Are the followers of your religion persecuted?

Answer 1

Yup.. in many countries it is illegal for my brothers and sisters to preach the good news. back then we were treated the same way the jews were. Its going to get worst. there is a time when we are going to be persecuted more. we are going to be hated by all nations and this is called "the great tribulation"

Answer 2

All religions have been persecuted at one time or another. Modern laws don't allow persecution in the same way it used to occur, so that is a plus. But overall, I'd say that the followers of my religion are not tolerated. We aren't given the same respect, even on a Gov't level, that other Religions enjoy. Though, I do see that changing for the better.

Please note: I did NOT say we are persecuted. I said we are NOT tolerated.

Pagan

Answer 3

I think followers of any religion have know persecution. Hopefully one day that will end but I fear it is not within human nature to allow for that to happen.

Blessed Be )O(

Answer 4

I think follower of just about every religion are persecuted to some extent. As a Wiccan I can say that we are in the sense that people are ignorant and intolerant of us. And, granted they aren't "Wiccans" or being persecuted for being one per se, woman are still being killed to this day under the crime of Witchcraft.

Answer 5

all followers of any religion are persecuted

Answer 6

In some countries, yes. During the holocaust, we were treated the same way as the Jews were treated.

Answer 7

Yes, but Jesus said his followers would be. So that only gives me more confidence!

Answer 8

Jewish persecution of Christians

The New Testament reports that the earliest Christians suffered persecution at the hands of the Jewish leadership of the day, commencing with Jesus himself.

The first Christians were born and raised under Judaism, as Christianity began as a sect of Judaism. The earliest examples of "Jewish persecution of Christians" could better be understood perhaps as examples of "Jewish persecution of other Jews," that is, sectarian conflict. The creeds of early Christianity (for example 1Cor 15:3-9) were a clear departure from Pharisaic Judaism of the time. However, several other Jewish sects of this time such as the Essenes were similarly heterodox.

According to the New Testament accounts, persecution of Jesus' followers continued after his death. Peter and John were imprisoned by the Jewish leadership, including high priest Ananias, who however later released them (Acts 4:1-21). Another time, all the apostles were imprisoned by the high priest and other Sadducees, only to be freed by an angel (Acts 5:17-18). The apostles, after having escaped, were then taken before the Sanhedrin again, but this time Gamaliel (a Pharisee well known from Rabbinic literature) convinced the Sanhedrin to free them (Acts 5:27-40), which the Sanhedrin did, after having flogged them.

The New Testament recounts the stoning of Stephen (Acts 6:8-7:60) by the members of the Sanhedrin. Stephen is remembered in Christianity as the first martyr (derived from the Greek word "martyros" which means "witness"). Stephen's execution was followed by a major persecution of Christians (Acts 8:1-3), led by a Pharisee named Paul of Tarsus (also called Saul), throwing many Christians into prison. According to the New Testament, this persecution continued until Paul converted to Christianity, after reportedly seeing a bright light and hearing the voice of Jesus on the Road to Damascus, where he was traveling to carry out more imprisonment of Christians (Acts 9:1-22). Acts 9:23-25 reports that "the Jews" in Damascus then tried to kill Paul. They were waiting for him at the town gates, but he evaded them by being lowered over the city wall in a basket by other Christians and then escaped to Jerusalem. Understandably, he had difficulty at first convincing the Christians in Jerusalem that he, their persecutor, had truly converted and was now being persecuted himself (Acts 9:26-27). Another attempt on his life was made, this time by "the Grecians" (KJV), referring to a group of Hellenistic Jews (Acts 9:29), whom he debated while in or around Jerusalem.

There is some debate over why Paul, before his conversion, and other Pharisees persecuted Christians. According to Paula Fredriksen, in From Jesus to Christ, the most likely reason was that Jewish Christians were preaching the imminent return of the King of the Jews and the establishment of his kingdom. To Roman ears, such talk was seditious. Romans gave Jews at that time limited self-rule; the main obligations of Jewish leaders were to collect taxes for Rome, and to maintain civil order. Thus, Jewish leaders would have to suppress any seditious talk. In cases where Jewish leaders did not suppress seditious talk, Jewish leaders were often sent to Rome for trial and execution.

During the famous Bar Kochba Rebellion of AD 135, Christians refused to fight, as a result of which, according to Justin Martyr, they were "commanded to be punished severely, if they did not deny Jesus as the Messiah and blaspheme him."

In pre-Islamic Yemen, a Jewish king called Dhu Nuwas came to power and persecuted Christians in his realm, and massacred Christian communities in Najran in about 524; apparently this was intended as retaliation for Christian Byzantine persecutions of the Jews. According to Muslim tradition, he was the person cursed in the Quran for burning believers alive (Quran 85:4-8.)

In the early sixth century, Khosrau II, King of Persia from 590 to 628, 'invaded Asia Minor and Syria at the head of a large army. The Jews joined the Persians in great numbers under the leadership of Benjamin of Tiberias, a man of immense wealth, by whom they were enlisted and armed. The Tiberian Jews, with those of Nazareth and the mountain cities of Galilee, marched on Jerusalem with the Persian division commanded by Shahrbaraz. Later they were joined by the Jews of southern Palestine; and supported by a band of Arabs, the united forces took Jerusalem by storm (July, 614). Ninety thousand Christians are said to have perished. ... In conjunction with the Persians, the Jews swept through Palestine, destroyed the monasteries which abounded in the country, and expelled or killed the monks. Bands of Jews from Jerusalem, Tiberias, Galilee, Damascus, and even from Cyprus, united and undertook an incursion against Tyre, having been invited by the 4,000 Jewish inhabitants of that city to surprise and massacre the Christians on Easter night. The Jewish army is said to have consisted of 20,000 men. The expedition, however, miscarried, as the Christians of Tyre learned of the impending danger, and seized the 4,000 Tyrian Jews as hostages. The Jewish invaders destroyed the churches around Tyre, an act which the Christians avenged by killing two thousand of their Jewish prisoners. The besiegers, to save the remaining prisoners, withdrew.' According to the Jewish Encyclopedia, 'The immediate results of these wars filled the Jews with joy. Many Christians became Jews through fear. A Sinaitic monk embraced Judaism of his own free will, and became a vehement assailant of his former belief.'

In Ethiopia, Queen Gudit, who persecuted Christians around 970 AD and helped bring down the Kingdom of Aksum, is said in Ethiopian chronicles to have been Jewish, though some modern scholars have cast doubt on this, suggesting that she may have been a pagan.

Persecution of Christians in Sudan

There is an abundance of evidence since the early 1990s of oppression and persecution of Christians, including by Sudan's own Sudan Human Rights Organization, which in mid-1992 reported on forcible closure of churches, expulsion of priests, forced displacement of populations, forced Islamisation and Arabisation, and other repressive measures of the Government. In 1994 it also reported on widespread torture, ethnic cleansing and crucifixion of pastors. Pax Christi has also reported on detailed cases in 1994, as has Africa Watch. Roman Catholic bishop Macram Max Gassis, Bishop of El Obeid, also reported to the Fiftieth Session of the UN Commission on Human Rights, in Geneva, in February 1994 on accounts of widespread destrucution of hundreds of churches, forced conversions of Christians to Islam, concentration camps, genocide of the Nuba people, systematic rape of women, enslavement of children, torture of priests and clerics, burning alive of pastors and catechists, crucifixion and mutiliation of priests. The foregoing therefore serve to indict the Sudanese Government itself for flagrant violations of human rights and religious freedom.

In addition, it is estimated that over 1.5 million Christians have been killed by the Sudanese army, the Janjaweed, and even suspected Islamists in northern Sudan since 1984.

It should also be noted that Sudan's several so-called civil wars (which often take the form of genocidal campaigns) are often not only or purely religious in nature, but also ethnic, as many black Muslims, as well as Muslim Arab tribesmen, have also been killed in the conflicts. It is difficult to ascertain how many deaths are due to the conflict and how many are due to the numerous famines which have affected Sudan, costing thousands of lives.

Persecution of Christians in Pakistan

In Pakistan, 1.5% of the population are Christian. Pakistani law mandates that any "blasphemies" of the Quran are to be met with punishment. On July 28, 1994, Amnesty International urged Pakistan's Prime Minister, Benazir Bhutto to change the law because it was being used to terrorize religious minorities. She tried but was unsuccessful. However, she modified the laws to make them more moderate. Her changes were reversed by the Nawaz Sharif administration which was backed by Islamic Fundamentalists.

Ayub Masih, a Christian, was convicted of blasphemy and sentenced to death in 1998. He was accused by a neighbor of stating that he supported British writer, Salman Rushdie, author of The Satanic Verses. Lower appeals courts upheld the conviction. However, before the Pakistan Supreme Court, his lawyer was able to prove that the accuser had used the conviction to force Mashi's family off their land and then acquired control of the property. Masih has been released.

On September 22, 2006, a Pakistani Christian named Shahid Masih was arrested and jailed for allegedly violating Islamic "blasphemy laws" in Pakistan. He is presently held in confinement and has expressed fear of reprisals by Islamic Fundamentalists.

Nazi-Fascist persecution

Although far less hostile to Christianity than to Judaism, which the Nazis sought to exterminate in the Holocaust throughout the Third Reich and lands that came under Nazi rule, Nazi totalitarianism demanded that all religious activity conform to the desires of Nazi leadership. Christian churches were obliged to accept the racist doctrines of Nazism. The Gestapo monitored Christian clergy and congregations for any semblance of dissent with Nazi policies, and many Christian clergy and laymen ended up in concentration camps when they asserted opposition to the teachings and practices of Nazism or if they acted upon pacifist convictions (like many Jehovah's Witnesses and some Confessing Church members). During the early part of the Nazi rule, the "German Christians" were an important pseudo-Protestant tool of the regime to bring about the Gleichschaltung of the churches.

The expansion of Nazi Germany and the establishment of Nazi rule in occupied countries brought about persecutions ranging from those characteristic in Germany itself to conditions approaching those of the Soviet Union. Catholic priests in Poland that were opposed to the Nazis were taken to the concentration camps; many were murdered in the liquidation of the Polish intelligentsia. Due to its long historical association with Slavic cultures, Nazi occupation officials used collaborators such as the Roman Catholic Ustashe to specifically target Eastern Orthodox Christians in Yugoslavia. Roman Catholics were heavily persecuted in Nazi Germany because of their opposing views on Nazi Eugenics.

In Italy the fascist regime of Mussolini heavily persecuted Pentecostals, Roman Catholics, and Jehovah's Witnesses from 1936 to 1945, when the Persecution Decree, named Circolare Buffarini-Guidi was revoked due Western nations pressure

Discrimination and persecution in the Soviet Union

After the Revolution of 1917, the Bolsheviks undertook a massive program to remove the influence of the Russian Orthodox Church from the government and Russian society, and to make the state atheist. Thousands of churches were destroyed or converted to other uses, such as warehouses. Monasteries were closed and often converted to prison camps, most notably the Solovetz monastery becoming Solovki camp. Many members of clergy were imprisoned for anti-government activities. These victims are now recognized as the "New Martyrs" by the Russian Orthodox Church, the old martyrs being the victims of the Roman persecutions. Church property, including the icons and other objects of worship (especially those made of precious metals) was confiscated and put to other uses.

While religion was never outlawed in the Soviet Union, and the Soviet Constitution actually guaranteed religious freedom to all Soviet citizens, persecution was still government policy. The persecutions were usually carried out for political, not religious, reasons and abated during World War II, at which time Stalin's government reached a truce with the Church in order to use it as part of its program to inspire Russian patriotic fervor. Nevertheless, the Soviet government sought to put the Church under control by appointing loyal men as priests, allegedly ending up with the entire upper ranks of the Church being officers of the KGB.

Throughout the 1920s and 1930s the celebration of Christmas and the traditional Russian holiday of New Year (Feast of the Circumcision of Christ) was prohibited (later on New Year was reinstated as a secular holiday and is now the most significant family holiday in Russia). Gatherings and religious processions were initially prohibited and later on strictly limited and regulated. In later years, a more subtle method of disrupting Christian holidays involved broadcasting very popular movies one after the other on the major holidays when believers are expected to participate in religious processions, especially during the Easter celebration. Apparently, this was intended to keep those whose faith was uncertain or wavering in their homes and glued to their TVs.

An intense ideological anti-Christian and anti-religious campaign was carried out throughout the history of the Soviet Union. An extensive education and propaganda campaign was undertaken to convince people, especially the children and youth, not to become believers. The role of the Christian religion and the Church was painted in black colors in school textbooks. For instance, much emphasis was placed on the role of the Church in such historical horror stories as the Inquisition, persecution of Galileo, Giordano Bruno, and other heretical scientists, and the Crusades. School students were encouraged to taunt and use peer pressure against classmates wearing crosses or otherwise professing their faith. In the 1920s there were many "anti-God" publications and social clubs sponsored by the government, most notably the scathingly satirical "Godless at the Workbench" ("Bezbozhnik u Stanka" in Russian). Later on, these disappeared because a new generation has grown up essentially atheist.

A "scientific" perspective was used to attack religion extensively. The Church was portrayed as obscurantist and opposed to the findings of science. Much was made of alleged Christian belief in the literal Creation account in the book of Genesis which the pro-Darwinian textbooks ridiculed. Interestingly, as part of the anti-foreign and anti-capitalist propaganda, an effort was made, especially in the 1920s and 1930s, to imprint in the minds of the people an image of the West as dominated by the anti-scientific ignorance of the Church, as opposed to the scientifically "progressive" atheist Soviet state.

In general, Christianity was portrayed as corrupt, hypocritical, a loyal servant of the reactionary czar, obscurantist, "opium for the people" according to Karl Marx, and otherwise evil. This Communist persecution of the Church proved enormously successful. Within the span of one generation, the traditionally highly devout Russian people became overwhelmingly atheist. This transformation was, for the most part, complete by the 1950's. As such, it counted as one of the greatest and the most successful persecutions Christianity had ever experienced, on par only with the destruction of Christianity in the Middle East, North Africa, and Asia Minor by the Islamic and Turkish conquests.

After the fall of the Soviet Union, the government of Russia openly embraced the Russian Orthodox Church, and there was a reputed renaissance in the number of the faithful in Russia. As of 2004 it is generally noted, however, that whereas a very large percent of Russians today identify themselves as believers and members of the Church (up from a very small group in the Soviet days), still relatively few of them actually attend church regularly, read the Bible, or otherwise take their communion with the Church seriously. For many, it seems, faith has become a matter of personal identification and readiness to baptize their children or have church marriage and burial ceremonies, and not much else. This is a clear testimony to the completeness and the long term success of the Communist persecution of the Christianity in Russia.

Richard Wurmbrand, author of Tortured for Christ described the systematic persecution of Christians in one East Bloc nation. Many Christian believers in the Soviet Union have told of being imprisoned for no other reason than believing in God - a fate shared no less by Jewish believers. Many have recently been canonized as saints following their death at the hands of Soviet authorities; they are collectively referred to in the Orthodox Church as the "new martyrs". (See also Enemy of the people, Gulag, Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Varlam Shalamov)



A partial list of countries not already mentioned above where significant recent persecution of Christians exists includes North Korea, Vietnam, Laos, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Maldives, Serbia (Kosovo), Afghanistan, Thailand, China, Lebanon, Syria, the Sudan (Darfur), Cambodia, Egypt, and Turkey. Persecuted Christians in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia are supported by the Montagnard Foundation.