Tag Archives: Christian Persecution

Christianity Facing Extinction in Many Middle Eastern Countries

Aid groups told Fox News on Tuesday that Christianity could vanish in the Middle East within the next decade as many Christians are being killed, ran out of their homes, or forced to renounce their faith in order to live.

As Islamic State radicals plague Syria and Iraq and continuously kill Christians and others with different religious views than their own, other areas are continuing to put pressure on Christians including Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and other Gulf nations.

A report done by the international Catholic charity Aid to the Church in Need states that the Christian population in Iraq was 1.5 million in 2003, and now in 2015, there is estimated to about 275,000. The numbers continue to dwindle as Christians are killed, living in secret, or flee. In Iraq alone, a dozen Christian families flee each and every day according to 21st Century Wilberforce Initiative, a Falls Church, Va., nonprofit dedicated to promoting religious freedom worldwide.

“Unless the global community gets involved, we will witness the loss of Christian witnesses in a land that is biblically significant,” Elijah Brown, executive vice president for 21st Century Wilberforce, told FoxNews.com.

He told Fox News that Iraq’s second largest city has been purged of Christians after ISIS took over.

“Last Christmas was the first time that bells did not ring out in the city of Mosul in 2,000 years,” Brown said. “I think that speaks to the reality that hundreds of thousands of Christian families are living on the edge of extinction.”

And while Christians in Syria and Iraq continue to flee in fear of ISIS, one Middle Eastern country was mentioned in the report as being tolerant and protective of their Christian community: Egypt. Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi has vowed numerous times to protect the Coptic Christians and even attended Christmas church services with them as a sign of tolerance and solidarity.

“Such a development holds out a potential beacon of hope for Christians and others in the Middle East against a backdrop of growing Islamism,” the report stated.

While the Middle East is the most well-known area for Christian persecution, Christianity in Africa and Asia is in danger too. Boko Haram, an Islamist terror group, has killed several Christians in Nigeria and has sparked other extremists to do so in Sudan, Kenya, Tanzania, and other parts of the continent. Christians located in Asia face persecution from nationalist religious movements such as Muslim, Hindu, and Buddhist in countries such as Pakistan, Hindu, and Myanmar. In most of these countries, Christianity is viewed as a foreign, Western practice, according to Fox News.

7th Grade Texas Student Told to Deny God as Part of Classroom Assignment

A junior high school in Katy, Texas is under scrutiny after a teacher gave an assignment to her class where they had to deny the existence of God.

Student Jordan Wooley, 12, told ABC News that her reading class was given an assignment to identify statements as fact or opinion. When Jordan marked the statement “There is a God” as both a fact and an opinion, her teacher marked the answer as wrong. According to USA Today Jordan tried to explain to the teacher that it could be either answer, based on a person’s beliefs, but the teacher stated the answer was still wrong and that Jordan had to say God wasn’t real. The assignment was graded so if she did not deny God, she couldn’t pass the assignment.

Jordan then told her mom when she got home.

“In this day in age, I would have never guessed that something like this would happen in a classroom in America,” Chantel Wooley told ABC News.

The Wooleys then visited the school district’s Board of Education meeting to inform them of the situation.

“Today I was given an assignment in school that questioned my faith,” Jordan said at the meeting.

The Katy Independent School District has apologized since the incident and released a statement saying that the exercise was intended to encourage critical thinking, not question any religious beliefs of the students.

“Still this does not excuse the fact that this ungraded activity was ill-conceived and because of that, its intent had been misconstrued,” the district said in its statement.

The teacher in question has not responded to any requests for comments regarding the situation.

TruNews: Bremerton High School Coach Placed on Leave for Praying

TRUNEWS – Coach Joe Kennedy has been placed on paid administrative leave.

The Bremerton High School football coach in the state of Washington has come under fire for praying after games. The school district plans to pay him through the remainder of his contract but he will not be allowed to participate in the football program.

For the past few years, he would go to the 50-yard line of the field after the crowds left the stands, to give thanks to God. A few students started joining him, of their own free will, and that’s when the school board stepped in.

Washington Football Coach May Be Fired over Prayer

Photo Courtesy of the Liberty Institute

Joe Kennedy, a high school football coach in Bremerton, Washington, was told that he could be fired if he continued to lead prayer in front of students on public school property.

The school district told Kennedy in a letter that while the former Marine is allowed to pray at work, he cannot do so in front of students. This includes even bowing his head, taking a knee, or any other action that would indicate that he could be praying.

The issue stems from Kennedy’s tradition of praying in the middle of the football field after every game. While other people can join voluntarily, the district believes it could alienate the students and staff that participate in different religious practices.

“Your talks with students may not include religious expression, including prayer,” Superintendent Aaron Leavall wrote. “They must remain entirely secular in nature, so as to avoid alienation of any team member.”

State Superintendent Randy Dorn backed the district’s decision.

“School staff exercising their right to silently pray in private on their own is fine. But leading a prayer isn’t,” he said. “School officials are role models; leading a prayer might put a student in an awkward position, even if the prayer is voluntary. For students who don’t share the official’s faith, players, the official’s public expression of faith can seem exclusionary or even distressing.”

The school district also state that Kennedy’s religious practices violate federal law that separates church and state, and possibly leaving the school and district open to lawsuits.

The irony of this is that they are already being sued by the Liberty Institute who is representing Kennedy. They state that the district is violating his religious freedom.

“The ball is in their court, the school district’s court,” said Mike Berry, senior counsel with Liberty Institute. “They have the opportunity to make this right, to do the right thing and to follow the law.”

Attorney Hiram Sasser added this: “What they are saying is he cannot pray by himself, he cannot simply take a knee at the 50-yard-line,” Sasser said. “That’s like telling a coach he can’t wear a yarmulke if he’s Jewish, he can’t wear a turban if he’s a Sikh, he can’t pray to Mecca if he’s a Muslim, he can’t wear a cross necklace if he’s a Christian.”

While the suit will be filed by the end of the week, Coach Kennedy will still lead the football team on Friday night, and plans to continue his tradition of praying at the 50-yard-line.

Hindu Extremists Order Christian Missionaries to Leave Nepal

Extremist Hindu groups have warned foreign Christian missionaries to leave Nepal. Even though there is a new Constitution that bans people from converting others to their faith, the extremists are blaming Christians for “corrupting the country.”

Morcha Nepal, a Hindu radical group, was handing out leaflets throughout Nepal, warning Christian missionaries to leave according to a report from the International Christian Concern. A report in Fides News Agency stated that the leaflets read: “Foreign influence have manipulated government decisions” and “Christians have corrupted the country.”

A statement from the extremist group says: “From today, the Morcha declares Nepal a Christian-free Hindu nation. We warn all the Christian religious leaders to leave Nepal, and appeal to all those who converted to Christianity to return home [convert back to Hinduism].”

Despite the warnings, the Fides News Agency has reported that several Christian missionaries will stay. In Nepal, 1.4% of people are Christians and 81.3% identify as Hindu.

The warnings come after Morcha Nepal was responsible for attacks on two churches in the Jhapa region of Nepal. The bombings happened after Nepal’s Constituent Assembly received and turned down many calls to revert the country back into an official Hindu state.

Report Says One Christian Martyred Every 5 Minutes

A new report from Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe shows that one Christian is being martyred worldwide every five minutes.

Massimo Introvigne told a conference there are about 105,000 Christians killed every year for their faith.  That number doesn’t include victims of war.

“If these numbers are not cried out to the world, if this slaughter is not stopped, if it is not acknowledged that the persecution of Christians is the first worldwide emergency in the matter of violence and religious discrimination, the dialogue between religions will only produce beautiful conferences but no concrete results,” Introvigne said according to Zenit.org.

The data also showed that between 50,000 and 70,000 Christians are being held in North Korean prison camps.

The report’s publishers said they were making the information available for Christians to keep in mind during the upcoming National Day of Prayer.

“I think it’s important considering all that has happened in the last year, from Iraq to Syria, to the issues of persecution in North Korea; that we have a time here in America to come together and pray as one body of believers for the people who are part of our family, who are persecuted,” Open Doors CEO and President David Curry said.

Davis Case Brings Religious Freedom Issues to Forefront

The recent jailing of a Christian in Kentucky because of her stand for her beliefs is bringing about a national debate on the issue of religious freedom and religious accommodation.

Kim Davis, a county clerk in Kentucky, recently spent five days in jail because she refused to compromise her Christian beliefs.

“Thank you all so much. I love you all so very much,” she said. “I just want to give God the glory. His people have rallied, and you are a strong people. We serve a living God who knows exactly where each and every one of us is at. Just keep on pressing. Don’t let down, because he is here. He’s worthy.”

The lawyers in the case say the problem is that the judge involved with the case will not make an accommodation to Davis based on her faith that would allow her to complete her tasks without violating her “Constitutionally protected” freedom of speech.

“We’ve asked for a simple solution — get her name and authority off the certificate. The judge could order that,” attorney Mat Staver said.

Now, the Kentucky legislature has a majority of members calling on the Governor to hold a special session to look at religious accommodation laws and ways that the religious freedom of people of all faiths can be protected.  The Governor has refused stating a desire to not spend taxpayer dollars.

Missouri lawmakers have also announced an intention to introduce laws to “protect religious liberty.”

Iraq Documents Christian Persecution

The Iraqi government has begun to document the persecution of Christians in areas that are under the control of the Islamic terrorist group ISIS.

The revelation from Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki comes one day after the terrorists told Christians in their territory to pay a tax, convert to Islam or be killed.

“What is being done by the Daesh terrorist gang against our Christian citizens in Ninevah province, and their aggression against the churches and houses of worship in the areas under their control reveals beyond any doubt the extremist criminal and terrorist nature of this group,” al-Maliki said in a statement.  Daesh is the Arabic acronym for ISIS.

“Those people, through their crimes, are revealing their true identity and the false allegations made here and there about the existence of revolutionaries among their ranks.”

The news that the Iraqi government is tracking the abuse of Christians was welcomed by Christian persecution watchdog groups such as Open Doors.

“This is a positive first step, by which the government acknowledges that something is wrong with the way Christians are being treated in Iraq and that this needs to change. It is the first time that the government is officially investigating this, after decades of discrimination and abuse,” Henriette Kats, persecution analyst for Open Doors, stated to reporters.

“The establishment of the Islamic State (ISIS) in June 2014 has brought about a further radicalization of Iraqi society, a development that has been ongoing since the US invasion in 2003. Corruption plays an important role in the persecution of Christians as can be seen in the ransoms demanded and the illegal taking of Christian-owned houses and land.”

Iraq is listed third on Open Doors’ list of nations that persecute Christians.

Pakistani Christian Killed by Muslim In-Laws After Wife Accepts Christ as Lord

A 28-year-old Pakistani Christian was murdered by his in-laws after his wife proclaimed Christ as Lord and turned away from Islam.

Aleem Masih was shot three times by the father and brothers of his wife Nadia.  The couple was attempting to flee from Lahore, Pakistan to avoid the very situation in which they were killed.

“The couple fled to Narang Mandi, some 60 kilometers [37 miles] away from Lahore, as Nadia’s Muslim family launched a manhunt for them to avenge the shame their daughter had brought upon them by recanting Islam and marrying a Christian,” Aneeqa Maria, an attorney from the human rights organization The Voice Society, told Morning Star News.

The girl’s family found the couple in a rickshaw and dragged them to a farm where they were severely beaten and shot.  Nadia survived her wounds and was taken to a hospital where she continues to recover.

“The attackers returned to their village and publicly proclaimed that they had avenged their humiliation and restored the pride of the Muslims by killing the couple in cold blood,” Maria explained. “Nadia’s brother, Azhar, then presented himself before the police and confessed to having killed his sister and her Christian husband.”

Muslims in the region are threatening officials to not investigate the case and not to file charges against the girl’s family for their actions.

China Crackdown on Crosses Draws Backlash

“Aren’t you ashamed of what you have done?” a crying woman screamed at the security guards keeping the parishioners of Lower Dafei Catholic Church from protecting their church’s cross.

The woman was part of a dozen Chinese Catholics who tried to stop the government from cutting the cross off the top of their building.

“We have violated no law. We do not oppose the government,” said the parishioner, who gave his name only as Chen for fear of retaliation from authorities. “We have been good, law-abiding citizens.”

Tu Shouzhe told ABC News about the government ripping the cross from his church’s building.

“It was a surprise attack. We did not let them in, but they broke in by cutting off the lock. We demanded paperwork, but they showed us none. They cordoned us away from the church,” Tu said. “They had 60-70 people. We had just about a dozen or so. Everyone was crying. Our hearts ached. We felt powerless to resist, and only prayed and sang hymns.”

Chinese Christians are rising up against the government’s actions to the level that even some of the “official” churches are starting to rebel.  The Christian Associations in the nation – which was designed to ensure the Communist Party’s control over churches – has said that the government’s actions are out of line.  They warned the action could turn the faithful into “enemies of the party.”

“The crackdown has alienated the Christians in China, who are otherwise law-abiding citizens,” Yang Fenggang, an expert on China’s religions at Purdue University, told the Associated Press.