and temporally. This young nation will continue to experience accelerated pressures for social change. The Church’s historical legacy of emotion-laden rewards like belonging, security, awe, ecstacy, and zeal offer much to seekers. 

Several million Indonesians wait to hear and accept the gospel, but the Church in Indonesia has a future only if it successfully changes the present organizational obstacles into organizational opportunities. 

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[1] Typescript of historical records in the Indonesian Missionary Center, Jakarta. See R. Lanier Britsch, “Mormon Missions: An Introduction to the Latter-day Saints Missionary System,” Occasional Bulletin of Missionary Research 3 (Jan. 1977) : 22-27. 

[2] See my “Spreading the Gospel in Indonesia: A Jonah and a Contagion,” photocopy of typescript, pp. 10-11; notes prepared in Indonesia May to December 1980 and edited in Alaska in January 1981 (offset). Copies in Brigham Young University Special/Mormon collection and the Church’s Historical Office, Salt Lake City. 

[3] The attempted take-over of the government occurred in September-October 1965. Six generals were murdered as well as the five-year-old daughter of a general’s aide and the aide. In the recriminatory bloodbath that followed, approximately 500,000 died. See Arnold C. Brackman, The Communist Collapse in Indonesia (Singapore: Asia Pacific Press, 1970) ; John Hughes, Indonesian Upheaval (New York: David McKay Co., 1967), and Justus Marie Van der Kroef, Indonesia Since Sukarno (Singapore: Asia Pacific Press, 1971). 

[4] The Catholic Church in Indonesia (Jakarta: The Documentation/Information Department, Kantoro Waligereja Indonesia, Taman Cut, Mutiah 10, 1975), p. 92.

[5] See “President Asks Catholic and Protestant Leaders foreign missionaries should be replaced,” Indonesian Times, 10 Sept. 1979, p. 1. President Suharto stated: “Like in the business field expatriates in religious field should eventually be replaced by Indonesian nationals.” In the Indonesian mission files is a letter from Vice President Adam Malik to David M. Kennedy, Special Representative, dated 27 Oct. 1979: “We have noted the number of missionaries . . . serving in Indonesia has been reduced from ninety to fifty-three. . . . We appreciate the fact that it is your intention to make . . . further reduction . . . the next year or two to about forty.” A statement by the Minister of Religious Affairs, Haj Alamoyah Ratuperwiranegara, in “Indonesianisation of Foreign Missionaries Has to Go-on Minister,” Indonesian Times, 18 Oct. 1980, p. 3: “The Indonesian Government now requires that churches which still employ expatriates draw up concrete plans related to their replacement.” 

[6] See Nena Vreeland et al., Area Handbook for Indonesia (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1970), pp. 208-11; James L. Peacock, Indonesia: An Anthropological Perspective (Pacific Palisades, Calif.: Goodyear Publishing Co., 1973), and Brian May, The Indonesian Tragedy (Singapore: Graham Brash Ltd., 1978). 

The Catholic church under the Sukarno regime was particularly well treated. During the struggle for independence, a summary execution of Sukarno was reportedly planned soon after the Dutch captured Jogjakarta, the temporary capitol city, in December 1948. Only after strong representations by Monseigneur Sugiopranoto, the Roman Catholic bishop of Semarang, to Dutch authorities Sukarno’s life was spared. “This is said to have been one of the major reasons for the close friendship between the Bishop and Sukarno and the favored view he always held [of] Indonesian Catholics.” See C. S. M. Penders, The Life and Times of Sukarno (Singapore: Oxford University Press, 1975), p. 132.

[7] The observations of Siauw Giap, a scholar of multi-racial societies in southeast Asia, are particularly relevant in which he notes that few Chinese become Muslim, but more seriously, a breakdown in social structures fosters racial and religious quarrels. See J. A. C. Machie, “Anti-Chinese Outbreaks in Indonesia 1959—1968” in his The Chinese in Indonesia (Honolulu: The University Press of Hawaii, 1976), especially p. 81; see my “Spreading the Gospel in Indonesia,” especially the appendix. For a summary account of the November / December 1980 Chinese riots, see “Indonesia in 1980: Regime Fatiqua,” Asian Survey 21 (Feb. 1981) : 242-43. The implications of such events for the LDS missionary work in Third World societies are discussed in my “Expanding LDS Church Abroad: Old Realities Compounded,” DIALOGUE: A JOURNAL OF MORMON THOUGHT 8 (Spring 1980): 8-22. 

[8] Sartono Kartodirdjo, Protest Movements in Rural Java (Singapore: Oxford University Press, 1973).

[9] See Frank Cooley, “Focus on Indonesia,” Occasional Bulletin of Missionary Research 1 (Oct. 1977): 1, which summarizes a study undertaken from 1968 to 1976, when the post-Sukarno policies became evident to the Christian community. Some of those circumstances seemed threatening (resurgent, reactive Islam and Hinduism) and others challenging (the massive penetration of outside economics, political, cultural and social forces). The results of the 1980 Indonesian census are not available. The 1971 census shows a Christian population approaching ten million or 7.4 percent of the total population. The census breakdown follows: Islam 103,579,496 or 87.5 percent; Catholicism 2,692,215 or 2.3 percent; non-Catholic Christianity 6,049,491 or 5.1 percent; Hinduism 2,296,299 or 1.9 percent; Buddhism 1,092,314 or 0.9 percent; Confucianism 972,133 or 0.8 percent, and others 1,685,902 or 1.4 percent. Total population 118,367,850 or 99.9 percent. The 1980 census includes a new category for mystic religious groups which will decrease the percentage of Muslim and increase the percentage of Christian adherents. 

[10] See Avery T. Wells, Jr., Indonesian Revival: Why Two Million Came to Christ (South Pasadena, Calif.: William Carey Library, 1977) and George W. Peters, Indonesian Revival: Focus on Timor (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan Publishing House, 1973).

[11] These percentages are approximate, totalling 97 percent; see Cooley, “Focus on Indonesia,” p. 6. The study does not mention the LDS Church in Indonesia.

[12] The Catholic Church in Indonesia, pp. 45-51. 

[13] See Clifford Geertz, The Religion of Java (Glencoe, 111.: The Free Press, 1960).

[14] See Karl D. Jackson, Traditional Authority, Islam, Rebellion: A Study of Indonesian Political Behavior (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980) ; Sidney R. Jones, “It Can’t Happen Here: A Poet-Khomeini Look at Indonesian Islam,” Asian Survey, 20 (March 1980): 311—23; and Shahrough Akhava, Religion and Politics in Contemporary Iran: Clergy-State Relations in the Pahlavi Period (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1980). Many Indonesians are frightened that this kind of behavior will encompass their country. 

[15] Niels Mulder, Mysticism and Everyday Life in Contemporary Indonesia (Singapore: Singapore University Press, 1978), p. 7. 

[16] Willis, Indonesian Revival, p. 114-15. 

[17] See “Manage Resources Efficiently, Church Officers Counseled,” Ensign 11 (May 1981): 96. 

[18] Jan Shipps, “The Mormons: Looking Forward and Outward,” Christian Century 95 (Aug. 16-23, 1978) : 764. 

[19] See “Mormon Ahmadiyah Kristen,” Tempo 9(27 Oct. 1979) : 20, sometimes spelled Ahmadiyya or Ahmadiyah, established by Mirza Ghulam Ahmad (1835-1908). Ahmad longed for a regeneration of Islam and spent years studying his own and other religions. He claimed to receive revelation giving him the right of homage. Jesus foretold the coming of a messenger called Ahmad and he considered himself a prophet, contradicting Islam doctrine. He upheld polygamy, banned tobacco, and fostered cooperative ventures. His members are generally prosperous. In 1953 disturbances in the Punjab focused on this “infidel” Muslim sect. 

[20] Harold J. Leavitt, William R. Dill, and Henry B. Eyring, The Organizational World (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc. 1973), p. 306.

[21] Donald A. Schon, Beyond the Stable State (New York: W. E. Norton & Co., 1971), esp. ch. 4, “Diffusion of Innovation.” 

[22] Specifically relating to religious activities, see David J. Hellelgrave, “Conclusions: What Causes Religious Movements to Grow?” in his Dynamic Religious Movements, Case Studies of Rapidly Growing Religious Movements Around the World (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Book House, 1978), pp. 297-326. Included in his study was the LDS Church. 

[23] See also, for example, Irish Catholic priest Charles Burrows, who unobtrusively walked into an abysmally poor fishing village, Calicap, on the south coast of Java, dressed like a castaway. He taught the villagers to farm, build roads, bridges, and schools, and developed art programs. Peter O’Sullivan, “Charlie Burrows into Their Hearts,” Asian Magazine 26 (Taiwan), 1 March 1981, p. 12.