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Christian missionary Daniel Stephan Courney, who incited Kukis against Meitei Hindus and Modi government, carries out mass conversion in Nepal

“Headed out to preach here in Nepal and distribute New Testaments and tracts in the local language. Thank you for your prayers,” Daniel Stephan Courney posted on Facebook.

Daniel Stephan Courney, a US-origin Christian missionary who was news last year for inciting Kukis against Meiteis in conflict-ridden Manipur and carrying out illegal conversion activities while on a tourist visa has now expanded his tentacles to Nepal.

On 5th January this year, Courtney, who calls himself a “missionary pastor” and “street preacher” published a Facebook post announcing his arrival in Nepal.

He has since then been involved in proselytization activities in the Hindu-majority country. “Headed out to preach here in Nepal and distribute New Testaments and tracts in the local language. Thank you for your prayers,” Daniel Stephan Courney posted on Facebook.

In a subsequent post, Courney shared a video wherein he along with a fellow missionary Sajan Shreshtha was giving a speech glorifying Jesus Christ and propagating Biblical beliefs in a busy market while the locals passed by.

Screengrab of the Facebook Post

Uploaded on the Facebook page of Liberating Truth, a Nepal Christian group and its YouTube channel, the video featuring Daniel Stephan Courney and Sajan Shreshtha has garnered thousands of views. Upon checking the Facebook page of Liberating Truth, OpIndia came across numerous videos featuring Daniel Stephan Courney giving speeches and distributing Christian proselytization-related literature to Nepali Hindus and other non-Christian locals earlier this month and in December 2024.

In one of his Facebook posts published on 16th January, Courney expressed his disdain for ‘idolatrous religion’ as he wrote, “Man-made idolatrous religion does not afford the consolation of a clear conscience, but the condemnation of a seared conscience.”

Screengrab of the Facebook Post

Another post demonstrating Courney’s hate for Hinduism and Hindus of India reads, “Christian, are you thankful that you don’t worship demons? Thank the true God! I wrote this 14 years when living in a slum in India:  “One man here recently gouged out his eyes because he believes one of his Hindu gods appeared to him in a dream and told him to do this. I am thankful I worship a God who does not ask his children to maim and torture themselves for Him.”

Screengrab of the Facebook Post

Raising alarm over Courney’s conversion activities and alleged attempts at carving out a Christian nation in a Hindu-majority Nepal, Bangladeshi journalist Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhary wrote on X, “Daniel Stephen Courney, who funds terrorist and separatist groups has started religious conversion in Nepal and working to create a separate state inside the country by forming “Army of Evangelists”.

During his time in Nepal in December 2024, Courney picked a Hindu temple to lure Hindus towards Christianity. Sharing a video of his propaganda, the evangelist wrote, “See how eagerly Nepalis gather on the grounds of a Hindu temple to hear the Word of God being preached.  Scores of New Testaments translated into the Nepali language were distributed, as well as countless Gospel tracts written by Sajan Shrestha. Thanks to Sajan for also interpreting and preaching!”

Screengrab of the Facebook Post

It is amusing that while Courney on numerous occasions expressed his hatred for idol-worshipping Hindus, he juxtaposed the settings of an average respectable Hindu house in India and an average American household and emphasised that while a nice Hindu house as a Pooja room, wherein idols of Hindu deities are installed and a diya is lighted regularly, a nice American house features a TV room, for worship of the pantheon of football, baseball, Netflix, ad nauseam.

“Every respectable Hindu house in India and Nepal features a *puja* room (*puja* literally means propitiatory ritual worship), to light the *diya* (small oil lamp) and offer supplication for good fortune for the day.   Like the puja room in the house we rent, it is typically a small, closet-like room with a ledge to hold a pantheon of idols.  (Every nice house in a America features a TV room, for worship of the pantheon of football, baseball, Netflix, ad nauseam.) Our Lord declared in Matthew 6:6: “But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.” Does your home feature a prayer closet, even a sanctum sanctorum (holy of holies)? How often do you frequent it? We do not need to have one, but our priorities are certainly displayed by the layout of our homes! May we “PRAY WITHOUT CEASING” (1 These. 5:17) and remember that every Christian home should be temple to the living God,” Courney wrote.

Screengrab of the Facebook Post

Interestingly, Courney was recently in Israel’s Jerusalem where he was carrying out conversion activities and was arrested for the same. The controversial evangelist was later put under house arrest by the Israeli police only to be released three days later.

Screengrab of the Facebook Post

It must be noted that in Nepal, an erstwhile Hindu Rashtra, Christian conversion is rampant with the community’s population having skyrocketed by 68% since 2011. OpIndia has time and again reported about Christian missionaries offering miraculous cures and financial inducements to poor and vulnerable people both in Nepal and India to lure them into Christianity.

Daniel Stephan Courney’s anti-Hindu activities in India

Daniel Stephan Courney entered India on a tourist visa in the year 2009, stayed for over a decade and participated in and supervised conversions to Christianity throughout what was formerly Andhra Pradesh. He stayed with his pastor friend in Gantur who advised him that he would have to marry locally if he wished to stay in India forever. So he got married to a Guntur District Telugu local and managed to safeguard his “Conversion Mission.”

In 2017, Courney was deported and blacklisted from India, however, in the year 2023, he re-entered India on a tourist visa. involved in proselytization activities in Manipur under the pretext of doing social service (distributing blankets and mattresses) and preaching Christianity. He later also distributed Bibles and delivered hate speech against Hindus and the BJP-led Indian government even though it is illegal to propagate any religion or undertake religious conversions in India while on a tourist visa.

On 5th August 2023, Daniel Stephan Courney posted a live video from Manipur and claimed that Christians were being persecuted and that the community was being deliberately targeted. “Christianity here is being deliberately targeted. There is a conflict between the Meitei and Kuki people. So Kukis are tribal Christians and they are being systematically persecuted. They are being run out of their homes. Their villages are burnt due to their Christian identity,” he said.

OpIndia reported earlier how the Christian missionary from the United States was spreading against the democratically elected Modi government and called it a “radical Hindu government” while accusing the government of inciting violence against Christians in Manipur and said that northeast India is a holy land of Christians. Not to forget, ousted Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina had earlier raised concerns about an American conspiracy to carve out a separate Christian nation by including parts of northeast India, Myanmar and Bangladesh.

In several of his social media posts, Courney was found spreading hatred against Meitei Hindus accusing them of feeling jealous and threatened by the ‘prosperity’ of Christian Kukis. He also broadly wished that the chief architect of India’s Constitution Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar should have converted to Christianity instead of Buddism. While he emphasised that the Indian constitution allows the propagation of religion, he did not mention that the same is not allowed for those arriving in India on tourist visas.

OpIndia found a video of Courney spreading hatred against the Indian government and Hindus in Manipur under the pretext of preaching Christianity. “The Hindus many times tried to kill me for preaching about Jesus. They put ropes around my neck. They beat me with sticks. They threw me on the ground and stepped on my head. They say you must say Jai Shri Ram or else we’ll kill you. And I said I will not wear tika (kumkum on forehead), I will not praise your God. They hit me in my face as I refused to say, Jai Shri Ram. I am Christian. I follow Jesus. Once they hit me so hard that I fell unconscious for 15 minutes. The Government of India might not help you but Lord will,” he said.

While in one of his posts, Courney tried to trash the allegations of carrying out illegal conversion activities in India and Nepal by saying that “I have been accused of bringing Christian nationalism to India and Nepal.” There is ample evidence of him inciting Kukis in Manipur against the Indian government and Hindus at a time when the Kuki-Meitei conflict was at its peak and the Indian authorities were working to restore peace and normalcy in the state.

Notably, several foreign elements have been trying to make inroads into the conflict-torn Manipur to back Christians in the state in some way or the other. In May 2024, the Manipur government rejected aid announced by the European Union for the families which suffered from hailstorms and heavy rain. EU had claimed that aid worth €250,000 (over 22.6 million Indian rupees) was made for the state of Manipur via humanitarian partner ADRA (Adventist Development and Relief Agency), which is a ‘humanitarian agency’ operated by the Seventh-day Adventist Church. OpIndia’s deep dive into ADRA’s activities found that the organisation, which is run by a church, uses these activities to convert vulnerable people to Christianity.

Multiple cases against Daniel Stephan Courney

Interestingly, back in 2017, Courney was convicted by a district judge at Lincoln Magistrate Court on two counts of religious and racially motivated public order offences in Lincolnshire after he made offensive comments against the Muslim community while speaking at an event in the High Street.

Daniel Stephen Courney was apprehended by police in April 2021 for stalking an abortion doctor in Englewood, NJ, using a camera and microphone-equipped drone outside Metropolitan Medical Associates on Engle Street. He also attempted to prevent patients from entering the reproductive health services clinic, which was found to be in violation of the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act.

In 2021, Daniel Stephen Courney along with two other missionaries were charged in New Jersey with violating the state’s anti-bias intimidation statute, specifically for “shouting homophobic rhetoric directly in front of Allure Salon” after preaching to the gay salon owner and an employee.

Notably, Courney, who is reported to be a US Army veteran, has also been accused of coordinating the supply of weapons, explosives, advanced communication devices, drones, and “logistics” to violent outfits in Manipur and other northeast Indian states. In December 2024, an old video, most probably from August 2023 went viral on social media wherein Courney who came on a tourist visa was seen distributing bulletproof jackets and drones to Kuki militants to monitor their enemies—Meitei Hindus in a strife-torn area.

While his anti-Hindu propaganda and Christian conversion activities in Indian states of Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Odisha, Chhattisgarh, and Manipur, particularly targeting vulnerable Hindus and tribals have already been a major concern, Daniel Stephan Courney’s proselytization and his intrusive and annoying ‘street preaching’ tactics in Nepal is concerning as to how come foreign nationals are being allowed to enter countries like India and Nepal and openly run hateful and divisive agenda coupled with Christian conversion in India while replicating the same in Nepal.

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