The Persecuted Church - Dave's Raves

On Maundy Thursday, we heard testimony from Christians who are suffering for their beliefs and practices. In some cases, the persecution is not just religious, but racial and political as well. We will hear their stories and join our hearts with them as we pray that the Gospel of Jesus Christ will be proclaimed throughout the world. Here are a few of those stories:

Testimony from the Persecuted Church #1

Archbishop Benjamin Kwashi, of Jos, Nigeria, talks about life at the intersection of other faiths. He shares how he represented Christ in the midst of racial unrest and violence.

World Faiths Benjamin Kwashi Video

Testimony from the Persecuted Church #2

Suspected Drug Traffickers Kidnap Pastor in Mexico

Michoacan state church leader abducted during Sunday service.

Elisabeth Isais, Compass Direct News | posted 4/15/2011 02:39PM

Some 500 worshippers were gathered for last Sunday’s (April 10) worship service at the Christian Center El Shaddai in the Mexican city of Lázaro Cárdenas, Michoacan, at about 8:15 a.m. when four masked men burst in firing machine guns into the air.

Before the frightened believers realized what was happening, their pastor, Josué Ramírez Santiago, had been whisked away.

The following day, the pastor’s family received news that the criminals wanted a ransom of 20 million pesos (US$1.7 million). Even if the family could raise such an immense sum—considered doubtful—payment would not guarantee that the victim would be returned alive.

Arturo Farela, director of the National Fraternity of Evangelical Churches, has asserted that organized crime syndicates and drug cartels have targeted Christians because they view churches as revenue centers and because churches support programs for the rehabilitation of drug addicts and alcoholics.

“The majority of rehabilitation centers that have been attacked by organized crime in Ciudad Juarez, Tijuana, Tepic and other places belong to the evangelical community,” Farela said in a declaration regarding the kidnapping of Ramirez. “Furthermore, some 100 Mexican or foreign pastors who lived in Ciudad Juarez have had to abandon the city because of the threats and demands for money. And of course many pastors and their families have been victims of extortion, threats, kidnapping and homicide.”

Full article: Christianity Today

Testimony from the Persecuted Church #3 –

Governor killed for defending Christian

PAKISTAN An influential governor and human rights advocate who stood up for a Christian condemned for blasphemy was shot more than 25 times by one of his security guards. Punjab governor Salman Taseer had declared support for Aasia Bibi, the first Christian woman sentenced to be executed under a Pakistani law that mandates the death penalty for blaspheming Islam.

Mr. Taseer, 65, a successful businessman and publisher of a liberal English-language daily newspaper, was exceptional, even within the secular-minded Pakistan Peoples Party, for his vocal opposition to the religious parties and the extremism they spread. He was imprisoned in the 1980s under the military dictator Gen. Mohammad Zia ul-Haq for it and was still opposing the religious parties 30 years later.

He recently took up a campaign to repeal Pakistan’s contentious blasphemy laws, which were passed under General Zia as a way to promote Islam and unite the country. The laws have been misused to convict minority Pakistanis as the Islamic forces unleashed by the general have gathered strength. The laws prescribe a mandatory death sentence for anyone convicted of insulting Islam.

Religious parties staged vigorous demonstrations of thousands of people across the country last weekend to protest the campaign by Mr. Taseer, even burning him in effigy. Mr. Taseer countered in comments on his Twitter account and elsewhere.

On Tuesday (Jan. 4, 2011) Mr. Taseer was shot in daylight multiple times at close range as he was getting into his car in Islamabad at the Kohsar Market, an area frequently visited by the city’s elite. His attacker was identified as Malik Mumtaz Hussain Qadri, an elite-force security guard, who surrendered to the police immediately afterward and implied he had killed the governor because of his campaign to amend the blasphemy laws.

Popular support for Taseer’s assassination was shown when tens of thousands demonstrated to demand the killer’s freedom.

More here: New York Times (account required)

Update: Christians under increasing pressure in Pakistan

Bibles are being desecrated, churches attacked and human rights advocates threatened in Pakistan as Islamic extremists intensify pressure on the Christian community.

Christians have faced persecution in Pakistan for years but the climate has deteriorated in recent months with the murders of Punjab Governor Salman Taseer and Minorities Minister Shahbaz Bhatti, and particularly since the burning of a Koran at the church of Florida pastor Terry Jones last month.

Last Saturday, the Sarhadi Lutheran Church in Mardan, Khyberpakhtunkhwa province, was targeted in a bomb attack.

It is believed that Islamic militants planted the bomb that caused considerable damage to the building.