CHRISTIANPERSECUTION
 

""You snakes! You brood of vipers!
How will you escape being condemned to hell?
Therefore I am sending you prophets
and wise men and teachers.
Some of them you will kill and crucify;
others you will flog in your synagogues
and pursue from town to town.
And so upon you will come all the righteous blood
that has been shed on earth,
from the blood of righteous
Abel to the blood of Zechariah son of Berakiah,
whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.
I tell you the truth,
all this will come upon this generation.
"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets
and stone those sent to you,
how often I have longed to gather your children together,
as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings,
but you were not willing.
Look, your house is left to you desolate.
For I tell you, you will not see me again until you say,
'Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.'"
(Matthew 24:33-39)

• Christians persecuted by Christians - Raymond Moloney, S.J.
• Christians persecuted by non-Christians - (ref. Paul Marshall Interview - Insight C.N.N.)
• A Faith Watch Special Report - Betsy Pisik - 'The Washington Times'.
• The Fourth Sign: Persecution - M.M.P. message no. 171.

        The early days of Christianity were tough times, persecution was the order of the day, but nevertheless Christianity kept on growing and all the persecution could only help to make Christians stronger in their faith. Christianity today is the result of their work, the work that Christ Himself had started. Hundreds of people were baptised as Christians after having seen the courage of many men and women killed as martyrs in the Roman Coliseum.

In those early days, it could be understandable that persecution did occur and that Christianity found resistance against its doctrines. After all we do consider people who lived 2000 years ago as 'primitive'. But Christian persecution did continue along the centuries up to this present day proving that humanity has not yet accepted the message of love Jesus brought us.
 

        "In recent times the small African country of Rwanda has never been far from the news. This dates from 1994, when the world had to witness the greatest event of genocide since the holocaust of the Jews in the middle of the century. The scale of the problem in Rwanda defies belief, and its repercussions continue in the ongoing hostilities that have spilled into neighbouring Zaire.
 

        Recently I spent some time in Africa and met people from the various groups involved in the conflict. One of my former students, a Tutsi priest, told me how, of his ten brothers and sisters, only one is still alive. Of his thirty-three nieces and nephews, only three survive. He himself escaped only by hiding above the ceiling of a school with a fellow religious, while they could hear their would-be assassins hunting for them in the room below.

A story from the other side of the conflict tells of the fate of the Jesuit bishop of Bukavu, Zaire, whom I also knew. Only last autumn he spoke out against the invasion of his country by the Tutsi army of Laurent Kabila, coming in from Rwanda.

When the text of his protest against injustice reached his confreres in Rome, they said that he had signed his own death warrant. That very day word arrived from Zaire that he was dead, with a bullet through the back of his head, as an Irish aid-worker on the spot told me.

        The point about these stories, which should make us all pause to reflect, is the fact that Rwanda is one of the most Catholic countries in Africa. The vast majority of Tutsi and Hutu, the two opposed sides in that country, have been Christian for most of this century, but their enmity goes back long before the advent of Christianity.

At the time of the genocide, the Hutu majority were dominant in the government, and so they were able to use the resources of the State to plan the genocide.

For six months beforehand radio broadcasts were used to whip up anti-Tutsi feeling.

A recording of one such broadcast, made during the dark days when the genocide was at it's height, was picked up by the B.B.C. and featured in a recent programme.

It ran: 'Come, let us celebrate. The Tutsis have been exterminated. Come friends, let us celebrate. God rewards the just'.

Setting that message in the context of thousands of people being literally hacked to death by their co-parishioners and former friends, one can appreciate the remark of an American Jesuit to me on visiting Rwanda: there is only one word for it - diabolical."
 
 

        In China today there exist more Christians than in all other countries put together. Unfortunately they are not left to practise their faith freely because, Christian churches in China are all state regulated. 'Freedom of religion exists' the communist leaders would argue, but all is controlled to suit the Communist's ideologies.

Appointed priests by the government are not allowed to preach about the second coming of Christ and other issues including the view of the Roman Catholic Church on abortion. So, to practise freely, millions of Christians go underground. With the result of most of them being harassed, arrested, tortured and killed. All this because they do not want to be part of a state regulated church.These Christians are literally suffering for Christ!

Persecution of Christians has increased in these last ten years. The insurgency by the Islamic extremists in Algeria have targeted Christians, so have the militants in Egypt. In Sudan the government seems to be persecuting Christians, one million have been killed and two million displaced. Persecution is spreading throughout the third world and also in many Islamic countries.

Christian persecution and intolerance does not stop here. Russia is issuing a bill that would give the Russian Orthodox Church the upper hand to any other religion including all other Christian religions. This would make it hard for all the other Christians in Russia to practise their faith .

According to a recent study done by Paul Marshall, an American author, about 600 million Christians are suffering some sort of persecution in the world today. He speaks about this in his book -
"THEIR BLOOD CRIES OUT" and all this is happening in the world now at the dawn of the 22nd century AD, a time when everyone is supposed to be 'an evolved and mature global citizen'.

Let us not forget how the Jews used to be treated before the war. They were called 'rats' and many lies were spread about them by the Nazis, such as for example, the lie that Jews used to sacrifice children. This happened before they were exterminated in millions. Today, the same phenomenon is being repeated on a much more massive scale and it is mostly the Christians that are suffering this injustice.

Many people today call themselves fundamentalist and conservative. They are proud of belonging to organisations and religions. Many of these so called fundamentalists devote their life fighting for a cause. For freedom?

Do they really practise their faith?

Do they know the real meaning of love?

Are they really merciful, the very way their God is merciful with them?

No! They kill, bomb, massacre and murder each other and say that God gave them this authority and that He shall reward them. They are not real Muslims, nor real Catholics, nor real Protestants, nor real Jews. They are just fighting a political cause under the banner of their faith.
And many a time their faith gets a bad name because of them. These people are the least to be considered fundamentalist, because they do not conform to the ideologies of their faith. They do not conform to the ideologies of mercy and love of God our Creator.But, they definitely conform to the ideologies of greed, hatred, revenge, jealousy and envy which are the ideologies of satan our arch enemy. Because of the wish of many people to worship God in their own way, many governments are refusing their rights to:-

Freedom of speech (including Press freedom)

and most of all the freedom of religion.

Q. Will this injustice stop as the world becomes more democratic?

A. It depends what is understood by democracy. If this means that the government has consent by the majority of its citizens to go ahead with any form of persecution then this could also be termed 'democracy'. After all, Hitler in the second world war, had the consent of his citizens to massacre the Jews.

A more capitalist and democratic world does not necessarily mean a world where all human rights are protected and respected.

Q. What is the rest of the world doing to improve this situation?

A. Nothing. On the contrary, western countries are enjoying trade relations with these governments while many people are suffering the violations of their freedoms and rights.
 
 

        "The traditionally passionate debate over renewing favourable trade status for China grew hotter with former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger urging Congress to extend the preference and prominent Chinese dissident Harry Wu warning against it. Mr. Kissinger, who engineered U.S. diplomatic and trade relations with China a quarter-century ago, advised Congress not to demonize the Asian giant over human rights abuses. "That can only end with a confrontation with us and China," Mr. Kissinger told the Senate commerce committee. Lobbying in favour of most-favored-nation (MEN) status, he said, "cooperation with China is an essential element of U.S. foreign policy in Asia." But Mr. Wu, who was imprisoned as an "enemy of the state" for more than a decade in a remote labor camp, harshly criticized the Clinton administration's decision to renew MFN for China, saying the arrangement solely benefits the Communist government, not ordinary citizens. "Many lobby for MFN, saying that by revoking it you're damaging common people's lives," Mr. Wu, who was jailed again in 1995 for trying to document prison conditions, told international Catholic groups near U.N. headquarters. "Most of the profit from foreign investment benefits the Chinese government; very little goes to the people." Congress is required to review renewal of MFN status for China every year. The process has become increasingly controversial as awareness of human rights abuses increases. President Clinton formally requested renewal of MEN last week and Congress has until September to approve it. Organizing around the specter of the Tiananmen Square massacre, human rights groups have tried to turn up the heat on China, exposing the detention of dissidents, labor activists, the religiously devout and other potential enemies of the state.

According to the 1997 World Report, Human Rights Watch says inmates in China's gulags often are forced to work at hard labor for long periods, are severely beaten or tortured, may not receive adequate medical attention, and can be held beyond their sentences. It is also widely thought that the Chinese government harvests organs from executed prisoners for lucrative transplants. Mr. Wu, now an American citizen who lives in California, has worked for nearly a decade to focus the world's attention on these "re-education" camps, whose existence he says are common knowledge in China. He denounced U. S. efforts to influence China s and other nation's human rights policy by doing business with them, rather than shunning them. "If the engagement policy is a good idea, why was it never applied to Cuba?" said Mr. Wu at a gathering of Catholic groups in New York. "Is China's [human rights record] better than South Africa's? Or Burma's?" He dismissed the U.S. argument that MEN benefits Chinese workers, saying, "You are not helping the Chinese. You are making money, and the Chinese are helping you."

The Clinton administration de-linked human rights concerns from trade discussions in 1994. The decision largely was supported by the business sector but loudly denounced by human rights advocates, who warned that the United States is forfeiting its political muscle to appease a trading partner. China received more than $3 billion worth of World Bank loans last year, making it the bank's largest single recipient."
 
 

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