A young Indian evangelist and shepherd has been killed by Hindu priests seeking human sacrifices for a Hindu ‘goddess’, the latest in a series of violent attacks against Christians in India, BosNewsLife learned Wednesday, November 7.
It is Easter 2007, a day when the world is celebrating the resurrection of Jesus. They came from near and far throughout Central and Midwestern Nepal, the throng of masses converging and marching through the center of the crown city of Pokhara, at the foot of the Annapurna mountain range. No, this is not another Communist Maoist rally that we see so often these days, but it is a rally of men and women, boys and girls joyfully lifting up the banner of Jesus Christ, their Lord and King! Jesus said, “If I be lifted up I will draw all men unto me!†Today Jesus is being lifted up in major cities in Nepal.
Following the March 29 sentencing of Father Nguyen Van Ly to eight years in prison for distributing “material harmful to the state,†two Protestant lawyers charged with the same “crime†are expected to face equally harsh sentences in what Human Rights Watch has called the harshest crackdown in 20 years.
A prominent Mennonite pastor and his wife were recovering Sunday, March 11, from “brutal” beatings by Vietnamese security forces as part of a government crackdown on dissidents, a key activist told BosNewsLife.
A major human rights watchdog accused the Vietnamese government on Friday, March 9 of “flouting” its commitments on human rights by launching “one of the worst crackdowns on peaceful dissidents,” including Christians, “in 20 years.”
Tensions are rising across the Horn of Africa – there is death and danger. Irredentist Somali Islamists have declared jihad against Ethiopia. Christians are being attacked and murdered by Muslims in Ethiopia. Eritrea, which is accused of arming the Somali Islamists, is exploiting an opportunity and has breached the 2000 cease-fire agreement by moving troops into the Eritrea-Ethiopia border buffer zone. Two Protestant Christians were recently tortured to death in Eritrea. The savagery of persecution appears to be escalating in proportion to regional tensions — and it could be about to get much worse.
A long-time jailed member of Vietnam’s predominantly Christian Montagnard Degar community has been tortured to death, BosNewsLife learned from supporters Wednesday, September 6.
Leading Christian and secular human rights groups welcomed Thursday, August 31 the release of a church leader and a well-known Internet activist as part of Vietnam’s National Day of amnesty of thousands of prisoners.
Six Evangelical Christians of Vietnam’s Montagnard Degar minority were facing another tense day Wednesday, June 28, after a court reportedly jailed them on charges of inciting religious unrest and organizing illegal border crossings to neighboring Cambodia.
More anti-Christian violence was expected in Pakistan Thursday, February 16, as deadly protests against published cartoons of Prophet Mohammad spread across the country.
At least 40 pastors, elders and leading laymen from five of Eritrea’s banned Protestant churches have been arrested from their homes or offices in the past two weeks in the capital of Asmara.
Burma’s military government has closed down a major evangelical church and movement in the capital Rangoon as part of a fresh crackdown on Christian congregations across the Asian nation, a well informed advocacy group said Wednesday, September 7.
The Rev. Nguyen Hong Quang was working at a labor camp machine used to extract cashew nuts on August 9 when he was approached by high prison officials. They told him he would be moved immediately to another prison.
KABUL, AFGHANISTAN (ANS) — The Foreign Minister of Afghanistan’s Islamic Taliban regime denied Thursday, September 6, that his hard-line movement was considering a prisoner swap with the United States to free eight detained Western Christian relief workers. Reports from the region said that relatives of blind Egyptian militant Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman, currently serving a life term in the United States for terrorism, proposed the prison exchange.
JANUARY
Taliban leader Mohammed Omar declares on Radio Shariat that any Afghan caught professing Christianity or Judaism would be executed, and that any non-Muslim found “trying to win converts” would also be killed.
The events in Central Sulawesi are finally beginning to get the attention of major newspapers. An article in the New York Times December 1 said, “Thousands of Christian villagers on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi are fleeing attacks by armed Muslim paramilitary forces.” The article quoted a Roman Catholic priest, “Thousands have fled…What could they do? Their houses have been burned. The police came yesterday, but it was too late.”
A crucial paradox lies at the heart of China’s persecution dynamics. Over the past 30 years, conditions have improved for Christians in China. But during the past five years, they have deteriorated markedly.
LONDON, January 7 (Compass) — The forty-six-year-old founder of the “South China” house church movement, Gong Shengliang, was granted a reprieve from his death sentence, which was due to be carried out on Saturday, January 5. Gong was given a stay of execution, relatives said.
My prayers are that you receive an abundance of blessings from our Heavenly Father, the Father of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
The message about to be delivered to you should come as no great surprise. For the past nine months, I have been quietly stepping aside from any leadership position associated with God’s 40 day prayer and revival event. For all of my professional career which totaled almost forty years in Washington D.C., God has been preparing me for such a time as this.
Attorneys for a Chinese Christian leader who barely escaped execution in January want his retrial to be conducted in public this time, according to sources close to the case.