Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) has published a report showing that around 5.2 billion people live in countries where religious freedom is severely violated and restricted, International Christian Concern reports. These countries include China, India, and Pakistan, which have the world’s largest populations.
Devoted Christians in Europe and North America are increasingly among those being persecuted for their faith in Christ, a rights report shows.
Christian rights activists and other advocates urged Vietnam Tuesday to release four prisoners of conscience in Vietnam, including pastors, amid concerns about their health.
The wife of an evangelical pastor in eastern India has been freed after she was abducted, sold, and locked up in a brothel for nearly a month, Worthy News learned Monday.
The US Supreme Court has declined to hear an appeal from a Chicago church that says it continues to face the threat of COVID-19 related closure, the Christian Post reports. The state of Illinois argued the case filed by Elim Romanian Pentecostal Church is moot because pandemic-related restrictions ordered by Gov. J.B. Pritzker have been eased and churches can now gather again.
China’s Communist authorities may sentence detained human rights lawyer Chang Weiping to life imprisonment, Christian rights activists warned Monday.
The 2020 Abraham Accords, which normalized relations between Israel and the Muslim countries of Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates, may benefit not only Jewish communities in traditionally hostile Middle Eastern nations, but also other faith minorities in the region, including Christians, International Christian Concern reports.
A German pastor who faces expulsion from Turkey urged prayers Tuesday as he awaits the outcome of a trial that could effectively ban him from the country, supporters said.
A group of nearly 60 black Christian leaders is urging the U.S. Senate to reject the Equality Act recently passed by the House of Representatives and instead opt for a compromise bill that protects the rights of the LGBT community while also preserving the rights of religious believers and institutions.
The Chief Rabbi of Moscow warned this week that Jewish life in Europe is once again under serious threat due, among other things, to the intolerance of ritual slaughter and male circumcision practices that are central to Jewish religious expression. Writing in the Times of Israel, Rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt attested: “There is almost no value in remembering the past if a country and its politicians don’t allow its Jewish population to live their life in the present.”
Five Christians were arrested Sunday morning during a police raid on a house church in China’s Chengdu, International Christian Concern reports. The Spring of Life Church (East Hall) was in the middle of a service when authorities arrived and took away the elder Cha Changping, who leads the church, his wife, and three others.
The Oklahoma House of Representatives has passed a bill that would block state and local government officials from forcing houses of worship to close, even under circumstances like a pandemic, the Christian Post reports. House Bill 2648, the Oklahoma Religious Freedom Act, passed by 80-18 votes in the House and now goes to the state Senate for consideration.
The U.S. Supreme Court has sided once again with California houses of worship in their most recent request for an injunction against a county health order, pending appeal in the Ninth Circuit and disposition of a petition for a writ of cert.
House Republicans are rallying around a compromise bill that would add protections for religious organizations in addition to granting discrimination protections to LGBT citizens. The bill comes one day after House Democrats passed the Equality Act, which critics say infringes on religious liberty rights and is likely to fail in the Senate.
Lawmakers in Washington, D.C. are getting ready to decide on a landmark piece of LGBTQ legislation that would crush religious liberty.
Earlier this month a Christian youth leader in Sudan was reportedly detained and beaten by suspected national security forces because he spoke out against the January 3 burning of a church building, Morning Star News reports. The case highlights the continued vulnerability of Christians at a time of national transition from the brutal regime of Islamic dictator Omar al-Bashir (who was ousted in 2019) toward a government that seeks to root out long-term corruption and end religious intolerance in the country.
Leading Christian rights activist, broadcaster, and author Faith McDonnell, has become director of advocacy at the U.S.-based Katartismos Global (KGI Global) charity. The group says it “exists to equip the Church for mission and ministry” by supporting persecuted Christians and other believers in need.
Egyptian laws brought in since the 2011 revolution have resulted in significant restrictions on religious and other freedoms for Christians in the country, International Christian Concern reported Saturday.
Europe’s top rights court has been asked to support a Canadian-American pastor who was reportedly deported from Turkey after 19 years for evangelism.
The wide-reaching Equality Act championed by Democrats would put the hiring practices of faith-based organizations in “jeopardy” and will create additional religious freedom concerns for Christian schools, churches and ministries, a prominent legal nonprofit argues.