Persecution

CHHATTISGARH, India (BP) – At least 40 members of New Bethesda Jesus Tribal Ministry in Michwar Village remain sheltered at the church two weeks after the village council banned them from the community unless they renounce their faith.

NEW DELHI (RNS) — In July, more than two years after a Christian prayer service at his home was raided by police, a court in Uttar Pradesh in northern India acquitted Abhishek Gupta, a 41-year-old radiologist, of violating the state’s anti-conversion law.

HIDALGO, Mexico (BP) – About 150 Baptists forcibly displaced from their homes in Hidalgo, Mexico, since April have sought refuge in a neighboring state after Catholic village leaders reneged on an agreement that would have welcomed the Protestants home.

Myanmar – historically known as Burma – is “a disintegrating nation” where leaders of religious minorities continue to be targeted by the military, a report from the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom stated.

DALLAS (BP) – “Can God trust you?” if you are called upon to pay a social or financial price for following Jesus, an American pastor who spent two years imprisoned in Turkey asked students and faculty at Dallas Baptist University.

PLATEAU, Nigeria (BP) – Pastor Eli Abdullah Tinau lives in the charred room that remains of his home after an attack by militant Fulani Muslims, an increasingly violent group accused of killing thousands of Christians in middle and northeastern Nigeria.

Nations identified as some of the worst persecutors of Christians also have some of the most corrupt governments, a new study by International Christian Concern asserts.

SUDAN (BP) – War crimes are evidenced among harrowing human rights violations including gender-based violence in the Sudan war, an independent United Nations Fact-Finding Mission found, while the war has forced as many as 165 churches to close.

HIDALGO STATE, Mexico – More than 30 Baptist families who were forced from their homes in Mexico’s Hidalgo State in April have been allowed to return home, a human rights organization focused on international freedom of religion reported.

When their church no longer felt safe, deacon Francisco Alvicio and his congregation made a plan. Cautiously, discreetly, they took their worship to their homes.