Introduction / History

The Inanwatans are an indigenous group inhabiting the Inanwatan District, southwest Papua Province, on the west end of the island of New Guinea. It is part of Indonesia, a predominately Muslim islands nation. They were originally under Dutch colonial control before Indonesian independence put them under Indonesian governance. Their language is endangered as their youth become Indonesianized. Like most of Papua and New Guinea, they have gone from the Stone Age to the Space Age in the last eighty years.

What Are Their Lives Like?

Most live in small villages, where they engage in horticulture, sago harvesting, and fishing. Kinship and clan are important to them, as are family and village networks. Education and acculturation to Indonesian language and society weaken traditional practices. They have a rich ethnomusicology, especially in their religions.

What Are Their Beliefs?

They are religiously plural. There is traditional animism, Protestant Christianity, introduced by the Dutch; and Islam, the predominate religion of Indonesia. Animism influences both their Christianity and Islam. They have a rich mythology and ancestor veneration is significant. We can expect that animism will take a back seat to Christianity and Islam.

What Are Their Needs?

They need to preserve their language and culture in the face of acculturation to an increasingly dominate Indonesian culture. To that end, they need literacy, literature, and education in their mother tongue, as well as in Indonesian. They need better health care and preventative medicine, especially in the areas of maternal and infant health care. They need clean water.

Prayer Items

Pray for the improvement of health education, health care, and education at all levels.
Pray for clean water development.
Pray for their children to remain Christian in the face of cultural change.
Pray for a deeper Christian faith.
Pray that Christ-followers rise above nominalism and syncretism. Pray that believers reach out to non-believers with the faith.

Scripture Prayers for the Inanwatan, Suabo in Indonesia.

References

Simon Abdi Frank and Usman Idris, The Papuan Culture: : An Anthropological Review (2022)
Petrus Tekege and Marthan Raman, Papua People and Culture (2022)
Inawatan People, Wikipedia