Can Christian Publishing Survive in a Country Where Few Still Read?

Only 1 out of every 1,000 Indonesians is an avid reader, according to UNESCO’s 2012 reading interest index. The country also ranks second to last in a list of the world’s most literate countries, which examined tests as well as “literate behaviors” such as the number of libraries and newspapers and the availability of computers and years of schooling in a nation.

In such a challenging climate, can local Christian publishing survive?

Indonesian pastors and publishers say yes, although it might look different from the golden years of the early 2000s. It may include collecting donations to give away books to the impoverished, drumming up excitement over book releases with Zoom talks, or polling local seminaries and churches to determine which books they should translate into Bahasa Indonesia.

Indonesians can also learn from one of Indonesia’s most prolific Christian writers, Andar Ismail, whose 33-book Selamat series sold tens of thousands of copies in the late 1990s and 2000s.

Even as reading falls out of the zeitgeist, Christians believe it has an important role in spiritual maturity.

“Congregations should not rely only on weekly sermons to strengthen their faith,” said Susanto, a pastor and current chairman of Gloria Foundation, which oversees two Christian publishing companies. “They need to develop their spiritual journeys themselves, such as through quality books.”

An industry in crisis

The low interest in reading points to Indonesia’s strong oral culture, where stories and knowledge were traditionally passed through spoken rather than written word. Researchers also point to underfunded libraries, expensive book costs, and an education system that doesn’t encourage reading books outside of the classroom.

Casthelia Kartika, president of Amanat Agung Theological Seminary in Jakarta, noted that in the past, education was not a top priority in the country as families struggled to make ends meet. As the economy improved, especially in the cities, parents started focusing more on their children’s education, which led to an improvement in literacy. However, the recent rise of smartphone usage is pulling Indonesians toward watching videos or playing games instead of reading.

“Although the awareness of the importance of reading has started flourishing, teachers still need to further develop the passion to read books among their students,” Kartika noted.

This is apparent at her seminary, where some professors struggle to teach classes where few students complete the required readings. At the same time, the lecturers themselves often aren’t readers either, which keeps them from writing books and sharing Indonesian theology with the rest of the world. “There are actually a lot of smart theologians in Indonesia, but it is so hard to encourage them to write books,” she said.

In addition, the economic slowdown caused by the COVID-19 pandemic led to the closure of brick-and-mortar bookstores and a plunge in book sales. In 2010, Indonesia had about 600 bookstores across the country. Now the number has dwindled to 100, according to Susanto.

Odessa Diaz Krisdiyanto, coordinator of Literatur Perkantas Jatim (East Java InterVarsity Literature) said that before the pandemic, the publishing house printed about 15 titles a year, all of which were translated from English, and it took about six months to sell out the print runs of roughly 2,000 copies. Last year, they only printed 8 titles, and selling the copies took a year.

During COVID-19, sales slowed as “customers shifted their reading habits to online media and their spending priority to the health of their families,” Krisdiyanto said.

Still, Literatur Perkantas has a leg up on other Christian book publishers, as they have been selling books online since 2017. This year, Perkantas may be able to publish as many titles as they did pre-pandemic, although with a smaller number of copies in print.

Other Christian publishers are not as lucky. Susanto said both publishing houses under Gloria, Katalis and Graffa, suffered substantially from the recent downturn. Katalis publishes discipleship books, while Graffa publishes popular Christian titles.

Started in the 1980s, Gloria initially only printed Our Daily Bread in the Indonesian language, presented in a simple format and distributed free of charge. Several years later, the booklets were printed more professionally and sold for a slight profit. Not long afterward, Gloria also started printing foreign and local Christian books.

“During the rosy years of the early 2000s, we could print and sell up to 150,000 copies of Our Daily Bread each month and about 100 book titles,” Susanto recalled. “Today, we can only print around 24,000 copies of the monthly edition and 10,500 of the quarterly editions.” In total, Katalis and Graffa only managed to publish 8 book titles in 2023.

The slump in sales has led Gloria to rent out some of their office space to other firms in their Yogyakarta building.

Kartika, meanwhile, is mildly optimistic that Christian publishers will be able to survive in the years to come. “They might not perish, but they might not flourish either,” she said. “The demand and need for books will continue to exist, but it will not be as massive as in the past.”

The rise of the Selamat series

One Christian book series that has seemingly defied the dominance of Indonesia’s oral culture is Ismail’s Selamat, published over the past four decades. A former pastor of the Samanhudi Indonesian Christian Church in Jakarta and a professor of theology and pedagogy at Jakarta Theological Seminary, Ismail is unique in that he can present difficult doctrinal topics in a down-to-earth way. This set his books apart from other Christian books at the time, which were mainly targeted to intellectuals.

In the Indonesian language, the word selamat is used for greetings or congratulations, and it can also mean “safe from harm” and “salvation.” Each of the approximately 130-page books includes 33 short stories covering a wide range of topics like the biographies of well-known Christian figures, morals gleaned from traditional Javanese wayang puppet shows, profiles of faithful “no-name” pastors, and vignettes from Ismail’s own spiritual journey. Some stories are funny, while others are thought-provoking, inspirational, or even tear-jerking. Their common denominator is Ismail’s portrayal of the matchless love of Christ.

Ismail published the first two books in the series, Selamat Natal (Merry Christmas) and Selamat Paskah (Happy Easter), in 1981 and 1982. After a decade-long break where he focused on studying overseas, he published his third book, Selamat Pagi Tuhan (Good Morning, Lord). From then until 2022, he published a new book every year.

For two decades, Selamat books were bestsellers for the Christian publishing house BPK Gunung Mulia, according to former CEO Stephen Z. Satyahadi. Selling more than 10,000 copies of a Christian book is considered a rare achievement in Indonesia, and scores of Ismail’s books have sold up to 70,000–80,000 copies over the years, with earlier editions reprinted more than 30 times.

“Through the easy-to-understand yet deeply meaningful stories, Ismail could help nurture the spiritual understanding of readers from all levels of educational backgrounds,” said Ismail’s close friend Sunoko Nugroho Samiadji. He noted that Ismail wrote many of the books by hand before Samiadji helped type them up on a computer.

One of Samiadji’s favorite short stories in the series is Ismail’s analysis of Rembrandt van Rijn’s painting, The Return of the Prodigal Son. The pastor also wrote about Muslim figures who painted or wrote about Jesus, including journalist Goenawan Mohamad and poet Chairil Anwar, and how their unique viewpoints draw out different aspects of the Savior.

To acknowledge Ismail’s significant contribution to the Christian community, Indonesia’s Christian Art and Literature Festival awarded him the Tokoh Inspiratif (Inspirational Figure) award in August 2018.

After completing the series, Ismail went on to publish Tukang Antar Selamat (Courier of Salvation) in 2023, another collection of 33 stories. Now 84, Ismail plans to publish yet another book this year.

Finding new ways to attract readers

Yet even the sale of Ismail’s books have been affected by the recent downturn in reading. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, Gunung Mulia has halved the number of first printing copies of Ismail’s new books to 5,000. (Ismail, so far, has refrained from selling his series as e-books, as few Indonesians read electronic books.)

As a result of the bearish climate, publishers are looking for ways to increase interest and to tailor what they publish to local demands.

Graffa has started to hold online book discussions and reviews. For instance, following the release earlier this year of an Indonesian translation of the book When Children Come Out: A Guide for Christian Parents by Mark Yarhouse and Olya Zaporozhets, they invited Dwidjo Saputro, a local pastor and expert on child psychology, to give several talks about the book over Zoom. Hundreds of people joined in.

Literatur Perkantas, meanwhile, has been communicating with seminaries and other Christian institutions to figure out which foreign books they want translated for their students and members. In the past, Perkantas mainly based translation decisions on a book’s popularity overseas.

Since 2021, Perkantas has also started publishing books by local authors, such as Leadership Reformed and Menghidupi Injil & Menginjili Hidup (Living the Gospel & Evangelizing Life) by Sen Sendjaya, a professor of management and leadership at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in Australia.

Kartika believes that churches can help spur book sales by encouraging small-group book studies. She cowrote a series of Bible study books called Life Expedition , which sold more than 10,000 copies after small groups at several churches and high schools started using them.

Yoel M. Indrasmoro, pastor of Javanese Christian Church in Jakarta and former director of Literatur Perkantas Nasional, has a different approach to increasing reading among Christians.

During the pandemic, he started sharing a daily reflection and reading materials with more than 1,600 people through WhatsApp. As he developed closer personal ties with his readers, he asked them for financial support to send books to those in need, including pastors in impoverished areas and prison inmates. This developed into Tangan Terbuka Media (Open Arms Media), which publishes books by foreign and local authors.

In the past two years, Indrasmoro and Open Arms Media have sent 800 packages of books to pastors, priests, and nuns in Papua; more than 1,000 packages for pastors in East Nusa Tenggara; 650 packages for prison inmates in and around Jakarta; and almost 900 packages for teachers in Halmahera Island in North Maluku.

To distribute books to teachers, he worked with a council for Christian education in the province. Each package costs donors 164,000 rupiah ($10 USD) and consists of the books Sekolah Kristen dan Jalan Turun Yesus (Christian Schools and the Way of Jesus’ Descent) by Tyas Budi Legowo and Jujur Melangkah: 307 Renungan Kitab Amsal (Honest Steps: 307 Reflections from Proverbs) by Indrasmoro.

Indrasmoro urged other Christian publishers to build closer relations with their communities so that they could also raise support to distribute free books to those in need.

“So many church leaders and teachers in remote areas, and also prisoners, badly need books to enrich their lives,” he said. “But they don’t have the resources or access to get inspirational reading materials.”