Persecuted Church News

Saturday, January 28, 2012

Overseas Chinese Christian Businesswoman Who Visited House Churches in China is Kidnapped, Tortured by State Security Agents

LOS ANGELES, Jan. 27, 2012 /Christian Newswire/ -- A Chinese Christian businesswoman from Canada who visited China late last year was kidnapped and tortured by Chinese state security agents after she visited two persecuted Chinese house churches during the Christmas and New Year's holiday season, ChinaAid has learned.

Photo: Jenny Chen took this photo on Christmas Day 2011 of an armored personnel carrier and other police vehicles outside Jindeng Church in Linfen, Shanxi province.

Jenny Chen, who is in her 50s, was held by state security agents and denied food and water for nearly two days. About to go into shock, she was taken to a police hospital, from where she managed to escape and get on a flight to Los Angeles, arriving in the United States on Jan. 17.

Chen, who does business in Canada, the United States and China, had learned of the severe persecution inflicted on Shouwang Church in Beijing and the Linfen house church in Shanxi province from reports online.

Motivated by Christian concern for her fellow believers, Chen and her daughter traveled to Beijing and Shanxi. On Christmas Day, she was an eyewitness to police action in front of the Jindeng Church established by the Linfen house church. She saw both regular and armed police and police vehicles, including armored personnel carriers, surrounding the church to stop church members from attending a Christmas worship service. Police blocked streets leading to the church and closed nearby shops. Chen was followed and threatened by plainclothes police officers.

In Beijing, Chen had paid a visit before Christmas to Rev. Jin Tianming, senior pastor of Shouwang Church, who has been under house arrest since April 2011, and on New Year's Day, she and her daughter attempted to attend Shouwang's outdoor worship service. (See her account here: www.chinaaid.org/2012/01/new-years-visit-to-shouwang-church.html.) On both occasions, she was followed by Domestic Security Protection agents.

Aware that they were being followed more and more closely, Chen put her daughter on a U.S.-bound plane on Jan. 10, then returned to her hometown in the city of Tianjin. On the evening of Jan. 14, she was forcibly taken into custody by two plain-clothed state security agents who refused to show their IDs and taken to a secret place for questioning. She later realized that she had been kidnapped by Tianjin state security agents. She was interrogated in a cold, windowless cell with only one chair, and was asked what organization she was affiliated with and what overseas mission she was on. Chen said she had no organizational affiliation nor was she on any overseas mission. She said she was simply an overseas Christian whose conscience had propelled her to return to China to visit her fellow believers. The agents appeared not to believe her and threatened to imprison her for more than ten years for subverting state power and stealing state secrets if she did not tell them the truth. The agents also beat her, pulling her hair and slapping her hard.

Chen was detained for nearly two days without food and water, and almost went into shock.

Physically exhausted, she was sent to the Tianjin Public Safety Hospital, where she was diagnosed with slight pneumonia and had to be hospitalized. However, Chen had no money with her, and the state security agents said they had no money either. The hospital refused to treat her, giving her the excuse of returning home to get money. Instead, she took a cab and rushed to Beijing Capital Airport, where she caught a flight in the early morning of Jan. 16. She arrived in Los Angles on the following day and is currently undergoing medical observation and treatment.

"It is appalling to hear what Ms. Chen had experienced at the hands of the brutal Chinese security forces for simply visiting and trying to worship with the Chinese Christians during the Christmas season," said Eddie Romero, director of ChinaAid's Los Angeles office. "The unprecedented persecution against the peaceful house churches like Shouwang and Linfen should be stopped. We urge the Chinese government's highest authorities to hold those abusers accountable for the harm done to this businesswoman, Ms. Chen."

Jenny Chen's journal New Year's Visit to Shouwang Church:www.chinaaid.org/2012/01/new-years-visit-to-shouwang-church.html

Over 3000 Muslims Attack Christian Homes and Shops in Egypt, 3 Injured

By Dan Wooding
Founder of ASSIST Ministries

ALEXANDRIA, EGYPT (ANS) -- A mob of over 3000 Muslims have just attacked Copts in the village of Kobry-el-Sharbat (el-Ameriya), Alexandria, Egypt. Coptic homes and shops were looted before being set ablaze. Two Copts and a Muslim were injured.

Mary Abdelmassih, writing for the Assyrian International News Agency (www.aina.org) said that the violence started after a rumor was spread that a Coptic man had an allegedly intimate photo of a Muslim woman on his mobile phone. The Coptic man, Mourad Samy Guirgis, surrendered to the police for his protection.

According to eyewitnesses, the perpetrators were bearded men in white gowns. “They were Salafists, and some of were from The Muslim Brotherhood,” according to one witness. It was reported that terrorized women and children who lost their homes were in the streets without any place to go.

Father Boktor Nashed from St. George's Church in el-Nahdah, said that a meeting between Muslim and Christian representatives was supposed to take place in the evening in Kobry-el-Sharbat. But, by 3 P.M. a Muslim mob looted and torched the home of Mourad Samy Guirgis, as well as the home of his family and three homes of Coptic neighbors. A number of Coptic-owned shops and businesses were also looted and torched.

“We contacted security forces, but they arrived very, very late,” said Father Nashad. The fire brigade was prevented from going into the village by the Muslims and the fires were left to burn themselves out. “Those who lost their home, left the village,” said Father Nashed.

Coptic activist Mariam Ragy, who was covering the violence in Kobry-el-Sharbat, said it took the army 1 hour to drive 2 kilometers to the village. “This happens every time. They wait outside the village until the Muslims have had enough violence, then they appear.” She said that she spoke to many Copts from the village this evening who said that although their homes were not attacked, Muslims stood in the street asking them to come to their homes to hide. “They believed that this was a new trick to make them leave, so that Muslims would loot and torch their homes while they were away,” said Ragy.

Abdelmassih said that the Governor of Alexandria visited al-Nahda, near Kobry-el-Sharbat, this evening and told elYoum 7 newspaper that the two Copts and one Muslim who were injured were transported to hospital. He said that the family of the Muslim girl whose image was on the Copt's mobile phone wanted revenge from the Coptic man. They broke into his home and torched a furniture factory located in the same building.

Joseph Malak, a lawyer for the Coptic Church in Alexandria, said it is too early to count injuries to Copts or losses to their property.

Mr. Mina Girguis, of the Maspero Youth Union in Alexandria, said that “collective punishment of Copts for someone else's mistake, which is yet to be determined, is completely unacceptable.” He believes that the reason for this violence is fabricated, and the military is behind it. “They are trying to divert the attention from the second revolution which is taking place now.”

The Middle East journalist went on to say that Father Nashed denied that Islamists were present, only ordinary village Muslims, and could not give an explanation as why people who have lived together amicably for years could commit such violence. “Maybe because of lack of security, they think that they can do as they please,” he said.

He added that the nearly 65 Coptic families were ordered to stay indoors and not to open their shops and businesses tomorrow. He added that security forces did not arrest any of the perpetrators, “on the contrary, they were begging the mob to go home.”

“By midnight the violence had subsided,” concluded Abdelmassih.

Dan Wooding, 71, is an award winning British journalist now living in Southern California with his wife Norma, to whom he has been married for 48 years. They have two sons, Andrew and Peter, and six grandchildren who all live in the UK. He is the founder and international director of ASSIST (Aid to Special Saints in Strategic Times) and the ASSIST News Service (ANS) and was, for ten years, a commentator, on the UPI Radio Network in Washington, DC. He now hosts the weekly “Front Page Radio” show on KWVE in Southern California which is also carried throughout the United States. The program is also aired in Great Britain on Calvary Chapel Radio UK and also in Belize and South Africa. Besides this, Wooding is a host for His Channel Live, which is carried via the Internet to some 192 countries and also provides a regular commentary for Worship Life Radio on KWVE. You can follow Dan Wooding on Facebook under his name there or at ASSIST News Service. He is the author of some 44 books, one of which is his autobiography, “From Tabloid to Truth”, which is published by Theatron Books. To order a copy, press this link. Wooding, who was born in Nigeria of British missionary parents, has also recently released his first novel “Red Dagger” which is available this link.

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Former Muslim Extremist in Uganda Flees Wrath of Ex-Colleagues

Convert to Christianity faces death threats; father committed suicide over conversion.

NAIROBI, Kenya, January 27 (CDN) — A former member of a Muslim extremist group in Uganda who converted to Christianity is in hiding in Kenya, his movements severely restricted following threats to kill him.

Hassan Sharif Lubenga, 54, was a sheikh and member of the Buk Haram, a violent group of Islamists whose name suggests the Bible is corrupt and therefore forbidden. Originally from Chengera, seven kilometers from Kampala, the husband to four wives began his conversion process four years ago; in June 2011, he said, after various dreams and visions in which Jesus appeared to him, he made a full commitment to follow Christ.

Lubenga fled to Kenya last July 10 after hostilities peaked, and upon returning to Uganda in September he received messages on his cell phone from mujahidin – Islamic fighters – threatening to kill him, he said. He reported the threats to Chengera police, who told him they would investigate, but in October a friend told him that he’d heard in a Chengera mosque that his former colleagues were enraged and planning to kill him.

“My heart got troubled, but the voice of Jesus continued whispering to me to witness for Jesus without fear,” Lubenga said.

When Lubenga felt like giving up on his new faith, he said, he received a call from Bishop Umar Mulinde, his former pastor at Gospel Life Church International who was scarred in a Christmas Eve acid attack by Muslim extremists (see “Muslim Extremists in Uganda Throw Acid on Bishop,” Dec. 28, 2011). Mulinde told him the church was praying for him, and Lubenga was deeply heartened, he said.

“All my family members have deserted me,” he said by telephone. “The Muslims are looking to kill me. I need protection and help.”

The Islamic extremists who had declared war on “infidels” such as Lubenga had been threatening him since 2007, when he first began to speak of dreams and visions of Christ. Dangers peaked in 2010, when Muslims saw him visiting a church in Uganda. By April 2010, one of his four wives had poisoned him because of his budding faith in Christ, leaving him unconscious, he said. After his recovery, he fled Chengera to a village 25 kilometers from Kampala, Kiwangala.

In 2007, he said, he told his Muslim jihadist friends that he had seen Jesus in a dream. He said they had warned him, “Do not make such a mistake again – we are ready to help you. If you continue with this move, then we will destroy you. You know that you are a sheikh.”

He reported the threats to police at Insanje sub-county, Wakizo district, angering his colleagues, who sent threatening letters.

“I explained to them that it is Jesus who came to me, and not I who sought Him,” he said. “They were furious. They then kidnapped me and blindfolded me for three days, coupled with beatings. They demanded I deny Jesus as the Son of God, which I consented to because I feared that they were going to kill me.”

In 2009, another message from Jesus came to him in a vision, he said: “Do not hide your Christian faith.”

Within a few months, another threatening letter arrived: “If you do not join Islamic Jihad, then we shall kill you.”

Lubenga decided to go on pilgrimage to Mecca, in accordance with the tenets of Islam. While there, however, he heard another voice, he said: “You have decided to forsake me, and instead you are here to accuse me.”

“I then saw Jesus high up with white robe,” he said. “He laughed. I just left the place but got sick for two weeks. I visited Mohammed Ali, the head of majini [evil spirits], who promised that the majini will come and help me. But I did not receive any healing.”

Jesus continued appearing to him for three months in visions, he said.

“I could not resist, so I decided to believe in Him and started openly declaring that Jesus is my personal Savior,” Lubenga said. “The whole family and clan members were out to destroy me. I was poisoned by my own family.”

His father, Morshid Kabide, came to his house in July 2010 to establish the truth of the rumors he had heard, Lubenga said.

“I heard that nowadays you do go to church, and you are claiming that you saw Jesus,” his father told him. When he answered in the affirmative, reaffirming his decision to follow Jesus, his father was crestfallen; he later committed suicide, leaving a letter that read, “I have decided to kill myself because my son became a Christian” and urged all family members to curse him.

Lubenga said that since then he has been in hiding, growing more terrified as threats intensified.

“But I kept my faith in Jesus,” he said. “I sold some of my belongings to build the church structure at Chengera, outside Kampala.”

As a result of this act, threats on his life grew more shrill, and he fled to Kenya.

Two of his wives had left him in 2007; one has decided to stay with him, and he has been sharing his faith with her. The fourth wife, whom he married five years ago, is a Christian who has also received death threats; six months pregnant, she has fled to an undisclosed location.

END

Thursday, January 26, 2012

Two Catholic Priests Kidnapped in Sudan

Islamic militias loyal to government forces attack Catholic church compound.

KHARTOUM, Sudan, January 25 (CDN) — Islamic militias loyal to the Sudanese government have kidnapped two Catholic priests in Rabak, Christian sources said.

A large truck smashed through the gates of the St. Josephine Bakhita’s Catholic Church compound in Rabak, 260 kilometers (162 miles) south of Khartoum, on Jan. 15 at 10 p.m., and the assailants broke down the rectory door, the sources said. The Rev. Joseph Makwey and the Rev. Sylvester Mogga were kidnapped at gunpoint.

Four days later, on Jan. 19, the kidnappers forced the two priests to call their bishop with a ransom demand of 500,000 Sudanese pounds (US$185,530), 250,000 Sudanese pounds each.

Auxiliary Bishop Daniel Adwok told Compass by phone that there was no direct communication between the bishop and the kidnappers, though the priests managed to convey that they were being mistreated.

“We are worried about the two priests,” he said. “They are not treating them well.”

The kidnappers have attempted no communication with church leaders since then, Adwok said. Neither Makwey, in his 40s, nor Mogga, in his mid-30s, are supporters of southern Sudan military forces in territorial conflict with Sudan over border areas, he added.

Eyewitnesses told Compass that they saw the assailants severely beating the priests while abducting them. The kidnappers also looted the priests’ living quarters, stealing two vehicles, two laptops and a safe.

The incident caused panic and terror among Christians in Rabak, with church leaders saying they fear for their lives as they become targets of the Islamic government and its allied militias.

Sudan has seen a steep increase in persecution against Christians, according to an annual ranking by Christian support organization Open Doors. Sudan – where northern Christians experienced greater vulnerability after southern Sudan seceded in a July referendum, and where Christians were targeted amid isolated military conflicts – jumped 19 places last year from its 2010 ranking, from 35th to 16th, according to Open Doors’ 2012 World Watch List.

Sudanese law prohibits missionaries from evangelizing, and converting from Islam to another religion is punishable by imprisonment or death in Sudan, though previously such laws were not strictly enforced. The government has never carried out a death sentence for apostasy, according to the U.S. State Department’s latest International Religious Freedom Report.

Christians are facing growing threats from both Muslim communities and Islamist government officials who have long wanted to rid Sudan of Christianity, Christian leaders told Compass. They said Christianity is now regarded as a foreign religion following the departure of 350,000 people, most of them Christians, to South Sudan following the July 9, 2011 secession.

Sudan’s Interim National Constitution holds up sharia (Islamic law) as a source of legislation, and the laws and policies of the government favor Islam, according to the state department report. Christian leaders said they fear the government is tightening controls on churches in Sudan and planning to force compliance with Islamic law as part of a strategy to eliminate Christianity.

As he has several times in the past year, Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir on Jan. 3 once again warned that Sudan’s constitution will be more firmly entrenched in sharia.

“We are an Islamic nation with sharia as the basis of our constitution,” he told crowds in Kosti, south of Khartoum. “We will base our constitution on Islamic laws.”

His government subsequently issued a decree ordering church leaders to provide names and contact information of church leaders in Sudan, sources said. Christian leaders said the government is retaliating for churches’ perceived pro-West position.

Muslim scholars have urged heavy-handed measures against Christians to Al-Bashir, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity in Darfur.

END

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Egyptian Judiciary Accused of Collusion in Kidnapping and Forced Islamization of Christian Minors

By Dan Wooding
Founder of ASSIST Ministries

CAIRO, EGYPT (ANS) -- A Middle East journalist is reporting that an Egyptian court has ordered a 16-year-old Christian girl to be held in a state-owned care home, instead of returning her to her family, allegedly for expressing her wish to convert to Islam.

The 16-year-old girl

“She is to be held in state care until she reaches the age of 18. The decision has been widely criticized by Copts, who say it encourages Islamists to continue unabated the abduction of Christian minors for conversion to Islam,” said Mary Abdelmassih writing for the Assyrian International News Agency (www.aina.org).

“The decision taken by a prosecutor in Boulaq El Dakrour district, Giza, makes him an abductor and makes the law an accomplice to the crime,” said Dr. Oliver, a Coptic activist. “What this prosecutor committed is a crime -- he legitimized child abduction and detention.”

Dr. Oliver explained that these crimes are committed by thugs, criminals and kidnappers of children and, when the State legitimizes them, it makes itself a partner. In addition, he said, placing a girl under care for allegedly wishing to convert to Islam while still a minor is “tantamount to abduction by the State”.

Abdelmassih went on to say that the abduction of 16-year old Amira Gamal Saber, from Saft-el-Khamar village, Minya province, who disappeared from her home over 40 days ago, has turned into a tug of war between the Christian family and Islamist lawyers from an organization named Alliance for the Support of New Muslim Females.

They claim that they are “defending the rights of their Muslim sisters” and that “according to the Egyptian constitution, the principal source of legislation is Islamic Jurisprudence (Sharia), which should apply to both Muslims and non-Muslims, and therefore at 16 years of age, Amira can chose her own religion.”

According to the Al-Azhar Islamic Institution, a person cannot convert to Islam before reaching the age of 18 years.

In December 2011, Amira attended a school lesson but failed to return home. Her teacher said she had left school with two veiled girls. Her family looked for her in all the neighboring villages and were informed that she had accompanied three Muslim men to Cairo. They filed a report with the police on December 4. The head of security in Minya confirmed her kidnapping and assured her family that the culprits were being watched and not to take any action until they were detained. However, time passed and nothing was heard from security.

The journalist added that attorney, Tawfik Kamel, who accompanied the Sabry family to Giza, said that on January 15 a man named Mohammad Ahmed Ibrahim phoned the family and said that Amira had been staying at his home in Boulaq El Dakrour for the last 38 days and asked for 200,000 Egyptian pounds ($33,110.41 USD) for her return.

“The family asked to speak to their daughter, and she spoke to her mother,” he added.

According to Kamel, “We had no idea that Islamists were involved. We went to Giza to pay a ransom to someone and collect our daughter, instead we were directed to the police station where Amira is, and then we were told there that government prosecuters are handling the case.”

They were detained and interrogated for seven hours.

“We were surprised to find a bearded lawyer,” said Kamel, “backed by another 12 Salafist lawyers, appearing in the session, claiming that Amira wants to convert to Islam, and that she does not want to return home as she is afraid of retribution.” He presented prosecution with the birth certificate proving Amira is 16-years-old and a certificate from the Fatwa department of Al Azhar saying they have no record of her, and conversion is not permitted for people under 18 years old.

“We thought we would bring Amira home but were stunned by the decision to send her to a care home in Giza until she reaches 18,” said her uncle.

Abdelmassih added that Tawfik Kamel said that he heard that Amira is presently not in a state-owned care home, but in a home affiliated to the Sharia association in Giza, which is in violation of the court decision. He said that he is in the process of appealing the decision to the Attorney General.

Nancy and Christine Fathy

The decision of the prosecutor in Boulaq El Dakrour was not the first time that prosecution has taken such a measure. On June 12, 2011, 14-year-old Nancy Magdy Fathy, and her 16-year old cousin Christine Ezzat Fathy disappeared from their home in Minya. The family accused two Muslim brothers from a neighboring village of abducting them. Two weeks later they were found in Cairo, but said they converted to Islam, refused to go back to their families and applied for protection from them.

Prosecution decided to put them in a state care home and provided protection for them, until completion of the investigations. It was discovered they had lied about converting to Islam, according to Al Azhar.

“To this day they are still in the care home,” said activist Waguih Yacoub, “and no progress on their status had been made, except that the two brothers implicated of their disappearance were released”.

According to Dr. Oliver there is an active ring called “Sharia Association of Ain Shams” in the Cairo suburb of Ain Shams, which kidnaps Christian minors. “It depends on the protection and backing of a prosecutor serving there who colludes with this association,” he said.

“It is also not uncommon that prosecution detains parents of abducted minors so that they cease to search for their abducted daughters.”

Abdelmassih concluded by saying, “Similarly organized Islamization rings, which depend on the protection and collusion of high profile personalities, including prosecutors and policemen, exist in Alexandria. They target Christian minor girls through sexual coercion”.

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Embattled Indonesian Church Services Disrupted Again

By Dan Wooding
Founder of ASSIST Ministries

BOGOR, WEST JAVA, INDONESIA (ANS) -- A crowd of Muslim hard-liners disrupted about 100 members of the embattled GKI Yasmin congregation as they held divine services at a member's home in Bogor, West Java, on Sunday (January 22, 2012).

Image from a past protest over the embattled church (Photo: www.ucanews.com)

“We were conducting our worship at one member's home before people from Forkami and Garis came to our place,”

GKI Yasmin spokeswoman Dwiati Novita Rini told The Jakarta Post (www.thejakartapost.com) over the telephone on Sunday.

Dwiati said she did not know why the groups - the Islamic Reform Movement (Garis) and the Muslim Communications Forum (Forkami) - were protesting.

The congregation resisted efforts by about 50 Public Order Agency (Satpol PP) officers to stop their service, Dwiati said.

“The Satpol PP came around 9 a.m. and were trying to stop our activity because they didn't want any clashes to happen. [House of Representatives member] Lily Wahid was negotiating with one of the Satpol PP officers and the congregation could continue worship,” she said.

The congregation completed their service peacefully around 10 a.m. and the demonstrators from Forkami and Garis left the congregation member's home around 11 a.m, Dwiati added.

“The Bogor City administration, citing permit application problems, has barred the congregation from conducting religious services for more than two years, defying a 2010 Supreme Court ruling guaranteeing the congregation's right to hold services at its church building,” added the Jakarta story.

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