ABSTRACT
Back in Dornakal, Vedanayagam Samuel Azariah continued his work of church building. He turned the small Indian Missionary Society mission outpost in Dornakal into the center of India’s fastest-growing Anglican diocese. Azariah’s success with the so-called ‘mass movements’ in Andhra eventually caught the eye and earned the disapproval of the broader non-Christian Indian community, including Gandhi. Azariah’s approach to mission in Dornakal was, first and foremost, orthodox and church-centered. The rising and sizable non-Catholic, Evangelical communities in Andhra, as in other parts of India, depended on conversions from the lowest ranks of the social hierarchy. Conversions to Christianity occurred in Andhra at a faster rate than in almost any other South Asian region during Azariah’s lifetime. Bishop Azariah described one confirmation service in a small forest village called Lankapalli in 1934 where he was greeted by ninety-six confirmation candidates and a few hundred Christians ‘from the neighbourhood.’
