All posts tagged: persecution church news

Persecution: What do you really believe?

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Most people reading this are completely free to follow any religion, and to change their minds any time. We are free. We are so free that some believers have a hard time explaining what they believe, and maybe some struggle to understand what they believe. That is the price of freedom. I remember going to church, when I was a boy; my whole family went to church, and I had no choice. When I became an adult, I decided what I believed, and who I was. That was a big adjustment for me. In some places in the world, it’s very important to know what you believe. A person can be prosecuted, and even killed for believing the “wrong” thing. “Wrong” is an idea from the government or some powerful organization. We may be going in that direction in the comfortable free countries. READ: Varvel: Why ‘The View’s’ Joy Behar finally apologized to Mike Pence If you are a Christian, how do you feel about the accusation that you are mentally ill? In the U.S. …

Preparing for the end times

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When the warden for All Saints’ Radford church in Nottinghamshire showed up at the church on Sunday, July 26, 2020, Lorraine Smedley discovered that vandals had painted upside down crosses and swastikas on the church building. The Nottinghamshire police referred to it as a “hate crime.” Across the English Channel in France, reports indicate the number of attacks against Christian churches in that country has increased nearly 300% in just 12 years according to the Observatory on Intolerance and Discrimination Against Christians in Europe (OIDACE), a Venice-based organization. OIDACE reports that in 2018, the French government officially stated that there were 275 attacks, fires and vandalism, against churches in that county. That number had climbed to 1,052 attacks by 2019, representing a 285% increase. Recently, there was an arson attack on a 500-year-old Cathedral in Nantes, France on July 18, 2020. Unfortunately, this is only the tip of the iceberg because these simply represent threats and attacks against physical structures. In 2018, the French government reported that there were 2,000 hate crimes against Christians. Though …

Red Square, Moscow Credit: Matt Shalvatis/Flickr/Creative Commons

How to be a Persecuted Christian

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Are you a Christian? If ‘yes’ do you know that you will be persecuted? The Bible is very clear about that “In fact, everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted” (2 Timothy 3:12). “Will be.” I recently followed the appointment of Brett Kavanaugh to the U.S. Supreme Court. And yes, it is dangerous for me to say that, but note that I live in Canada and I don’t want to pick sides in someone else’s argument. What I noticed was that accusers and the accused were like soldiers on the front line, and they could be sacrificed for the benefit of greater powers. I am sure the dispute was more intense because the U.S. was a few weeks away from mid-term elections, at the time. So much was at stake. I could say more, but I am now in dangerous territory. This is safe for me; I have often traveled to the U.S. and I am always impressed by the large numbers of good people that I meet …