Evangelical Christians in Russia were forced to pay a “tax on faithfulness” in 2022, which will likely increase this year as part of a government crackdown on non-Orthodox faiths, rights investigators tell Worthy News.
A jailed leader of more than 30 churches and congregations in northeastern India has been released on bail after International pressure, Worthy News learned Tuesday.
The bipartisan US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) has expressed “outrage” over the Biden’s administration’s “inexplicable” decision to keep Nigeria and India off the State Department’s list of Countries of Particular Concern (CPC) when it added Cuba and Nicaragua to the list on Friday, Christianity Today reports.
A jailed leader of more than 30 churches and congregations in northeastern India faces a trial on charges supporters link to his Christian activities, sources told Worthy News late Thursday.
The Senate is fast-tracking a bill that could deny religious freedom for individuals and faith-based organizations.
Following the intervention of the US Supreme Court, the city of Boston has agreed to pay $2.1 million to a conservative Christian legal group that challenged the city’s refusal to fly a Christian flag at City Hall, the Associated Press reports.
Hungary says persecuted Christians “need help to be given in their homelands,” while those who have fled “must receive help to return.”
A top Indiana lawyer on Friday questioned the validity of a lawsuit brought by a group of residents who argue that the state’s abortion ban violates their religious freedoms.
As thousands of Christians in Nigeria are murdered by Islamic jihadists every year, a coalition of more than 30 international rights groups and faith-based organizations wrote to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on September 19, asking him to re-designate Nigeria as a “Country of Particular Concern” in regard to religious freedom violations, Church Leaders (CL) reports. The US annually reviews the status of religious freedom in every country in the world and designates each country that has tolerated “particularly severe violations of religious freedom” as a Country of Particular Concern (CPC).
Authorities in Indonesia’s province of Banten have denied the Protestant Batak Society Christian Church (HKBP) a permit to build a church, in a move described as going against the country’s 1945 constitution guaranteeing religious freedom, the Union of Catholic Asian News (UCA) reports.
On Friday, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the Biden administration mandate forcing doctors to perform gender transition treatments.
A federal judge in Florida ordered class action relief and granted a classwide preliminary injunction Wednesday against the federal government’s COVID shot mandate for all U.S. Marines whether they are active or in reserve service.
The US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) attests in its new report published this month that Iran’s Ja’afri Shi’a Islamic regime is continuing a misinformation campaign of propaganda against religious minorities it began last year. Neither Non-Muslim citizens nor adherents of other Islamic traditions are afforded equal protection under the law in Iran, the USCIRF reports attest.
A new poll by Lifeway Research has found that 54% of Americans believe religious liberty is declining in the US, and 59% believe that tolerance of Christianity specifically is declining, CBN News reports. The poll found that evangelical believers are more likely (74%) to say religious liberty is declining than those who are not evangelical (48%).
The prominent Minister of Myanmar’s government-in-exile has delivered a passionate speech demanding religious freedom and asserting that the people of Myanmar will “never give up the fight” for “freedom and [for] federal democracy,” International Christian Concern (ICC) reports.
An evangelical lawmaker in Finland who was acquitted by a lower court on “hate speech” charges for sharing her views on homosexuality now faces an appeals court hearing after the state prosecutor insisted on continuing the case, the Washington Times reports.
Protecting religious liberty around the world has become more challenging in the last year, advocates said this week ahead of Tuesday’s convening of the second International Religious Freedom Summit in Washington.
The Nigerian government has actively persecuted religion, contrary to the provision of religious freedom in Nigeria’s constitution, the US State Department found in its Annual Report on International Religious Freedom (IRF) published on June 2.
he US Department of State has now published its 2021 Annual Report on International Religious Freedom, setting out the status of religious freedom in each country in the world, International Christian Concern (ICC reports). The USIRF report to Congress found that a number of countries with poor records on religious freedom had made significant improvements: these countries include Morocco, Taiwan and Iraq, ICC said. However, the situation is extremely severe and/or deteriorating in numerous other countries, including Pakistan and Yemen.
At least 30 Christians were imprisoned on false charges in India’s Uttar Pradesh state last month, as Hindu nationalists continue to abuse the state’s harsh anti-conversion laws and accuse believers of forcing Hindus to convert to Christianity, International Christian Concern (ICC) reports.