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In this mailing:
by Raymond Ibrahim
• December 25, 2015 at 5:00 am
- "Often in
these cases the police take no action or, worse, side with the
rapists. Christian families or witnesses are pressured to withdraw
complaints." — Sardar Mushtaq Gill, Pakistani lawyer and human
rights activist.
- Asia Bibi, a
Christian mother of five, has been on death row since 2010 because a
Muslim woman, apparently with a personal vendetta against Bibi,
accused her of speaking blasphemy against the prophet of Islam,
Muhammad. "She could be killed by any inmate or even a prison
guard," said an official. "She was vomiting blood last month
and was having difficulty walking."
- Saddique Azam, a
Catholic teacher and headmaster at a primary school in a small
village, was beaten and tortured by a group of Muslim teachers who
resented being under the authority of an "infidel."
- Nabila Bibi, a
Christian woman who was engaged to a Christian man, was abducted,
forcibly converted to Islam, and forcibly married to a Muslim man.
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Asia Bibi and two of her five children, pictured prior
to her imprisonment on death row in 2010 for "blasphemy."
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The U.S. State Department lists only nine nations as "Countries
of Particular Concern" (CPC) -- a designation for those nations
considered to be the worst violators of religious freedom. These include
governments that "engage in or tolerate" systematic, ongoing, and
unspeakable violations of religious freedom.
According to many human rights activists, this list is far from
complete: "the State Department has seemed unwilling to recognize the
grave unspeakable abuses of religious freedom in a number of
Muslim-dominated countries that the USCIRF [U.S. Commission on
International Religious Freedom] considers CPCs: Egypt, Iraq, Pakistan,
Syria and Tajikistan."
by Alan Craig
• December 25, 2015 at 4:00 am
- Justice is in
short supply in northern Nigeria.
- In 2013, there
were over 200 Christian churches in the thriving Gwoza area. By the
middle of 2014, there were almost none left.
- The orphans have
nothing, but surrounded by the warm and disciplined Christian love of
the Kwashis, they have everything.
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Left: Nigerian Anglican Archbishop Ben Kwashi and his
wife, Gloria Kwashi. Right: Gloria Kwashi's school serves 400 orphans in
Jos.
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In Jos, in the middle-belt of Nigeria. despite the proliferating
Christmas decorations in homes and churches, peace on earth and goodwill
between communities continues to be in short supply. Across northern
Nigeria, the church is facing an existential threat from the violence and
intimidation of Islam in its various forms.
In the school of Gloria Kwashi, wife of the Anglican Archbishop, Ben
Kwashi, which serves 400 orphans, the lunchtime bowl of mixed rice and
beans with added nutrients is, for many of these children, the only meal of
the day. The education of these orphans is taken seriously by Gloria Kwashi
and her dedicated staff of seven, not only as a Christian imperative but
also as a vital route out of poverty.
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