The Persecuted Church

Galvasean

I say good look to them all. I had no idea the Saudi Arabian authorities were so.. I'm not sure if I can phrase this properly.. zealous in their prejudices?

Spyral

My understanding is that Scientologists have been denied permission to register as a religion in Germany, but must instead be registered as a commericial business. While that may be discrimination it hardly ranks as persecution. However, maybe I am misinformed. Maybe secret police in Frankfurt are pulling out Scientologists' toe nails with pliers as I write this post.

dont you have to pay money to advance to the nect rank in that religion or something ? ergo its a business ?

PDN

Three prominent Christian leaders from Hebei province were locked in an iron cage for insisting on their independence from China’s official church.

The three – Liang Aijun, Wang Zhong and Gao Jinbao – were in Inner Mongolia when they were seized by Chinese security police at a private home in Ximeng region. They were in hiding after resisting the authorities’ attempts to make them join the registered church.

When they were first arrested, they were caged like animals, denied water and barred from speaking. The three men have since been transferred to an undisclosed location.

A fourth church leader from Hebei, Cui Tai, has been detained by the Public Security Bureau (PSB) ever since he was involved in a minor motorbike accident in Zhuolu County in early July. His details were initially taken by the police but he was then handed over to the PSB. Cui Tai has also refused to register with the official church.

Meanwhile, in Xinjiang province, 10 PSB officials raided a house church and detained six of its members for 12 hours. One Christian was beaten up during the raid and a number of ‘illegal religious materials’ including Bibles were confiscated.

Members of the congregation were forced to sign an official document which stated that the signatory’s relatives would be held responsible if the signatory persisted in religious activities. It also claimed that Christians’ relatives were obliged to help believers ‘reform’ – and included a list of penalties for non-compliance.

China Aid reports that the son of the Christian whose home was raided has since been sacked from his job, reportedly as a direct consequence of his father’s church involvement.

* Pray for the swift release of the four church leaders from Hebei. Thank God for their principled stance against joining the officially recognised church.
* Pray that the national government will override Xinjiang officials’ attempts to punish Christians’ relatives simply by association.

Sources: AsiaNews; Assist News; BBC; China Aid Association; Christian Solidarity Worldwide; Compass Direct; International Christian Concern; RI sources; The News, Pakistan; The Voice of the Martyrs Canada.

DerKaiser

This thread is an affront to everyone who isn't Christian, the church is the worst bully of them all, let's face it, christians are vicious, why, 500 years ago I'd be burned at the stake for even saying this

philologos

Indeed some Christian leaders were vicious. Just look to Martin Luther and his case of anti-Semitism, which later inspired Hitler. But to say this for all Christians is a pure generalisation on your part.

PDN

DerKaiser wrote:

This thread is an affront to everyone who isn't Christian, the church is the worst bully of them all, let's face it, christians are vicious, why, 500 years ago I'd be burned at the stake for even saying this

No, it's only an affront to bigoted fatheads. Any sensible and reasonable non-Christian would have no problem with Christians, on a Christianity forum, wanting to pray for other Christians who are suffering persecution.

You might be burned at the stake 500 years ago, and that might be an argument for asserting that the Church was vicious 500 years ago, but it really is a very weak argument for saying that Christians are vicious today.

BrianCalgary

DerKaiser wrote:

This thread is an affront to everyone who isn't Christian, the church is the worst bully of them all, let's face it, christians are vicious, why, 500 years ago I'd be burned at the stake for even saying this

A couple of questions:

Can you define what you mean by church?
Can you tell us where they are the persecutors?

Thanks.

DerKaiser

I mean mainly the RC church, but it extends to anyone who has fundamentalist beliefs, and I must apologise for genralising, it's not all Christians, I have some very strong bonds with Christians, but there is recent evidence of violence perpetrated by all faiths, notably David Koresh, but that aside the USAF apparantly have a very strong christian core that bullies people of different faiths unless they convert, as one of the largest religions in the world in numbers and possibly the largest in popularity has very little worry of persecution, but feels free to abuse people of other or anti faiths, I have met people who regard themselves as "soldiers of the lord" and are very intimidating towards athiests and such like, so if the Christians feel like their being persecuted for their faith, pull the other one, mate, it's got bells on it!

PDN

DerKaiser wrote:

I mean mainly the RC church, but it extends to anyone who has fundamentalist beliefs, and I must apologise for genralising, it's not all Christians, I have some very strong bonds with Christians, but there is recent evidence of violence perpetrated by all faiths, notably David Koresh, but that aside the USAF apparantly have a very strong christian core that bullies people of different faiths unless they convert, as one of the largest religions in the world in numbers and possibly the largest in popularity has very little worry of persecution, but feels free to abuse people of other or anti faiths, I have met people who regard themselves as "soldiers of the lord" and are very intimidating towards athiests and such like, so if the Christians feel like their being persecuted for their faith, pull the other one, mate, it's got bells on it!

I'm not quite sure what the US Air Force has to do with anything (Or does USAF have some other meaning?)

Christians are currently being arrested, tortured & executed. This happens in Islamic countries and also in North Korea & China. Are you denying that this occurs? Or are you saying that because Catholics killed people 500 years ago then Christians have no right to object if they get tortured today?

Scofflaw

PDN wrote:

No, it's only an affront to bigoted fatheads. Any sensible and reasonable non-Christian would have no problem with Christians, on a Christianity forum, wanting to pray for other Christians who are suffering persecution.

You might be burned at the stake 500 years ago, and that might be an argument for asserting that the Church was vicious 500 years ago, but it really is a very weak argument for saying that Christians are vicious today.

As an atheist, I'm completely with PDN on this one. Those who are suffering persecution today are in exactly the same position as those who historically suffered at the stake - there is no 'turnaround' in this, but a continuation.

cordially,
Scofflaw

DerKaiser

PDN wrote:

I'm not quite sure what the US Air Force has to do with anything (Or does USAF have some other meaning?)

Christians are currently being arrested, tortured & executed. This happens in Islamic countries and also in North Korea & China. Are you denying that this occurs? Or are you saying that because Catholics killed people 500 years ago then Christians have no right to object if they get tortured today?

Absolutely not, but you're big and ugly enough to take care of yourselves, I think it's a tragedy, but as for "persecuted church", that's going a bit far, the klan are a christian group, right? Persecuted?

Fanny Cradock

DerKaiser wrote:

Absolutely not, but you're big and ugly enough to take care of yourselves, I think it's a tragedy, but as for "persecuted church", that's going a bit far, the klan are a christian group, right? Persecuted?

So let me get this straight. Individual Christians who are being tortured for their faith in China (no melodrama there) are to fend for themselves against the State? Perhaps they could use some Kung Fu moves!

You seem to feel the need to latch on to any group perpetrating violence - however tenuous their link with 'Christianity' is - and use that as a justification for your opinions. What in the world has the KKK or the USAF got to do with people in China?

What you have decided to do - I'm assuming this is through ignorance - is to lump all 'Christians' in together and blanket condemn us all. I do apologise for taking the moral high ground here, but I find your justifications difficult to take.

DerKaiser

Nothing whatsoever to do with people in China, I'm speaking more generally, but this I think you have already guessed, and are definitely on a tall horse of some description.

Please don't get me wrong, I do think it's awful that people, whatever your background is, can be treated like this, I just think the title is a little offensive,

Scofflaw

DerKaiser wrote:

Please don't get me wrong, I do think it's awful that people, whatever your background is, can be treated like this, I just think the title is a little offensive,

It refers to the "church" in the sense of the body of believers, not to the institutional church. It does have a ring of melodrama to it - except that we are talking about people being tortured here.

cordially,
Scofflaw

PDN

DerKaiser wrote:

Nothing whatsoever to do with people in China, I'm speaking more generally, but this I think you have already guessed, and are definitely on a tall horse of some description.

Please don't get me wrong, I do think it's awful that people, whatever your background is, can be treated like this, I just think the title is a little offensive,

How are we supposed to guess what you are thinking when you aren't very good at expressing it?

Actually there is nothing strange in referring to "the x church" when a section of the church is going through an experience (x). For example, in Nazi Germany there were a number of Christians who were known as "the Confessing Church" because they signed up to the Barmen Declaration and opposed Nazism. They were not an institutional body, and, sadly, they did not even constitute the majority of professing Christians in Germany.

Therefore, it is perfectly sensible for the thread to use the title "The Persecuted Church" in its commonly used meaning as referring to the millions of Christians who live under conditions of persecution.

PDN

Lawyers in Pakistan say that a growing number of young Christian girls are being abducted, forcibly converted to Islam and married to Muslim men.

The statement comes after the disappearance of two children from Faisalabad – followed by the delivery of marriage certificates to their parents’ homes.

Zunaira Rasheed, who is 11, vanished from her home on August 5. Her mother sold everything she owned to pay a man to trace her – but all she got in return was a marriage certificate signed by a Muslim cleric in Lahore. On it, Zunaira’s age was given as 18.

Shamaila Tabassum, 16, was last seen in a car with several Muslim neighbours, on the way, she said, to see her father in hospital after a ‘serious accident’. Her family smelled a rat when Shamaila’s father came home, in perfect health – and Shamaila did not.

Some days later, a certificate arrived at her parents’ home, announcing Shamaila’s marriage to one of her Muslim neighbours. The document was dated August 4 – 12 days before her disappearance. On both certificates, the girls had been given a Muslim name, suggesting they had converted to Islam.

The families’ lawyer Khalil Tahir said forcible conversions to Islam are on the increase, but poverty usually prevents Christian families from reporting such cases to the police. He is acting pro bono on these two cases – cases which the police have still to register under the penal code.

* Pray for the safe return of Shamaila and Zunaira. Ask God to protect them, physically and spiritually.
* Pray that the Pakistani authorities would do more to uphold the rights of religious minorities such as Christians, who are often considered second-class citizens.

hairyheretic

If true, I'd consider that very disturbing even without the religious angle.

PDN

hairyheretic wrote:

If true, I'd consider that very disturbing even without the religious angle.

Apparently this is happening to Hindu girls in Pakistan as well. The Asian Human Rights Commission has a report here: http://www.ahrchk.net/ua/mainfile.php/2007/2158/

wes

PDN wrote:

* Pray that the Pakistani authorities would do more to uphold the rights of religious minorities such as Christians, who are often considered second-class citizens.

I agree the Pakistani government needs to do a lot more. To be fair they do protect Churches with soldiers etc when things are going bad in the country. However, there is a lot more they could do, especially in the tribal area's where its most dangerous.

Just a quick note on Indonesia, is a secular country. There are some local councils that implement Sharia, but these are a minority last I checked, otherwise the country is a secular nation. Also, not defending the discrimination of the Christians as mentioned by the first poster, just pointing that Indonesia is a secular nation. The treatment of the Christians is deplorable and I hope there released soon.

Splendour

Unfortunately, we don't have to go as far as Asia to reveal the persecuted church. Channel 4's 'Dispatches' programme last night was quite disturbing.
It touched on Muslims' who are being persecuted for having converted to the Christian faith. Some Muslums (not all), see this as being an apostasy to their faith and the punishment is death!

Frightening stuff indeed and so close to home...

Sapien

Splendour wrote:

It touched on Muslims' who are being persecuted for having converted to the Christian faith. Some Muslums (not all), see this as being an apostasy to their faith and the punishment is death!

Not to be semantic, but it is apostasy. And when Christianity was Islam's age, it was executing people for apostasy too.

PDN

A Christian woman has been tortured to death in an Eritrean jail for refusing to deny Christ – the fourth believer to die in custody in less than a year.

Nigsti Haile, 33, died at the Wi’a Military Training Centre, near Massawa, on 5 September, 18 months after she and nine other Christian women were seized at a church meeting in Keren. Release International sources say Nigsti, a member of a Rhema church, had been under severe pressure to abandon her faith for all of that time.

Amnesty International reports that at least 21 other Christians have been arrested in Asmara since mid-August and are being held incommunicado. Among them were 10 members of the Full Gospel Church who, according to Amnesty, are now being held at the notorious Karchele security prison in the Eritrean capital.

Two young Christian men died of torture wounds at a military camp in October, while a third, Magos Solomon Semere, succumbed to four-and-a-half years’ abuse at a military base outside Assab in February.

UK-based Release-Eritrea believes the Eritrean authorities are turning up the pressure on the country’s evangelical Christians to ‘unprecedented levels’. Testimony from Eritrean refugees arriving at the Shimelba camp in Ethiopia suggests that Christian prisoners are ‘routinely’ tortured to try to make them recant their faith.

Amnesty adds that most of the 2,000-plus Christians currently jailed for their faith have been held for more than two years, in extremely harsh conditions.

Praise God for Nigsti Haile’s courage in resisting the authorities’ brutal campaign to make her deny Christ. Pray that her testimony will bring many to know Jesus.
Pray that pressure will be brought on the Eritrean authorities to end their witch-hunt of Christians and release all those being detained without charge.

This report is especially poignant for me as one of my congregants, Helen, is from Eritrea. Her sister has been held in a steel shipping container (with no ventilation or air conditioning) for the last 2 years purely because of her faith in Christ.

PDN

A Christian student has been describing how he ran for his life after being accused of drawing the Prophet Mohammed, as riots erupted in Kano State.

What triggered the violence in Tundun Wada over the weekend of September 28-29 is still unclear. But, according to official figures, ten Christians were killed when Muslim rioters took to the streets, torching nine churches and many Christian homes and businesses.

Iliya Adamu, 18, was getting ready for college when Muslim students burst into his dorm and started beating him. They accused him of drawing Mohammed on the mosque – a blasphemous act in Islam, which prohibits any depiction of the Prophet.

Iliya and other Christians who'd been attacked were taken to hospital by college staff. 'As we were about to be given first aid, we saw some of the Muslim students and other boys coming into the hospital with machetes,' Iliya said. 'We then decided to run for our lives. None of us went home because we saw smoke from the distance and people running.'

Confusion reigned in the violence that ensued. As well as rumours that a drawing of Mohammed had been pinned to a mosque, there were suggestions that Muslims were angry that a Christian youth had written 'Jesus' on a blackboard. Others suggest the violence was fuelled by reports of a newspaper cartoon about Mohammed in Bangladesh.

Iliya and another Christian friend, who both deny drawing any image of Mohammed, are now receiving support from The Stephanos Foundation. Release International is providing food, blankets and clothing to 121 Christians whose homes were destroyed. The authorities evacuated many other Christians and non-Muslims to Bauchi State: others have fled to neighbouring villages and have neither food nor shelter.

* Pray that calm would return to Tundun Wada and that the Kano State government would intervene to prevent further uproar. Pray for all those affected by the violence.
* Pray that the churches which have lost their place of worship will find new premises.

hairyheretic

Or possibly not

http://allafrica.com/stories/200710011063.html

"Kano State Police Command has denied a report which made the rounds last Friday that there was a religious disturbance in Tudun Wada town, the headquarters of Tudun Wada Local Government Area.

A statement signed by the state police commissioner, Alhaji M.A. Yesufu, attributed the disturbance to a religious argument that ensued between students of different religions in Government Day Secondary School, Tudun Wada as opposed to the religious riot theory, which was being bandied by certain individuals in the state ."

I did a quick check via google news, and the only sites reporting that story seem to be christian ones.

Then again, I could also see a single site refuting that version as well.

PDN

hairyheretic wrote: »

Or possibly not

http://allafrica.com/stories/200710011063.html

"Kano State Police Command has denied a report which made the rounds last Friday that there was a religious disturbance in Tudun Wada town, the headquarters of Tudun Wada Local Government Area.

A statement signed by the state police commissioner, Alhaji M.A. Yesufu, attributed the disturbance to a religious argument that ensued between students of different religions in Government Day Secondary School, Tudun Wada as opposed to the religious riot theory, which was being bandied by certain individuals in the state ."

I did a quick check via google news, and the only sites reporting that story seem to be christian ones.

Then again, I could also see a single site refuting that version as well.

A quick Google (90 seconds) showed me a non-Christian site reporting this event: http://http://www.wwrn.org/article.php?idd=26505&sec=46&con=60

World Wide Religious News (WWRN) is a non-partisan organisation that provides the international academic and legal community with up-to-date religious news from around the world. It is most certainly not a Christian site. In fact many of their stories include the persecution of Falung Gong in China, the suppression of NRM's (cults) by governments, discrimination against Muslims in the US since 9/11, and the US Government's discrimination against Wiccans by preventing pentacles from being displayed on headstones in military cemeteries. They have a reputation for checking their sources and providing accurate news for human rights groups etc.

WWRN's report includes the names of some of those killed, identifies which churches were burned, and includes interviews with eye-witnesses and victims.

What I find even more disturbing than the actual event itself is the way in which the cover-up is presented, and that an apparently educated outsider in the West would swallow it so easily!

Let's get some things straight. Kano State is under Sharia law. Christians are a small minority there. To believe the word of the local authorities is like accepting the assurances of the Turkish Government that no genocide was ever committed against the Armenians.

The report from the local police is particularly laughable. No 'religious riots' took place, they say. Instead there was a 'religious argument' after which some 'hoodlums' took the opportunity to 'wreak havoc' on innocent bystanders and 'a few buildings' were burned. I suppose it was simply a coincidence that all the buildings burned were churches or Christian-owned property, and that all the 'bystanders' who were killed or injured by these 'hooligans' happened to be Christians? Even though Christians compose about 1% of the population in the area?

What I also find saddening is the insinuation in your post that a story of persecution and murder should be deemed unreliable if it is carried on Christian websites. The fact is that most accounts of persecution against Christians will mainly be carried on Christian websites because no-one else really gives a damn. If I want to be informed on homophobia, I Google and find that most reports of homophobic attacks are carried on gay websites. I find that quite normal, given that they will be more interested in advocacy work in that area. I certainly would not dream of using it as an excuse to cast doubt on the reliability of the reports.

hairyheretic

PDN wrote: »

A quick Google (90 seconds) showed me a non-Christian site reporting this event: http://http://www.wwrn.org/article.php?idd=26505&sec=46&con=60

Fair enough then.

PDN wrote: »

They have a reputation for checking their sources and providing accurate news for human rights groups etc.

Which is commendable. Too often it seems news sites (or tv or papers) want to simply be the first to get a story out, and inaccuracies can be glossed over or later corrected.

PDN wrote: »

What I find even more disturbing than the actual event itself is the way in which the cover-up is presented, and that an apparently educated outsider in the West would swallow it so easily!

Who is making insinuations now?

You obviously know more about the area and situation there than I do. I did a quick search last night, as I said in my post, and could see only a handfull of reports, one from an official source, and a handfull from what seemed to be christian news sites.

Am I surprised that each would have their own view of events? Certainly not .. it's human nature. I figured the truth probably lay somewhere in the middle.

PDN wrote: »

What I also find saddening is the insinuation in your post that a story of persecution and murder should be deemed unreliable if it is carried on Christian websites.

I insinuated nothing, at least not deliberately. If you check my post you'll see I also indicated I only found one site offering another view of the events.

PDN wrote: »

I certainly would not dream of using it as an excuse to cast doubt on the reliability of the reports.

Given the spin that I frequently see accompanying news reports (and this is a general comment, its not specifically addressed to this issue) I take little at face value, unless it's from a news source I would unconsider unbiased.

If you want to further debate this, we should probably take it to PM, rather than clutter up the thread.

PDN

hairyheretic wrote: »

Who is making insinuations now?

Well, I did say apparently educated. I suppose that does insinuate that you actually are educated.

robindch

PDN wrote:

I certainly would not dream of using it as an excuse to cast doubt on the reliability of the reports.

No doubt, you wouldn't. But I find it difficult to reconcile this point of view with your rubbishing of the Telegraph's reporting of the "bishop says gays cause floods" brouhaha some months ago, largely it seemed, because it was reported in the Telegraph, even going so far, if my memory is right, to insinuate that they may have invented quotes

More seriously, I recall Brian late last year and earlier this year, repeating a claim that around 150,000 christians were murdered every year because of their religion. The source for this was religious news websites and while I don't recall which ones they were, I do recall that their standard of reporting was, to say the least, below par.

Are you saying that all religious news websites are in fact equally factual, and maintain standards which are as high as the best non-partisan news sources?

Relatedly, you mentioned in another thread that some of your work involves proselytizing in Nigeria. Do you believe that it's a good thing to introduce more religion to an area which is already suffering from religiously-justified violence?

PDN

robindch wrote: »

Are you saying that all religious news websites are in fact equally factual, and maintain standards which are as high as the best non-partisan news sources?

No, I am not saying that. There are religious news websites that are very good and there are those that are crap. Similarly there are non-partisan websites which are good and others which are crap. I think it is wrong to assume that a news website is less (or indeed more) accurate just because it is run by Christians.

Relatedly, you mentioned in another thread that some of your work involves proselytizing in Nigeria. Do you believe that it's a good thing to introduce more religion to an area which is already suffering from religiously-justified violence?

Yes, I certainly do think it's a good thing. Radical Islamists employ violence to suppress other religions. If the rest of us back out due to such violence then we surrender to bullies. That would be morally repugnant to me, and would be a tragedy for the people of Nigeria. I think it is much more beneficial to the region to promote a religion that teaches people to love their enemies rather than to burn them.

Scofflaw

PDN wrote: »

No, I am not saying that. There are religious news websites that are very good and there are those that are crap. Similarly there are non-partisan websites which are good and others which are crap. I think it is wrong to assume that a news website is less (or indeed more) accurate just because it is run by Christians.

Hmm. That's not what hairyheretic said, though. His point was that he had only seen it reported by Christian sites. While that could be taken (say, by someone partisan) to be a slur on Christian sites, it's perfectly normal to want to see something reported by both 'sides' and/or by neutral observers.

PDN wrote: »

Yes, I certainly do think it's a good thing. Radical Islamists employ violence to suppress other religions. If the rest of us back out due to such violence then we surrender to bullies. That would be morally repugnant to me, and would be a tragedy for the people of Nigeria. I think it is much more beneficial to the region to promote a religion that teaches people to love their enemies rather than to burn them.

The problem is that, as we can see, an 'unbiased viewpoint' might be no such thing.

cordially,
Scofflaw