Although Christians in Nepal are growing in number, they have to contend with a rather unique problem: They are struggling to find land near their community where they can bury their dead, according to World Watch Monitor.
This is because non-Christians in Nepal, particularly in the capital Kathmandu, object to any burial near their communities.
To somehow address the problem, churches in Kathmandu and surrounding areas have bought a piece of land on a secluded mountain where a cemetery has been built.
But the problem is that the road leading to this cemetery is about 30 miles from Kathmandu and two miles from the main road. Moreover, the makeshift road is steep and only a 4×4 vehicle can traverse it. Few Christians can afford to hire, much less own such a vehicle.
As such, they have to trek for about an hour and a half from the main road carrying the remains of their loved ones before they could reach the cemetery.
Bishop Narayan Sharma of the Believers Church in Nepal said some Christians have tried to bury their dead on their own private land. But this, too, has become problematic since once their neighbours find out about this, they would demand that the bodies be taken out and put somewhere else.
"Though the government recognised the Christian community in Nepal and our Constitution gives equal rights to all religious communities in Nepal, still we struggle with (the issue of) the graveyard," Sharma said. "We don't know, after our death, where we will be taken for burial, where our bodies will be laid. We are still negotiating with the government, but so far there is no clue (as to what the government has done), no solution," he said.
This difficulty notwithstanding, Nepal's Christian population more than doubled from 180,000 in 2001 to 375,699 in 2011, when the latest official census was taken, according to World Watch Monitor.
Official records show that Christianity is the religion of just 1.4 percent of Nepal's population of 26.5 million. Hinduism dominates the land with 81.3 percent followers, followed by Buddhism (9 percent), Islam (4.4 percent) and Kirant (3 percent).
However, a Nikkei Asian Review report in December 2016 said there are now over a million Christian converts in Nepal, with the number still rising.
Moreover, the reports said the country also hosts more than 8,000 Christian churches.
Christianity appears to be thriving in Nepal despite the fact that the country has a strong Hindu influence and that proselytizing is still not allowed, according to Open Doors USA.
