Christian News

Authorities in India’s Assam state have fined two American Christians $500 each for allegedly violating their tourist visas by preaching the Gospel and leading people to Christ at various locations, Christian Today India (CTI) reports.

Cracking down on Christianity it perceives as a threat to its authoritarian power, Iran’s Islamic regime last year arrested a record number of Christians across the country, targeting Bible distributors in particular, the Christian Post (CP) reports. 

An American missionary has met with senior officials at the US State Department in an effort to secure the release of 11 pastors imprisoned in Nicaragua on trumped up charges of money laundering and organized crime, CBN News reports. Britt Hancock of the US-based Mountain Gateway missionary organization made his recent appeal to lawmakers in Washington even as he himself also faces criminal charges in the matter.

Hindu extremists in India’s Chhattisgarh state violently assaulted a Christian man and his father and brother last week after he refused to renounce Christ and return to Hinduism, Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW) reports. Christians in Chhattisgarh state have been increasingly violently targeted by Hindu extremists who, emboldened by the ruling Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, are seeking to impose their version of the religion as the dominant ideology in India.

Amid a surge of reports that revival is taking place on US college campuses, Christian author and founder of IF:Gathering Jennie Allen announced Friday that Florida State University (FSU) saw up to a thousand students going forward to put their faith in Christ during a free worship event the evening before, CBN News reports.

Hindu extremists in India are continuing to persecute Christians in their zeal to ensure Hindu nationalism is the dominant ideology in this vast country: in a recent incident, a mob of Hindus in Chhattisgarh state attacked and hospitalized eight Christians who were on their way home from their weekly house church meeting, International Christian Concern (ICC) reports.

Islamic jihadists slaughtered more than 8,000 Christians in Nigeria in 2023 alone, according to a new report by Nigerian human rights organization International Society for Civil Liberty and Rule of Law (Intersociety).

As China’s ruling Communist Party continues its crackdown on Chinese Christian families and house churches, police on Jan. 18 arrested three believers from the Fuyang Maizhong Reformed Church as they led children in the congregation in singing hymns and prayer, China Aid reports.

Christianity is legal in Uganda, but believers who left Islam for Christ are increasingly vulnerable to extreme violence by radicalized Muslim relatives and neighbors. In the latest incident of such brutality, a formerly Muslim couple in eastern Uganda were hacked to death on Feb. 2, just weeks after putting their faith in Christ, Morning Star News reported.

Christians in Punjab Province, Pakistan, last Monday had fire bombs thrown and gunshots fired at their homes by Muslim extremists enraged that they had voted for an opposing political party in the Feb. 8 general election, Morning Star News (MSN) reports. 

Police officers in the United Kingdom recently threatened to arrest a Christian who was preaching the Gospel of salvation on a London street after they received a call claiming he had made a homophobic statement through an amplifying device, the Daily Mail reports.

A Christian mother of seven living at an internally displaced persons camp in Sudan was badly beaten by her Muslim husband after he heard about her new faith in Jesus, Morning Star News (MSN) reports.

A Hindu rights organization in India’s Assam state is demanding the removal of all Christian symbols from local Christian schools on the grounds that missionaries must be prevented from evangelizing pupils, UCA News reports.

Christian rights advocates are concerned that believers in China are being pressured by the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to discourage their children from entering into faith in Christ, Christian Today (CT) reports.

A newly published survey shows that support for Israel dropped by a dramatic 50% among young American Evangelicals in just three years between 2018-2021, the Jerusalem Post reports. The data is consistent with the outpouring of anti-Israel sentiment that was unleashed worldwide, including in the US, following the Oct. 7 attack on the Jewish state by the Hamas Palestinian terror group.

Muslim extremists in eastern Uganda beat a Christian man unconscious, and then torched his house, after seeing him setting up for a Gospel event near their village last month, Morning Star News reports. Christianity is legal in Uganda but believers have come under increasing violent persecution from radicalized Muslims, with those who left Islam for Christ being particularly vulnerable to attacks.

An estimated 10,000 Christians from different faith traditions gathered in Lebanon’s capital city Beirut last month for a groundbreaking ecumenical worship event intended to encourage unity and hope in the Body of Christ, CBN News reports. Titled “Beirut 2024,” the event was held on Jan. 20 as part of celebrations for the annual Week of Prayer for Christian Unity and the 50th anniversary of the Middle East Council of Churches (MECC), CBN News reports.

Screaming that no Christian in the area should be left alive, Islamic gunmen in Punjab Province, Pakistan, murdered a 14-year-old Christian boy during an attack in a marketplace on Feb. 5, Morning News (MSN) reports. 

A recent report on the status of Christianity around the world shows that – despite intense persecution in many countries there – the largest number of Christians are in the Global South, and that Asia (five regions) has the fastest growing Christian populations of all. Titled ‘Status of Global Christianity, 2024, in the Context of 1900–2050,’ the report was published by the US-based Center for the Study of Global Christianity (CSGC).

A spate of extremely violent attacks on Christians in Pakistan’s Punjab Province was manifest again when a Muslim man attacked two Christian women with an ax and attempted to rape one of them last month, Morning Star News (MSN) reports.