Sentinel Watch March 12, 2012 Issue

Prayer that unmasks corruption

Mark Sappenfield

Courtesy photo

Recent events in India and Pakistan have deepened my appreciation of how the Christ operates to destroy deeply rooted claims of evil anywhere in the world.

In my two and a half years of traveling South Asia as a writer for The Christian Science Monitor, few things made more of an impression on me than the corrosive impact of corruption on the lives of individuals and the health of nations. I watched opportunistic policemen set up roadblocks to extract bribes from passing motorists. I met politicians who treated their seat in parliament like a birthright, exacting from their public office lucrative business deals and personal favors. I stood among women and children who had to collect their daily allotment of fresh water from the backs of trucks because a government riddled with self-serving bureaucrats had failed to install safe taps.

But now, there are growing signs of a backlash. In India, last summer’s hunger strike undertaken by Gandhian activist Anna Hazare spawned unprecedented public support. In Pakistan, the long-mocked Justice Party, founded on a platform of anticorruption, recently held a public rally of 100,000 people, and its leader tops national opinion polls.