(RNS) — In early December the Syro-Malankara Church, a church that traces its origins to the first-century journey of the Apostle Thomas to India, had its first bishop installed in Britain, a sign of its rapid increase in local membership. Its joins another denomination, the Syro-Malabar Church, which has also boomed in Britain in recent years, with dozens of new missions across the country.
The uncommon rise of both churches, according to their leaders, is not due to evangelization but avid recruiting by the UK’s National Health Service in the southern Indian state of Kerala.
Kerala, which has the largest Christian minority population of any other Indian state, has benefited from its relationships with Christian organizations that over the decades have founded and supported professional schools there. Since Brexit has reduced the supply of immigrant help from Europe, Britain, with its longstanding ties to India, has increasingly turned to these training colleges, which have a track record of producing highly qualified nurses and other healthcare workers.
Last year the Welsh government signed a memorandum with Kerala’s government to hire 300 healthcare staff. Barnsley Hospital, in South Yorkshire, has hired 100 nurses from Kerala since 2020; Humber and North Yorkshire Integrated Care Board has recruited a similar number. Kerala …