A Christian in Iran sent to languish in a remote desert town after a seven-year prison sentence found a warm welcome from local Muslims, according to a new YouTube interview.
The Chinese government has continued its campaign of removing crosses from churches in recent months, citing bizarre reasons in support of the “sinicization” of religion begun by President Xi Jinping.
A pastor and three members of his congregation were killed in Nigeria in April, as lack of a response by government authorities to Islamist Fulani herdsmen attacks continues to leave Christians vulnerable.
China’s Communist government has halted online church services despite the coronavirus pandemic forcing many Christians to stay at home this Easter, Worthy News learned Saturday. The online religious rights watchdog Bitter Winter and local Christians said only groups holding state-issued licenses could stream religious services online in China. “We can’t get together because of the pandemic,” an underground house church pastor in the province of Jiangxi told Bitter Winter.
A Cuban journalist reporting on abuses against Christianity in Cuba was recently taken in for questioning by authorities, who accused him of being a CIA agent and threatened his mother and two-year-old son.
Recent attacks by Muslim Fulani herdsmen against Nigerian Christians have left many people displaced and women and children without adequate food and shelter, according to a Nigerian Christian leader.
Concerns remained Thursday over the whereabouts of a jailed Christian in China after authorities prevented his wife from sending him money and clothes, Christian activists say. Jiang Zhanchun was arrested in China’s capital Beijing last year when he and his wife discussed opportunities to be baptized with Christian leaders of a Beijing house church, according to the letter seen by Worthy News.
A young Christian family in India once considered cursed by their village was attacked by a mob wielding sticks, the husband beaten unconscious before his wife and two children.
Muslim Fulani herdsmen have killed more than 60 Christians in the last month in Nigeria, confirming a warning in January by a major Christian watchdog group that genocide was looming.
Iranian authorities have released another Christian convert from prison amid concerns the new coronavirus COVID-19 could spread in overcrowded jails, Christian activists said Monday. Amin Khaki, 38, learned from prison authorities Monday that he should not return to jail, confirmed well-informed advocacy group Middle East Concern (MEC). “It is expected that he will be able to reclaim the money put down as security,” MEC told Worthy News.
The Prime Minister of Sri Lanka is calling for the establishment of an “anti-conversion” law he claims will “save this country” from the phenomenon of people converting from Buddhism to other religions, Christians say as a pretext for persecution.
The Burmese military allowed its jets to open fire on four Christian villages in the predominantly Buddhist country in March, killing 21 people and forcing thousands of others to flee to a neighboring region.
Iran has released a Christian woman who was jailed after refusing to reconvert to Islam, activists confirmed to Worthy News. Rokhsareh (Mahrokh) Ghanbari, 62, is among some 85,000 prisoners freed in recent weeks amid concerns about the spread of the new coronavirus COVID-19.
Police, state governments, and radical Hindu nationalist groups are joining together against Christians in India, marshaling the accusation that Christians are forcing people to convert to faith in Jesus.
A pastor in Nepal who made sure to fastidiously follow government regulations forbidding worship services was attacked by police anyway while at home with his family, the officers taunting him and Jesus.
Christians in China have reported ongoing harassment from government authorities during the coronavirus crisis. China is ranked as one of the world’s worst countries in the persecution of Christians, according to the Open Doors USA’s World Watch List.
A Christian watchdog group in the UK published a new report this week on the erosion of religious freedom in China under President Xi Jinping, whose ‘sinicization’ campaign has set out to absorb faith into the Chinese socialist system.
A pastor and a team of youth missionaries from his church were abused and falsely charged in India earlier this month for providing food and clothing to the poor, in another instance of police complicity with the radical Hindu nationalist agenda.
It is confirmed that four French Christian aid workers have been freed after they were kidnapped in Iraq in January. A statement from President Marcron’s office on March 27 informed that the Élysée Palace had made ‘every effort to reach this outcome.’ The statement thanked Iraqi authorities for their cooperation but gave no details or information about any conditions of the workers’ release.
Peter Tumbelaka wasn’t in a hurry to become the pastor of Jakarta’s largest Pentecostal churches where many Muslims convert to Christianity. “I thought I could remain an architect and an engineer. But God had different plans,” the 52-year-old preacher told BosNewsLife in Indonesia’s bustling capital.