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Fewer Iraqi Christian families are fleeing their homes in the northern province of Ninevah thanks to the heavy presence of security forces, but families who already fled anti-Christian attacks over the past few weeks are living in difficult conditions and are still reluctant to return to their homes, a local aid official said on 25 October.”They are experiencing hard living conditions in the places they have ended up despite receiving aid on a daily basis,” Falah Hilal, head of the provincial department of the Iraqi Red Crescent Society (IRCS), said.”Most of these families have ended up cramped in small rooms in churches and monasteries while others joined relatives or friends in their houses. Their children have left schools and employees can’t go to their offices,” Hilal added.Hilal said that the IRCS had not registered any new displacements among Christian families over the past week as security forces had deployed in the areas where Christians lived.
“Yet we didn’t register any return of families to their houses either,” Hilal told IRIN.
Anti-Christian violence in Mosul, the provincial capital of Ninevah and some 400km north of Baghdad, erupted on 4 October when gunmen started assassinating Christians and threatening others, telling them to leave the city.
13,000 displaced Christians
On 24 October, the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) estimated that more than 2,200 families, or some 13,000 people, had fled their homes since 4 October. UNHCR said this represented about half the province’s Christian population. It added that about 400 families had crossed the border into Syria while others had gone to safe areas to the north and east of Mosul and others to neighbouring Dahuk, Erbil and Kirkuk provinces.
“Many left with little money and need help,” the UNHCR statement said, adding that it had delivered relief supplies to over 1,700 Christian families.
Police estimated that 12 Christians had died in the violence. The latest incident was on 13 October when gunmen broke into a music store in Mosul killing its Christian owner and injuring his nephew.
No group has claimed responsibility for the attacks but Sunni extremists are believed to be behind the campaign, which is taking place despite US-Iraqi operations aimed at routing insurgents from remaining strongholds north of the capital.
The newly displaced 13,000 Christians add to the more than 4.2 million Iraqis who have fled their homes since the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, according to UNHCR.
Of these, about 2 million are living as refugees in neighbouring countries – mostly in Syria and Jordan – while the remainder are displaced within Iraq.
Source: IRINews
Taliban gunmen killed a Christian aid worker in Kabul on Monday, and the militant group said it targeted the woman because she was spreading her religion.
The dual South African-British national worked with handicapped Afghans and was killed in the western part of Kabul as she was walking to work around 8 a.m., officials said.
The gunmen, who were on a motorbike, shot the woman in the body and leg with a pistol, said Interior Ministry spokesman Zemeri Bashary. The Taliban claimed responsibility for the slaying.
“This woman came to Afghanistan to teach Christianity to the people of Afghanistan,” militant spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid told The Associated Press. “Our (leaders) issued a decree to kill this woman. This morning our people killed her in Kabul.”
The woman’s aid group SERVE — Serving Emergency Relief and Vocational Enterprises — identified her as Gayle Williams, 34, in a statement on its Web site.
“She was a person who always loved the Afghans and was dedicated to serving those who are disabled,” it said.
The group describes itself as a Christian charity registered in Britain. The Web site says it has been working with Afghan refugees since 1980 in Pakistan.
“SERVE Afghanistan’s purpose is to express God’s love and bring hope by serving the people of Afghanistan, especially the needy, as we seek to address personal, social and environmental needs,” the site says.
Rina Vamberende, a spokeswoman for SERVE in Kabul, said the group is a Christian organization “but they are definitely not expressing this on purpose. They are here to do NGO (aid) work.”
“It’s not the case that they preach, not at all,” she said.
Afghanistan is a conservative Islamic nation. Proselytizing is prohibited by law, and other Christian missionaries or charities have faced severe hostility. Last year a group of 23 South Korean aid workers from a church group were taken hostage in southern Afghanistan. Two were killed and the rest were released. In 2001, eight international aid workers, including two Americans, were imprisoned and charged with preaching Christianity. The eight were freed by Afghan mujahedeen fighters attacking the Taliban after the U.S.-led invasion.
Monday’s attack adds to a growing sense of insecurity in Kabul. The capital city is now blanketed with police checkpoints. Embassies, military bases and the U.N. are erecting cement barriers to guard against homicide bombs.
Source : Fox News
Egypt’s most well-known convert to Christianity is still hiding a year after he filed the landmark case to become the first Egyptian Muslim to sue the government for rejecting his application to officially change his religion.
Mohammed Ahmed Hegazy, 25, had lost his case in January when an Egyptian judge ruled that a Muslim who converted to Christianity cannot legally change his religious status.
Now, eight months after his case was closed and a year after he filed the case, Hegazy is still hiding out of fear for his life.
Since January 29 when the court ruled against him, Hegazy, his wife and baby daughter have had to move five times, according to the persecution watchdog agency, Compass Direct News.
“The verdict for my case was discriminatory [on the part] of the judge,” Hegazy told Compass in an interview last month. The judge had based his decision on Islamic law that says someone can convert “up”, or to more recent religions, such as from Judaism and Christianity to Islam, but not vice versa.
But even after the media stopped reporting on his case, Hegazy said he still remains a target – as all converts do – of Islamic militants.
During the trial, Hegazy’s face was splattered across TV channels and newspapers, making him easy to recognize to any extremists.
“The most difficult thing for me is that the lives of my wife and daughter are in danger all the time,” Hegazy said.
He recalled last October that a friend had called and said one of his lawyers had given authorities his address and he should quickly move.
Hegazy and his family moved immediately and within a day the fundamentalists came to attack them. The extremists camped around his former house for several days and set fire to the apartment next door to his, killing the female resident inside.
The female neighbour was his wife’s best friend who had helped them during their difficult time in hiding.
“The church denied that she was killed, and it was never reported publicly,” he said.
Hegazy dreams that he and his family can leave the country someday, but they do not have passports. Obtaining passports would require them to go back to their hometowns where Hegazy says they will be killed as soon as they arrive.
“Even if it’s not family, others will do it, so I can’t take that risk,” he said.
A convert is “stuck” between the pressure from an Islamic government, Islamic society, and a weak church, Hegazy said.
He does not think his case alone can be resolved, but thinks a change is possible if Egyptian converts overseas and in Egypt filed a joint case.
Human rights groups also need to push harder for convert cases, he said.
Egypt has the largest Christian population in the Middle East, which makes up about 10 per cent of the country’s population.
Source Christian Today
People killed for their faith in Orissa and victims still suffering at the hands of religious extremists were remembered in prayer at the Synod of the Church of North India (CNI), in Punjab. Churches are not being permitted to contribute to the relief effort, but people are being urged to pray and join in the call for justice.
The 350 Synod members were visibly moved as they listened to two Christians from Orissa tell of their experiences in one of the 311 villages that have suffered violent attacks from religious extremists.
One victim told how his congregation had been attacked during a service and people were forced to flee into the forest. He had been attacked with an axe and left for dead among the trees. To this day he wonders how or why God saved his life.
Although he has had to sell almost all he owned to pay for the medical treatment, he said. “I praise God for his mercy. My faith is now stronger than before.”
Concern was expressed at the way the police and authorities are failing to intervene to prevent violence, unwilling to protect Christians and their homes, and being partial in their upholding of law and order.
Christine Elliott, Methodist Secretary for External Relationships has written to the Indian Prime Minister, asking him to assure the British Methodist Church that the religious rights of all Indians will be protected and that the police and the courts will do all they can to guarantee the personal safety of individuals, families and communities.
The CNI General Secretary, Rev Enos Das Pradhan, expressed gratitude for statements of support from partner churches, including the British Methodist Church, and noted that the Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, had been forced to acknowledge the communal violence against individuals because of their faith as “a national shame”.
“The immediate need is for emergency relief for those who are homeless or hiding in the forests and to bring an end to violence and threats,” said Rev Das Pradhan, adding, “Religious tolerance has been the basic tenet and hallmark of India’s ancient civilization and history. We condemn all religious violence.”
Source: Christain Today
The Church of England has found that an increasing number of people turn to its prayer website for support in the current global financial crisis, the church said Friday. A Church of England website focusing on advice to those concerned about rising personal debt had seen a 70-per-cent increase in traffic in recent weeks, the church’s own website said.The number of web users looking up the page for the daily prayer had grown by 25 per cent, with one addressing the financial turmoil proving especially popular, the church website said.The prayer had been viewed nearly 8,000 times since it was published online in September.
It reads: “Lord God, we live in disturbing days, across the world, prices rise, debts increase, banks collapse, jobs are taken away, and fragile security is under threat. Loving God, meet us in our fear and hear our prayer: be a tower of strength amidst the shifting sands, and a light in the darkness; help us receive your gift of peace, and fix our hearts where true joys are to be found, in Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.Source Earth Times
Next month, the author of The Shack will be joining a public online chatroom to discuss his No. 1 New York Times best-selling book, which has received strong praise from some Christian circles and strong criticism from others.
Both fans and critics of William P. Young’s surprise best-seller will get the opportunity to submit questions to the author as part of Abunga.com’s bi-weekly “Authors at Abunga” chat, which connects avid book readers with their favorite authors.
Though Young had not originally intended the novel to be for public consumption, since its debut on the market last year, The Shack has reaped in a surprising amount of success, generating a large amount of buzz – both positive and negative – within Christian circles.
The Shack tells the fictional redemptive story of Mackenzie Allen Phillips, whose daughter is tragically abducted and murdered during a family vacation.
Four years after the tragedy, Phillips receives a note, supposedly from “God,” inviting him back to the abandoned shack where evidence of his daughter’s murder had been found. When Phillips accepts the offer and returns to the shack, he enters into a kind of spiritual therapy session with “God,” who appears in the form of a jolly African-American woman and calls herself “Papa;” Jesus, who appears as a Jewish workman; and Sarayu, an indeterminately Asian woman who incarnates the Holy Spirit.
“This is a story of one believer’s brokenness and how God reached into that pain and pulled him out and as such is a compelling story of God’s redemption,” explained author and former pastor Wayne Jacobson, who was part of a team that worked with Young on the manuscript for over a year and also is part of Windblown Media, the company formed to print and distribute this book.
“The pain and healing come straight from a life that was broken by guilt and shame at an incredibly deep level,” Jacobson wrote in his personal blog, “and he (Young) compresses into a weekend the lessons that helped him walk out of that pain and find life in Jesus again.”
Young says he had suffered sexual abuse in New Guinea as the child of Canadian missionaries and spent a decade in therapy trying to earn back his wife’s and family’s trust after an extramarital affair 15 years ago.
In 2005, Young started writing what would eventually be The Shack to show how he had healed by forging a new relationship with God.
Source – Christianpost
The Rev G P Taylor, who has sold millions of books worldwide, claims that a producer at the corporation told him they couldn’t be “seen to be promoting Jesus”.The author of Shadowmancer, which spent 15 weeks at the top of the British book sales charts in 2003, says that he has been the victim of political correctness that favours minority religions at the expense of Christianity, a claim the BBC denies. He says that once his present series of books is complete, he will write under another name and employ an actor to do any public appearances, in an attempt to stop his work being “discriminated” against. Taylor, who gave up life as a parish priest after signing a £3.5 million publishing deal with Faber in 2004, believes the BBC began to shun him after he was described as the new C S Lewis – the Christian author who wrote The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. “I had good relations with them until they realised that there were religious allegories in my stories,” he said.”Once they had decided that I was promoting Christianity in my books I found the door firmly shut.”After the success of his first novel, Shadowmancer, which is being made into a film, he was initially asked to appear on a number of BBC programmes. However, he alleges that further attempts to publicise his work were rejected following an interview with a researcher in which he talked about his faith.
“They weren’t turning me down because I was a bad guest, but because of who I am.
“I’m an Anglican priest and sadly while it’s OK to be the next Philip Pullman, it’s not all right to be a Christian writer.”
His second novel, Wormwood, sold 22,000 copies on one day, yet he says that the makers of Blue Peter told him that he was not welcome. “A BBC producer told me ‘off the record’ that it was a matter of my faith and the fact that I was an Anglican priest. ‘We can’t be seen to be promoting Jesus’, he said with a laugh.”
Internal correspondence between BBC staff, obtained by the author under the Freedom of Information Act, shows unease about the writer, although the documents question his character rather than his faith.
One email was sent by Christine Morgan, BBC radio’s executive producer of religion. She wrote: “He does an impressive job of publicising his work but he is not universally admired… He has a very high opinion of his own books and in recent press releases there were constant references to him being the writer to take on J K Rowling’s mantle. There’s something quite revealing about their tone.”
A BBC spokesman said: “Programme makers make their own editorial decisions about which guests to have on their shows. There is no truth in the claim that there is a BBC ban on G P Taylor.”
Source: Telegraph.co.uk
The co-authors of an eye-opening book that informs and equips Christians – especially parents – about Wiccan and New Age teachings will be joining a public online chatroom to discuss their findings and answer questions about the growing religious movement.Marla Alupoaicei and Dillon Burroughs, who wrote “Generation Hex: Understanding the Subtle Dangers of Wicca,” are set to be the next guests on Abunga.com’s bi-weekly “Authors at Abunga” chat, which connects avid book readers with their favorite authors.Since July, Abunga.com has been hosting its special chats every other Wednesday from 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. ET, allowing readers “to join with writers of family-friendly book genres without leaving their home,” as Abunga.com Chairman Lee Martin reported in an announcement.One week prior to each chat, readers can visit the chat Web page to submit questions for upcoming authors. While questions will also be accepted during chats, all will be screened prior to being presented to the author.Transcripts of each chat session are posted the following day on the “Authors at Abunga” chat page. Anyone who registers to be an Abunga.com community member can sign up to receive e-mail notification of transcript postings.
The next guests, Alupoaicei and Burroughs, had interviewed neopagan conference practitioners, travelers to Salem, Mass., and current and former Wicca followers before writing their book, “Generation Hex.”
“Generation Hex” was published as media reports have claimed the existence of more than 700,000 Internet sites for teenage witches and as Wicca stands as one of the fastest-growing religions in the United States. By the year 2012, Wicca is projected to be the third-largest religion in the United States.
Source – Christianpost
Religious organizations can now place anti-abortion advertisements on Google after a lawsuit by a British pro-life charity forced it to lift the ban.
Google settled out of court Wednesday with The Christian Institute, a UK-based charity, and will now allow religious groups to place factual and campaigning ads about abortion. The new policy will apply world-wide with immediate effect. The Institute lost no time in placing its first advertisement on the website.
The Christian Institute started legal action against Google on the grounds that it was infringing the Equality Act 2006 by discriminating against Christian groups. The charity argued that Google accepted ads for abortion clinics, secular pro-abortion sites and secularist sites which attack religion.
A spokesperson for Google told The Independent: ‘The issue of abortion is an emotive subject and Google does not take a particular side. Over the past few months we have been reviewing our abortion ads policy in order to make sure it was fair, up to date and consistent with local customs and practices. Following the review we have decided to amend our policy, creating a level playing field and enabling religious associations to place ads on abortion in a factual way.’
Source – Irish Sun
Scientists using American space technology have started a huge project to digitally photograph the Dead Sea Scrolls, the oldest known version of the Hebrew Bible, and post it on the Internet for all to see, Israeli authorities said Wednesday.
High-tech cameras using infrared photography are being used to uncover sections of the 2,000-year-old scrolls that have faded over the centuries and become indecipherable, the Israeli Antiquities Authority said.
The project is expected to take about five years and the goal is to make the scrolls accessible to scientists and the general public, Antiquities Authority official Pnina Shor said.
“Now for the first time the scrolls will be a computer click away,” said Shor, who heads the authority’s department responsible for the conservation of artifacts. “This will ensure that the scrolls are preserved for another 2,000 years.”
Experts have complained for years that only a small number of scholars have been allowed access to the scrolls and the thousands of fragments that were found in caves near the Dead Sea in the late 1940s. In recent years, steps have been taken to widen access, but many of the findings are still not properly identified and categorized. To protect the scrolls, Shor said, the new imaging will be done in a setting that minimizes exposure to light.
A pilot project started Wednesday and when it is finished, it will be possible to determine how long it will take to digitize the thousands of fragments from about 900 separate documents, Shor said, estimating five years.
Infrared technology was used to photograph all the findings in 1950, the Antiquities Authority said, but technology has advanced considerably since then.
The first scrolls were discovered by accident in 1947 by a young Bedouin shepherd who was chasing a runaway sheep. They were buried in a cave in Qumran, just above the Dead Sea — one of the most barren areas in the world. Archaeologists began buying scrolls and fragments that appeared in marketplaces around the region, but many were damaged by their removal from the extreme dryness of the cave where they were buried for 20 centuries.
Occasionally, the Antiquities Authority, which is in charge of preserving the scrolls, allows the public to see some of them. A 24-foot section with the Book of Isaiah went on display in May to coincide with Israel’s 60th anniversary celebrations.
A special hall called the Shrine of the Book at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem is dedicated to the scrolls, but the fragments on display there are copies.
Source – Fox news
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