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At Large
On the Watch for Religious Persecutors
Open Doors has released its World Watch List of the 50 worst persecutors of Christians worldwide.
(Page 2 of 2)
Northern Nigeria, which is majority Muslim, puts this important African state at number thirteen. Reports Open Doors: “The main persecution engine in northern Nigeria is Islamic extremism.” A recent rise in deaths caused the organization to raise Nigeria from 23 to 13: “this change highlights the structural process in which social groups firmly linked to a dominating religion (Islam) and government drive each other into a ‘vicious circle’ of suffocating religious minorities (Christians) in the sharia dominated areas of Northern Nigeria.”
At number fourteen is another Islamic African nation, Mauritania. Says Open Doors, “Because of harsh government restrictions, it is very difficult, if not impossible, for Christian missions and Christians in general to operate in the country.” Like other Islamic states, Mauritania “does not include any provision for religious freedom in its constitution, and its laws prohibit conversion to Christian faith. The sentence for apostasy is death,” adds the group.
Another long-time persecuting U.S. ally is Egypt, which holds the fifteenth position. For Christians, at least, the Arab Spring has turned into an Arab Winter. Open Doors details the sad tale: “…as the Islamists succeeded in the events following the constitutional referendum, the government was unable to restore necessary law and order.” Violence is increasing and “Persecution of Christians in Egypt is on the rise, with a substantial increase in numbers killed, physically harmed and churches/houses attacked.”
In recent decades Sudan has been among the most tragic of nations, with more than a million or more people killed in long-running domestic conflict. Despite a reduction in fighting, Sudan still comes in at number sixteen on the World Watch List. “The main persecution engine in Sudan is Islamic extremism,” observes Open Doors: “persecution has increased rapidly over the past 12 months.” Moreover, “The number of formally reported killings is limited, but the whole Abyei, South Kordofan and Blue Nile area has seen thousands killed, religion being one factor.”
Next at seventeen is the small Himalayan (and largely Buddhist) country of Bhutan. The new constitutional monarchy is democratizing, with some improvement in the status of Christians. Reports Open Doors: “The church in Bhutan is no longer an underground church, since Christians are allowed to meet in private homes regularly on Sundays without any interference by authorities; Christians in remote villages encounter more difficulties, though.” Moreover, the parliament is debating legislation to criminalize conversions.
At number eighteen is the Islamic and former communist republic of Turkmenistan, where, notes Open Doors, “the tight grip of the authorities on Christians continues.” This state’s repression appears to more reflect Turkmenistan’s communist than Muslim heritage. Alas, “All unregistered religious activity is strictly illegal” and “For native Turkmen communities, being registered is simply impossible, for the others it is difficult.”
Although Vietnam has moved away from doctrinaire communism, it is nineteen on the Open Doors World ranking. The organization explains that “Vietnamese authorities keep a close eye on all Christian activities in the country. Believers face more problems by officials, often being accused of causing ‘social disturbances’, ‘fighting the local government’ or simply ‘subversion.’ Church leaders are carefully monitored.”
Completing the top twenty is Chechnya, formally a republic within the Russian Federation. “The general religious climate in Chechnya has always been Islamic, and the influence of Islam is growing.” The government has discussed implementing sharia law and “Slowly but surely, the country is Islamizing.” Moreover, Muslim converts to Christianity “suffer greatly from government and family oppression.”
The terrible list goes on. Leading the next ten is China, a still nominally communist state where the situation remains mixed — better than during the Maoist era but still repressive. Then comes Qatar, one of the Muslim Gulf sheikdoms, which restricts Christian worship and conversion. Another repressive North African Islamic state, Algeria, follows, where, unfortunately, “oppression of Christians has been constant.” Next is the Islamic island of Comoros, which restricts expatriate worship and punishes Muslims who convert to Christianity.
Azerbaijan is both Islamic and former communist, which leads to persecution of Christians, in this case police raids, imprisonment, and more. In “liberated” but Muslim Libya the situation of Christians has not improved from the Gaddafi era. Islamic Oman restricts Christian worship by expatriates and pressures Christian converts. Islamic Brunei tightly regulates Christians and plans to introduce Islamic criminal law. The situation for Christians has improved somewhat in Morocco, another Muslim North African state, where “the main source of persecution is Muslim fundamentalist influence on the authorities and in society.” Kuwait always has been a fairly liberal Islamic state, but pressure on Christians remain; “the main persecution engines are family and Muslims extremists, and to a lesser extent authorities.”
The next group of ten is: Islamic but nominally secular Turkey, where “various forms of persecution of Christians” nevertheless occur; Hindu India, where “The main persecutors are mobs organized by extremist Hindu organizations”; Buddhist Burma, where the army long has victimized largely Christian ethnic minorities such as the Karen and Kachin; Muslim and former communist Tajikistan, which recently implemented new restrictive church registration laws; Islamic Tunisia, where pressure on Christians has increased since the “Jasmine Revolution”; Muslim but secular Syria, where support of Christians for “the Alawite regime in the past has made them vulnerable to attacks from the opposition”; the Islamic United Arab Emirates, a relatively liberal Gulf sheikdom which nevertheless restricts Christian practices; religiously mixed Ethiopia, where persecution has come from the Ethiopian Orthodox Church as well as Islamic extremists; Muslim Djibouti, where family law discriminates against Christians; and Jordan, where Christian proselytism is forbidden and Islamic converts to Christianity continue to suffer.
Bringing up the rear are communist Cuba, former communist and still repressive Belarus, Muslim Indonesia, the Islamic Palestinian Territories, former communist and Islamic Kazakhstan, Muslim Bahrain, democratic and Catholic Colombia (where organized crime targets Christian social reformers), former communist and Islamic Kyrgyzstan, Muslim Bangladesh, and Muslim Indonesia. Christians suffer from a variety of repressions, debilities, pressures, and discriminations in these nations.
Persecution of any religious believer is a moral outrage, a violation of individual conscience and assault on human dignity. But the principle source of religious persecution today is unambiguous: Islam. As Open Doors emphasizes, 38 of 50 persecutors are Muslim. Nine of the top ten and the three largest risers (Northern Nigeria, Egypt, and Sudan) are Muslim. Islamic extremism is the “usual suspect” among persecutors around the world.
The U.S. government should include religious liberty in its dialogue over human rights with other countries. Moreover, as individuals and in community with one another Americans — not just Christians or people of faith, but anyone who believes in human life, dignity, and freedom — should target persecutors and support the persecuted. If nothing else, those persecuted for their faith should not stand alone.
About the Author
Doug Bandow is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute. A former Special Assistant to President Ronald Reagan, he is the author and editor of several books, including The Politics of Plunder: Misgovernment in Washington (Transaction).
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Jack in Wi.| 3.23.12 @ 6:44AM
The fact that a lot of these countries are friends and allies of the USA is troubling. Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Egypt, Yeman, Quatar, Pakistan, Afganistan, Iraq, etc. Whatever happened to China on the list? It was always one of the top ones before.
Alan Brooks| 3.23.12 @ 7:50PM
John786 has something: when Christians have committed many atrocities; that the atrocities have vastly dimished is due to our being on top- we can now ease up and say we have what we want and if you Islamics rebel against our patrimony then we will clobber you in the name of national interest and faith.
Alan Brooks| 3.23.12 @ 9:11PM
AS is evading the more important 'issue'.
All ideology/faith to one side, the Bush administration never really tried to hide the fact that the war(s) would continue for a very long time: meaning several decades. However they never went into how the war is to be paid for in the long term; there seems to be a religious notion that God will provide for the war.. perhaps believers think gold and platinum bars will rain from Heaven when funding gets to be an existential threat.
Patrick| 3.24.12 @ 10:28AM
I think it had more to do with Bush Jr. having the notion stuck in his head to be just like JFK (except for the adultery stuff of course).
Alan Brooks| 3.24.12 @ 6:15PM
More's the pity.
Will post this one more time:
... [Ryan] does not propose to balance the budget of the government of the United States until the year 2040. That would be 27 years after Congressman Ryan’s current term of office expires. Who knows what could throw a wrench in those numbers? Suppose Beijing decides to seize Taiwan. The U.S. is obligated to defend it militarily. But U.S. taxpayers would be funding both sides of the war — the home team, via the Pentagon budget, and the Chinese military, through the interest payments on the debt. (We’ll be bankrolling the entire People’s Liberation Army by some point this decade.) A Beijing–Taipei conflict would be, in budget terms, a U.S. civil war relocated to the Straits of Taiwan. Which is why plans for mid-century are of limited value. When the most notorious extreme callous budget-slasher of the age cannot foresee the government living within its means within the next three decades, you begin to appreciate why foreign observers doubt whether there’ll be a 2040, not for anything recognizable as 'the United States'...[emphasis added]"
--NRO
Brian Mc| 3.23.12 @ 6:48AM
Islam is to 'extremism' as wet is to water. As if there is a possibility to seperate one from the other. I like to think that when it's time to dole out our fortune to countries in need the tap is shut off for each and every one of these listed. A guy can dream. Lock the doors to the U.N. and let the chips fall where they may.
John786| 3.23.12 @ 7:42AM
Should have just called it a list for islamophobia. Complete nonsense. It's Muslims who are being murdered by (US) Christians in very, very large numbers. In the ME it is is estamated that 30-40 million Muslims have been killed or expelled by christains & Jews. In Pakistan (US) Christians are killing Muslims at the rate of 1000 a month: burning them to death with drones. In Afghanistan the killing by Christians is of the charts. The Christian rapturers stated policy is to holocaust the entire world! .
numbatdog| 3.23.12 @ 7:50AM
Forgot the meds again last night John?
Mike Hawk| 3.23.12 @ 8:03AM
I think he's been sniffing the chloroform with P-A. It can really rot your brain.
Purp| 3.23.12 @ 9:54AM
John is right. The US blithely goes whereever it wants to for it's own reasons, and when there's a backlash, the US has the same response as any bully "How dare you confront us?", doubles down and the "we'll show you who's boss? " attitude springs to life. Perhaps we should grow up, stop waving our BIG DICK around and leave the world alone. Naw - that's not what a bully does, is it?
Dick Nome| 3.23.12 @ 10:00AM
Your genitalia/ anal fixation is showing. Put you little dicky aaway and go outside with the other kids.
W| 3.23.12 @ 2:19PM
The Purp is right. We Americans have been forcing Muslims and others to view our mangers during the Christmas season. Now that is a real religious terror across the land, forget about those peaceful Muslims accidentally setting off bombs and guns everywhere.
Alan Brooks| 3.23.12 @ 8:57PM
Purp is right because IF you had virtually unlimited funds, quadrillions, quintillions, sextillions, septillions, octillions... of dollars (or, say, Rembimbi) to spend on nation building, then you could do nation building.. but you don't- and the jig is up.
Brian Mc| 3.23.12 @ 7:59AM
Since you are willing to 'submit' to any and all with the 'proper' authority, why don't you leave the land of the free and home of the brave to the rest of us who refuse? No, you gotta drag the rest of us, kicking and screaming to your hope and change that none of us signed on for...and by the way, you show us your "charts" and we'll show you ours.
Teaghan| 3.23.12 @ 8:18AM
Watching too much MSNBC dude?
Teaghan| 3.23.12 @ 8:19AM
The above comment was meant for John786
dave| 3.23.12 @ 9:13AM
Whose estimate are you quoting? Source please.
MikeBee| 3.23.12 @ 10:12AM
John,
You're going to have to produce evidence. What evidence do you have of large-scale persecution of Muslims by Christians in the middle East?
There have been some killing of Muslims by Christians in Africa, when war has broken out between the two groups. But war is not persecution. Persecution always occurs toward the defenseless.
John786| 3.23.12 @ 10:35AM
Persection. Every Muslim in America is being pressurised to spy on each other, join honey traps. There is no Habeus corpus for Muslims in America. The civil rights of Muslims in America has fallen off the charts. NYPD, CIA, Homeland security competing with each other to cause the most damage to Muslims.
Teaghan| 3.23.12 @ 4:12PM
Well that's what happens when your brothers in arms fly passenger jets into buildings. Also, when you don't come out and SCREAM at the top of your lungs that "we are not like those people". I hear narey a peep from the Islamic community in defense of their theology.
Christian| 3.23.12 @ 11:06PM
Why is it that Christians cannot even pray for there food for lunch in public schools, but Muslims in Dearborn MI are allowed to bring prayer rugs and pray in the library for Ramadan? You think the Muslims are persecuted? Try mentioning the name of Jesus Christ in any public setting and see the hateful response you elicit.
John786| 3.23.12 @ 11:01AM
Christain intervention in Muslim lands is too vast and numerous to catalogue. The crimes are too many. I had tears when faluja the city of a thousand mosques was obliterated. I have tears for the thousands of Muslim holy sites trashed/ desecrated on a daily basis in Palestine etc..
http://rwor.org/a/v23/1120-29/1125/timeline.htm
WRTolkas| 3.23.12 @ 12:05PM
Dear Jon786,
I think you picked the wrong venue to list your grievances unless your express wish is to pick a fight.
As for me, I read where a sixteen year old girl was lashed to death in Pakistan for the crime of being a rape victim, the children shot dead in France for the crime of being sons and daughters of Abraham, the girls in a school in Saudi Arabia that burned to death in a fire BECAUSE the security guards would not open the emergency exit for the girls BECAUSE the girls didn't have their head scarves.... I could go on and on but I don't have the time. What this list brings to the light is the cowards the rag-tops are and their hatred of women. If your child raping prophet has just one enemy here on earth, then I'm it.
Everyone else, have a safe weekend.
WRTolkas| 3.23.12 @ 12:06PM
Sorry, I meant John. Jon is my grandson.
Ryan| 3.23.12 @ 1:20PM
Tell you what.
When Muslims denounce militantcy, when they denounce military activities from civilian areas, (such as shooting at people from mosques and homes and such) we'll stop blowing them up.
If you shoot at a soldier from a mosque, it is no longer a mosque. It's a military emplacement and loses its protection.
Teaghan| 3.23.12 @ 4:13PM
Do you have tears now that some countries in the ME say to tear down all churches? No, didn't think so.
John786| 3.24.12 @ 5:44AM
Yes I do.
Ryan| 3.23.12 @ 1:22PM
Western countries allow for freedom of speech, religion, and property, treat women as more than property, protect the disabled, etc...
Muslim-ruled countries do not.
John786| 3.23.12 @ 1:51PM
In this dystopian reality where the persecuted/ murdered become the guilty. The persecuters become victims. Bravo. The Muslim people are in a difficult position: they have now faced 100+ years of western Christian murderous holicasting aggression. Its impossible to move around the Muslim world without bumping into occupation forces/ basis/ military installations. They holocaust one Muslim population and the get ready for the next: shock and awe coming to a downtown Persia. This will I feel be the last hurrah. There will be norhing else to burn.
Calvin| 3.23.12 @ 2:55PM
Muslims murder wherever they are. They have rivaled the secular atheists of the 20th century for their ability to murder. The conquering of India was unbelievably bloody. They won't win but they may force their neighbors to utterly destroy them. Nobody should have to live under a Muslim government, even a Muslim.
John786| 3.23.12 @ 5:03PM
India was ruled for 400+ years by Muslim dynasties. These came to an end with the rise if the British empire. India is still 80% Hindu. Christain minorities are still in the heart of the ME after 1500 years under Muslim rule. Where are the Muslims of Spain. Bosnian Muslims in the heart of christain Europe faced genocide only a few years ago. No doubt some Muslims have committed crimes but they are nothing to what the Christians have done and are doing. I suggest the Christian occupation forces/ bases/ military advisors are all brought back. That will improve security immeasurably for everyone.
Dick Nome| 3.24.12 @ 5:06PM
You are obviously not aChristian, are you a Muslim?? It would seem so. Even Paulbots aren't as nuts as you.
you are sheltered and weak| 3.25.12 @ 3:09AM
To people like John I'd love to watch them and do a video diary of week-t0-week living for 2-3 years in a country like Malaysia. Or maybe Kuwait, Yemen, or Qatar. Guys like John wouldn't make it 9 months in Saudi Arabia. He wouldn't make it 9 weeks in Somalia or northern Nigeria.
Tell you what, John. Land in a plane at the airport in Davao City, Philippines. Head west. Yep, that's right, west. Just 48, 54 miles west, northwest.
Nobody would ever hear from you again.
Maybe that'd be a good thing?
Dick Nome and others, it doesn't matter if John is a muslim. (Even if he is, he just thinks he is. To their standards he is and always will be rubbish.) Once they've extracted any monetary value from Johnnyboy, he'd be roadside feed for animal predators.
He'd be lucky if he were offered a swift death.
he is protected and strong| 3.25.12 @ 11:30AM
To people like john this would be no problem for he would be safe from all harm because his god and the god of his child raping prophet mullahlikesmen or homohamased or whoever is baal.
Alan Brooks| 3.23.12 @ 7:51PM
John786 sses something we do not-- we can afford to noble-- we run the show
Alan Brooks| 3.23.12 @ 7:56PM
John786 sees what we do not: we are on top, so we can afford to be noble and hand out aid to Afghans and Iraqis, and think "as long as the taxpayer is footing the bill"
Ralph Novy| 3.24.12 @ 7:58PM
You hit the nail on the head, methinks, my friend
Kudos.
Dick Nome| 3.23.12 @ 8:13AM
If a fear of being killed by an Islamist terrorist fanatic and killing the SOB first is Islamophobia, I am guilty as charged. When they come for you pal, Too bad.
Alan Brooks| 3.23.12 @ 7:58PM
And throwing trillions down the Ashcanistan rathole helped us?
Dick Nome| 3.23.12 @ 9:49PM
And just what does that have to do with what I said??I never said a thing about that 10th century time warp.
albert constantine jr.| 3.23.12 @ 8:29AM
“Reports Open Doors: ‘Despite having signed all international agreements designed to protect the freedom of religion, the government in the current setting is not even able to guarantee the most basic tenants of this right.’”
If this report is accurately quoted, I believe (sic) after tenants is in order. Tenants (hopefully) pay rent, the principles or building blocks of an idea are tenets.
I’m sure Open Door does fine work reporting on religious persecution of Christians, and Mr. Bandow covers this and other topics with vigor. Nevertheless, at the risk of being even more of a crank, I ask that you please make proper use of vocabulary words.
Vox populi| 3.23.12 @ 10:15AM
The point is that we are at war and our political class refuses to realise the fact. I think Newt. does, but he's down and done for.
Bruce| 3.23.12 @ 10:33AM
I've said it here before, but I'll say it again. The Korans were NOT accidentally burned. The soldiers found messages written in the margins of them and made the decision to burn them as a means of destruction.
Petronius| 3.23.12 @ 10:59AM
Name those things you cannot do without. They are your gods.
WRTolkas| 3.23.12 @ 12:07PM
Dear Petronius,
I will keep that as a notable quote. Thanks.
The great Satan| 3.23.12 @ 1:12PM
I'm a lot more concerned about religious persecution of atheists in my own country. After all it is none of my business what happens overseas, but it certainly is my business when citizens of my own country can't hold public office if they are atheist.
O.F. A.N. A.S.S.| 3.23.12 @ 1:48PM
Even sheep know these are the words of an anal raping sodomizer of lamb rams.
Ovines For
A Nation
Absent Species Sodomization
Dick Nome| 3.24.12 @ 5:10PM
Religous Persecution of the a-religous?? That's a good one. An oxymoron at best.
Curmudgeon| 3.23.12 @ 5:35PM
C'mon now Great Satan, not being able to get elected is not persecution. Thinking it is may be why people think you aren't brought enough to vote for.
Leslie Johnson | 3.23.12 @ 11:51PM
America’s Most Biblically-Hostile U. S. President
Listed in chronological order are (1) numerous records of his attacks on Biblical persons or organizations; (2) examples of the hostility toward Biblical faith that have become evident in the past three years in the Obama-led military; (3) a listing of his open attacks on Biblical values; and finally (4) a listing of numerous incidents of his preferential deference for Islam’s activities and positions, including letting his Islamic advisors guide and influence his hostility toward people of Biblical faith.
http://www.wallbuilders.com/LI.....?id=106938
Michael S.| 3.24.12 @ 3:03PM
How refreshing, another topic-related remark, while doubtless many unaware remain clueless, and so many of the best of credentials fall desperately short. With the inference of “the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much” Jms.5:16, could produce less of the same there, and more of the same here.
Nos.1-3 ring out on their own, don’t they? Now bring in No.4 and you have a highly polished heads-tails coin, so brazen it is fit for history’s mantle. I can actually see the returning reproach streaming live. This temporary gratification for BHO is now on parade in steady delivery. Call it moderate religious persecution.
Why not just use the many infallible proofs within the Bible to defend Christianity, instead of making all sorts of other arguments?
I’m also concerned regarding the position this article forwards from the folks at Open Door, that persecution is confined to extreme expressions of resistance/hostility. While 50 areas of extreme religious persecution are listed, all these seem to occur in localities where the precise punishments of specific religious-based activities are clearly spelled out. There is no mention of the subtler and “milder” forms of persecution that occur daily in many democracies around the world, against Christians, including, unfortunately more and more, the United States. Possibly now positioned as the chief threat.
If one brings up for comparison the full established proscriptions of conduct for its followers, what other religion besides Christianity is there that openly demands both to love and pray for its enemies, especially for those who persecute them? Mt 5:44. Remember, key here is “enemies” of the way.
The scales of justice cannot be weighed against such treatment of enemies when they would otherwise abide by “hate your enemy”.
At conversion, the Christian enters a new sphere this article fails to inflict thought to, which is the awareness of diverse origins. One, the Christian takes on the nature of kindness in himself that he will become “harmless as doves”. The other is to be “wise as serpents” in their ways and intentions without being wise in evil mischief. Mt.10:16, Rm.16:19.
So with what may not be a fact of every Christian’s sacrificial life of kindness in the face of hostility, my point is that there does not exist in
Christianity said definitions of hate or persecution.
In the article, and commonly, the phrase “ religious persecution” is used to describe multiple fronts of flight from threat or ultimate demise, but not the milder forms of persecution. I feel this is a big mistake, for to not count the less severe, more subtle forms of persecution is to discount hyper oppositions, some very damaging anti-religious activities, and their significance.
So is it actually “50 worst” because of the severity and not the head-count? While every one of the 50 situations listed is an atrocity, let us not lose sight of the dangerous happenings in our own democracy and others – of religious freedoms slowly and steadily being chipped away from within our own governments.
Ralph Novy| 3.24.12 @ 8:20PM
"I can actually see the returning reproach streaming live. "
Uh-oh.
Cut back on the caffeine, son.
You're seeing things -- that aren't there.
Feel free to communicate with me -- I'm not ever afraid of dialogue about goddamned anything -- but be prepared to defend your political/moral positions with a whole lot more than Biblical citations.
Michael S.| 3.24.12 @ 8:44PM
Hello Ralph,
How are the citations provided not so. A little more relevance please, for indeed they are "there", I would hope you are aware.
So that is where you are content then, with BHO's approach to date?
Ralph Novy| 3.24.12 @ 8:23PM
And, by the way, you need to get WAY MORE succinct in what you say.
I could've said what you said in about 150 words, instead of 45o or so.
Cynthia Lauren Thorpe| 4.16.12 @ 8:58PM
Thank You, Michael - for bringing your wisdom-filled words to my computer.
When our fallible 'egos' are exalted above Devine Authority ((I know about this, as I used to be a true 'daughter of Eve - lemme tell you, yet - I will NOT digress.)) We fall headlong into the muck and mire of true 'self-ish-ness' and that's exactly where most humans go - as it is in our very nature.
Only when Men of GOD quit 'harkening to the voice...' (decidedly little 'v', there) of their decidedly Greek 'female' leaders (read Socrates and Aristotle with their penchant to 'self') and STAND on the WORD of GOD - will we have true Statesmen/Representatives of the Most High.
And, until then - the truly bankrupt CATO institute will simply provide us with drivel rather than MEAT - giving us shallow words and opinion rather than True sustenance.
Thank GOD that there are men such as yourself - out there - to listen to/read.
High Fives to You. With gentlemen of your ilk around - perhaps someday they'll have to change the name of American Spectator to American Initiator... (One may only hope and pray.)
Cynthia Lauren
CHRISTIAN American in Australia's Coastal Outback
Joshua time| 3.25.12 @ 5:47PM
Ms. Johnson, thank you for this list and reference to the WallBuilders site.
One needs these reminders.
One tries to pay attention to what is occurring but one is at a loss to keep up. For example, who knew of all these anti-Christian faith steps by the United States Air Force? A pagan place of worship at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs? Catholic Air Force priests/chaplains being told what they cannot relay/share with their congregations? Bibles or helpful Christian tracts not being encouraged to be passed among our recovering wounded at Walter Reed Medical Center?
I shudder to think what we'll learn when the U.S. Navy's actions against Christianity become public.
All of this sanctioned and pushed by leaders in our highest positions, to include the sitting president.
I'll have to look now where Canada falls on the faith/religious persecution list. Canada should be on this list. With the USA right behind.
The faith persecution is right here. (Even I have experienced this firsthand)
Folks, we got to wake up and get busy.
Dmitry Aleksandrovich| 3.24.12 @ 2:29AM
It's funny that Uzbekistan is on the list. I was chrismated Russian Orthodox Christian in Uzbekistan less than 3 years ago. Christianity is openly practiced in Uzbekistan by Russians, Armenians and Koreans. What's forbidden is foreign missionaries of any type (including and especially Wahhabist Muslim) who could possibly threaten the traditional religious order of the country. Practicing Islam might even be more restricted in Uzbekistan than practicing Christianity because the current government rightfully fears political Islam (Islamism usually of the Sunni Wahhabist type) from gaining any kind of a foothold in the country that could possibly challenge the current regime.
Phil| 3.24.12 @ 3:32AM
When will the US start tying trade status and aid to human rights protection? Why does China get MFN tradig status when they persecute Christians (among many other things they do). Better yet, when will this question be asked in a presidential debate?
Dmitry Aleksandrovich | 3.24.12 @ 12:15PM
As for Ethiopia and Eritrea those people are Coptic Christians like the Egyptian Christians. I don't blame nation's for keeping foreign missionaries out. There's no reason why an Orthodox, Roman Catholic or Coptic Christian country should have to accept evangelical missionaries. Those evangelicals don't have a right to poach souls from traditional Christian lands. They should keep their missionary efforts to traditionally Protestant countries.
EMS| 3.25.12 @ 3:48AM
Once more, Dmitry, you prove you are mentally lacking and rather narrow in your understanding. No worries. In year 2012 you are in such good company that you are in the majority -- worldwide.
Faith persecutions take hundreds and hundreds of forms.
It can be overt or covert discrimination when it comes to jobs, housing, schooling opportunities. parenting, career paths, associations, opportunities to gather, the ability to create, print and distribute materials.
It can be in the form of not permitting parents to parent their own children. In even western countries (e.g. Germany, Sweden) it often means parents being unable to home school their own children.
My basic test when abroad has always been public and open conversation. Dialog. And invitations. You seem a bit too fixated on missionaries. Missionaries are a moot point when a Christian of Catholic or Protestant persuasion is unable to invite an indigenous person to his or her home as it is a known "Christian home." Or the indigenous person cannot be given the gift of a Bible tract, a Christian music CD, or a simple New Testament in his or her own language.
When two people meet and an invitation is extended yet the person receiving the invitation MUST decline for fear of being followed, being reported on, being blacklisted, reprisals -- any and all of the above -- this is a country engaged in open, real faith persecution.
And this is active, every day in well over just 50 countries on our globe.
When it is a crime with long lists of possible punishments for an Asian in his own country to accompany a foreign businessman friend and colleague to a 30 minute Christmas service inside a 300- year old church, this is persecution.
And this is real. I experience it all the time. Inside that same church are "locals" who must report on who attends (foreigners, locals, unknowns) and what transpires. These informers are present every service, and they report if not daily, weekly.
The locals know this and do not attend -- EVEN THOUGH THEY WOULD OTHERWISE WISH TO DO SO. They don't necessarily wish to learn more or start a lot of reading or personal searching or even think of the idea of converting. No, they just have a natural curiosity and wish to accept the simple invitation. Yet they can never do this. This is persecution.
The laughable thing (and ironically very sad) is that less than 200 yards from the church entryway is tens of thousands of dollars of Christmas merchandise on sale every year in December, merchandise bought and sold by the local people.
Decorations can be okay. Finding out the real message behind those decorations? No way! Verboten!
Poaching souls, eh?
"Poaching souls?" The only thing here that has been poached is your mind. Who stole it, Dmitry? You surely don't possess your own any more. (see below for more input on this)
Free and open (and good) societies are not afraid of another sect. Yes, one must be cautious as with wahhabism, as you point out. (as it is not a faith, it is no better than national socialism. islam is nothing more than an ever-violent cult of the brainwashed). There is nothing to fear from the various forms of Christianity from Orthodox to Pentecostal -- unless the leadership of that village, province, or nation is a dictator.
And that is why Christianity is and always will be persecuted. Christianity offers the real God, real life. These are always threats to the lost and the leadership of the lost.
And that is why you have a disdain for missionaries?
Dmitry, you wrote, "They (you mean those bad, bad evangelicals) should keep their missionary efforts to traditionally Protestant countries." And you claim yourself as a Christian? Really?
Dmitry, what do you not understand about The Great Commission?
Dmitry Aleksandrovich | 3.27.12 @ 6:20PM
EMS religious freedom works in America because otherwise America's Protestant pilgrims might have left ecclesiastical disagreements turn into conflicts not unlike the bloody Catholic-Protestant wars that gripped Europe in the wake of the Protestant reformation. As a matter a fact the first American colony to grant full religious freedom was the Roman Catholic state of Maryland.
With that said as a traditionalist and a Russian Orthodox Christian I believe that Protestant missionaries are a bad thing for traditional Roman Catholic and Orthodox Christian (or Coptic or Armenian Apostolic) because they can completely change the culture of the people as well as give them a political orientation that is more oriented to the West.
EMS what do you think the great Russian writer, Russian nationalist and Russian Orthodox zealot (I don't say zealot in a bad way) thought of Protestant or even Roman Catholic missionaries in Orthodox lands? Those who would question my opposition to Protestant missionaries in lands that are ALL READY CHRISTIAN should read a little more history and see how missionaries can change the entire cultural and political landscape of a region.
Kingofthenet| 3.24.12 @ 5:01PM
Well i did my part, I sacrificed part of my Penis to please the Lord.
Ralph Novy| 3.24.12 @ 8:03PM
By the way, Mr. Bandow, when you were quoting Mr. Jefferson in your opening paragraph, you might have taken note that high amongst his concerns was the influence of the clergy -- the CHRISTIAN clergy.
Ralph Novy| 3.24.12 @ 8:05PM
Yeah, you know, Bandow, I am SO afraid of Islamic clerics from Yemen and the Maldives having some big effect on American politics.
LMAO.
Get a non-fear-mongering life, guy.
Jack Kelly| 3.25.12 @ 3:59AM
Mr. Novy, you don't seem to track well. This is not about American politics.
Oh, Yemen? I guess you do not have a son or daughter murdered at Fort Hood, Texas then?
Is that what it will take?
Then may it be so. Soon. Except that it should not be a loved one (as if you have the capacity -- or willingness -- to love) -- it should be you.
And then, yes, then, from the grave, you might have a clue.
Please. Take me up on this. Print your real name and residence address here in your next post (or don't post at all). I will forward it to Yemeni clerics who will gladly bring you up to date.
I am not kidding. I do not kid or josh.
POST American| 3.24.12 @ 11:40PM
"Way back in the 1890's, capstone
Fabian front man H G Wells pointed
out that it would be difficult to 'take
down' the standing American society
as long as their little Calvinist churches
figured so stubbornly in the mix.
By the 1920's, the Rockefeller's et al
were even paying ministers across
America to preach that Jesus was FOR
EUGENICS."
-------Take that in for a moment.
And then take up the matter of so called
'christian evangelist', and full blown 33rd degree
Free 'MAY--SIN' Pat Robertson's recent
public greenlighting of dumping one's spouse
with Alzheimers. A little bit of EUGENICS
'X--speedy-ants' that, of course, spits in the
face of Christ uttered doctrine 'One man,
one woman ONE LIFE'.
And then there's the fact that none of the
other high 'MAY-SINs' posing as christians
(ie Billy Graham/ thte late Oral Roberts/ Robert Schuller/ Jesse Jackson on and on) ----have ANY record whatsoever standing up powerfully and unflinchingly to the capstone EUGENICS age-enda.
Just weeks after the memory holed, very likely
MURDER of Andrew Breitbart --and the public
roll out, in 'Bio Ethics' (ie EUGENICS) journals
of Dr Peter Singer's call for selective extermination
of children up to 3!!!!!
---------------------------UH!------------------------------
we'd say it's time for christians and anyone
with a beating human heart to LOSE their
squeamishness and fear ---and CALL OUT
the MONSTERS among us.
"We are living in a psychopathic 'sis-stem'
run by PSYCHOPATHS."
-AMEN-
Baker| 3.25.12 @ 6:03PM
Mr. Bandow, thank you for this article.
I had forgotten about Open Doors and their list. Your article serves as a timely reminder of both.
Let me assure you it will come to a very practical use. Our family knows dear friends who are about to see their youngest daughter finish nursing school in just a few months. She is 25, very pretty and single. She is headed right now to a nursing position in a land too near the top of this list.
Additionally she is a Christian, big on heart and enthusiasm, short on real world hard knocks, I fear.
This list will go to her and her family so that they can perhaps recalibrate her post graduation plans. Personally we are praying that she does.
Alan| 3.26.12 @ 3:22PM
It would make your work so much more powerful if you didn't lead off with a misattributed quote.
Jefferson never said that, it isn't necessary to your point yet it immediately exposes your lack of basic fact checking/research in your reporting.
Tony| 3.27.12 @ 12:16AM
I wish people would actually do a little reading about Islam; the work of B'at Ye'or, for starters. Islam has "bloody borders," and always has had them. It doesn't matter who the opponents are, whether animists in Africa, Jews in Palestine, Sikhs in the Punjab, Catholics in the Philippines ... The problem lies with the necessarily fundamentalist approach to the Koran -- the Koran itself fairly demands it; there is nothing similar about the Bible. I wish I could say that I thought there could be an Islam open to philosophy and to at least a "natural theology," but it isn't there. The Islamic post-facto rejection of the Christian doctrines of the Trinity and of the Incarnation amount to this: a rejection of the statement we find in 1 John: "God is love." For the Muslim, God is power -- as Pope Benedict pointed out a few years ago, power, divorced from reason. In that sense the Muslims have far more in common with secularist totalitarians, who also believe ultimately in (technological) power, than they have in common with Catholics.
Cynthia Lauren Thorpe| 4.16.12 @ 8:42PM
Doug. You 'must' know that 'human rights' are NO rights at all - correct?
We have UNALIENABLE rights - and we must continue to focus on those; for when we segue to 'human rights' all is truly lost to 'hum'man (read, 'of the earth' rather than to 'man' which is what is in the Bible - MAN, not 'human', dear. ) And, down the morass of 'purported ' civilization we all do go.
Cynthia Lauren Thorpe
Enjoying your 'facts' while totally against your stance - which is 'sand' indeed .
I must 'side' in getting every one of my 'rights' from GOD alone - for He is the only One from which all Authority is derived.
schmenz| 4.25.12 @ 11:26AM
Mr Bandow:
Interesting list, and very informative. But I must say I was confused by the curious omission of one country that has a rather notable reputation for treating its Christian population (as opposed to its Christian tourists) abominably. In fact, the recent reportings of these events (not emphasized in the major media, for obvious reasons) as reported by Haaertz et al have only underlined the tip of the iceberg. We are speaking, of course, about Israel and the antiChristian fanatics who run that place, who oppress their Arab Christian population while cynically (and typically) enticing wealthy Christian tourists to come and spend lots of money.
The hypocrisy of those folks is beyond nauseating, don't you think?