CHRISTIANS PERSECUTED ACROSS THE WORLD

By R. A. Pearson

During his New Years Day 2011 address to the world, Pope Benedict XVI indicated “Humanity cannot be allowed to become accustomed to discrimination, injustices, and religious intolerance, which today strike Christians in a particular way. Once again, I make a pressing appeal (to Christians in troubled areas) not to give in to discouragement and resignation.” During the homily, on the day the Catholic Church celebrates its World Day of Peace, the pope dedicated his remarks to religious freedom and tolerance. At the time of the Pope’s sermon, the world had seen recent church bombings in Egypt and Iraq, and a death sentence in Pakistan brought on by an Islamic blasphemy law.

Perhaps the recent atrocity against Christians on the Pope’s mind as he spoke to the world on January 1, was the bombing at a Coptic Christian church in Alexandria, Egypt, the day before which had killed 21 worshippers gathered to mark the New Year and wounded about 43. The incident touched off riots in the Christian quarter of Alexandra. Reports noted there was no police security for the church at the time of the bombing. In Egypt, Christians make up about ten percent of the nation’s 79 million people and the Coptic branch is the largest branch of the Christian faith in the North African Nation. While Egyptian leaders have indicated the incident was an isolated case, Vatican leaders and observers of violence toward Christians around the world indicate the attack was part of a growing trend, especially in the Moslem world.

Another country where Christians have been severely persecuted is Iraq, the country where the United States has been fighting and training army and police forces for six years and lost more than 4,400 killed in action. The onslaught of attacks in Iraq began with the Baghdad church massacre on October 31, 2010, that killed 58 people and was followed by unrelenting bombings and shootings targeting Christians throughout Iraq, including incidents where militants invaded Christian homes and killed people sitting in their living room. A series of ten bombs exploded in Christian homes in Baghdad on December 30, killing two people and wounding more than a dozen.

The UN High Commission For Refugees said at least 1,000 families had fled Baghdad and Mosul since September 2010 for the semi-autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq. A further 133 families had registered with the organization in Syria, as had 109 individuals in Jordan. U.N officials estimate there are 500,000 Christians remaining in Iraq, down from 1 million when Saddam Hussein was ousted. It appears the Christian persecution in Iraq is divided equally between the Syrian Catholic Christians and the Chaldean Christians in the country.

Other attacks on Christian churches at the end of 2010 included two attacks on Christmas Day in northern Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation, where six people died, and a bombing of a Roman Catholic Church on the island of Jolo in the Philippines where six people were injured.

However, the most publicized case of Christian persecution has been in Pakistan where an Islamic anti-blasphemy law has been in the spotlight since November 2010, when a court sentenced Asia Bibi, a Christian mother of four, to death. On January
4, 2011, the governor of the state of Punjab, Salman Taseer, who had strongly opposed the law and sought presidential pardon for the 45-year-old Christian farmhand, was gunned down by one of his bodyguards who opposed Taseer’s opposition to the law.

The incident began in June 2009 near her village of Ittan Wali, a patchwork of lush fields and dusty streets in the Sheikhupura district of Pakistain’s Punjab province. While she was picking berries alongside local Muslim women, a disturbance developed over sharing water and Moslem water purification rituals. A few days later, the women claimed she had insulted the Prophet Muhammad. She was tried under the county’s Islamic anti-blasphemy law and became the first woman be sentenced to death for the crime in Pakistan. She has been in prison for over a year while Christian groups have protested the case and sentence. Her husband and their children fear for their lives and have gone into hiding. In December 2010, a pro-Taliban Muslim cleric offered a $5,800 reward to anyone who killed the Bibi in prison.

Christians make up 4 percent of Pakistan’s population and have been especially concerned about the blasphemy law saying it offers them no protection. Under the law, anyone who speaks ill of Islam and the Prophet Mohammad commits a crime and faces the death penalty, but activists say the vague terminology has led to its misuse. Critics of the law argue convictions hinge on witness testimony and often these are linked to personal vendettas. Also in 2009, 40 houses and a church were set ablaze by a mob of 1,000 Muslims in the town of Gojra, Punjab, and at least seven Christians were burnt to death during the incident. The attacks were triggered by reports of the desecration of the Qur’ran.


On December 29, 2010, Scandinavian intelligence agencies announced they had foiled a plot to kill staff members at the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten, which published caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed in September 2005, and had arrested five suspects in the case. Police in Denmark and Sweden said they thwarted the terrorist attack possibly hours before it was to begin indicating the plan including shooting as many people as possible in the Copenhagen building housing the newspaper’s newsroom. Many people had thought the five-year-old incident involving the cartoons had passed; however, it is apparent some religious leaders and individuals in the Islamic world refuse to let the issue die.

The problem is for years people in the non-Muslim world have been told Islam is a peaceful, nonviolent, benevolent, and tolerant religion; however, the more the world sees of Islam, the intolerance of Islam to other religions and beliefs, the brutality of Sharia law, and hears the vengeful fatwas and sermons of the Mullahs and Ayatollahs, the less the world believes Islam is the peaceful, tolerant religion it claims to be.

While the United States has made its faux pas concerning religious freedom over the last couple of years, the protest over the placement of the Mosque/Islamic Cultural Center near Ground Zero in New York City and the planned burning of the Qur’ran by the minister in Florida being a few examples, Americans believe in the right of an individual to say, worship, and believe as they please. This right of an individual to believe and practice their religion was also included into the Charter of the United Nations and should be allowed by all member nations. However, eight of the countries included on the top ten World Watch List in 2011 for the persecution of Christians include the Islamic nations of Iran, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Yemen, Iraq, Uzbekistan, and the Maldives. Many of these are members of the U.N. and some are U.S. friends and allies. Non-Islamic nations on the list include North Korea and Laos.

In the Pope’s New Year's message he indicated, “words were not enough” to bring about peace, particularly in the Middle East. He called for “concrete and constant commitment” from national leaders and said everyone on a local level should push for peace in their daily relations with their neighbours. It would be nice to see and hear the Mullahs, the Ayatollahs, the secular leaders of the Islamic world, and all the Muslims around the world prove once and for all that Islam is the tolerant and peaceful religion it claims to be.