Free Republic

Where is the hardest place in the world to be a Christian citizen? North Korea, perhaps? Saudi Arabia? According to Lars Widerberg of Intercessor's Network, it is the nation of Somalia. There are thought to be no more than a thousand Christians in a resident population of 8 million people, with perhaps a few thousand more in the diaspora. The Islamist Shabab militia, which controls most of southern Somalia, is dedicated to hunting these remaining Christians down and eliminating every one of them. Christian men attend mosques on Fridays, so as not to arouse suspicion. Bibles are kept hidden. There...

Ghana’s first Catholic Cardinal, Peter Appiah Turkson is closer to becoming the first black pope ever of the Catholic Church. Saturday October 24, 2009, Pope Benedict appointed Cardinal Turkson to head the Vatican’s justice and peace office. This position is a high-profile one that cements his reputation as a possible future candidate for the papal office, according to the Associated Press. The justice and peace office is responsible for promoting the church’s social teachings on justice issues, such as war, the death penalty and human rights. Turkson told reporters three weeks ago there was no reason there couldn’t be a...

‘Moderate’ Islamist group had long suspected woman in Puntland was Christian. Three masked members of a militant Islamist group in Somalia last week shot and killed a Somali Christian who declined to wear a veil as prescribed by Muslim custom... Members of the comparatively “moderate” Suna Waljameca group killed Amina Muse Ali... in her home . Ali had told Christian leaders that she had received several threats from members of Suna Waljameca for not wearing a veil, symbolic of adherence to Islam. She had said members of the group had long monitored her movements because they suspected she was a...

Somalia: Christian Leader Killed On Sept. 28 an Islamic extremist shot and killed Mariam Muhina Hussein, an underground church leader, after discovering six Bibles in her possession, according to Compass Direct News. The day before the shooting, a leader of the Islamic extremist group al Shabaab reportedly sent his wife to visit Hussein's home in Marerey villange. She pretended she was interested in learning about Christianity. During the visit, Hussein read passages of the Bible and told the woman that she could visit regularly to discuss God's Word, according to Compass. The following day, the al Shabaab leader, identified as...

VATICAN CITY (AP) - African bishops attending a Vatican meeting are speaking about the election of Barack Obama in divine terms—putting them very much at odds with many of their U.S. counterparts. Archbishop Gabriel Charles Palmer-Buckle of Accra, Ghana said Wednesday that there was "a divine plan behind" Obama's election. "It's like the biblical story repeating itself," he told reporters, citing the Old Testament figure Joseph, who after being sold into slavery in Egypt ends up becoming a top official. "We believe God has his own plans. God directs history," he said of the U.S. election. "We pray that it...

Pope To Open Africa Synod In Rome By David Willey BBC News, Rome The pope drew huge crowds during his visit to Angola in March Pope Benedict is to open a three-week gathering of African bishops with a Mass in St Peter's Basilica in Rome. The Synod on Africa is aimed at discussing the continent's social and economic problems. The Catholic Church is growing faster in Africa than in any other part of the world, nearly trebling in size to 150 million followers over 30 years. It will be the second synod of bishops organised at the Vatican to be...

Forget Lions and Tigers The Latest in Big Game thelastcrusade.org Somalia (MNN) ― Somalia's Muslim militants are hunting down converts to Christianity. According to Voice of the Martyrs Canada, Al-Shabaab members have murdered 14 believers since July 15. Compass Direct News reports the September 15 shooting death of 69-year-old Omar Khalafe, an underground Christian who had Bibles in his possession.On the day of his death, Khalafe was carrying 25 Somali Bibles he hoped to deliver to an underground fellowship in Somalia. At a checkpoint controlled by al Shabaab--a rebel group linked with al Qaeda which has taken over large...

widespread human rights violations, including mutilation, torture, rape, the abduction of civilians, the use of child soldiers, and a number of massacres. In recent months there has been an increase in violent incidents across provinces of southern Sudan, especially near the Ugandan border. "Everywhere, people are being killed" including at least one church leader, said Bishop Daniel Deng Bul Yak in remarks aired by Radio France International (RFI), monitored by BosNewsLife. "This is why we are appealing to the United Nations and governments in the world like the U.S. Germany and Norway. They should come in now, so that peace...

One of the most powerful figures in the Anglican Church believes that Africa is under attack from Islam and that Muslims are “mass-producing” children to take over communities on the continent. Archbishop Nicholas Okoh, 56, was elected Primate of Nigeria last week and his elevation could exacerbate tensions at a time when Anglicans are working to build bridges with Muslims. Dr Michael Nazir-Ali resigned as Bishop of Rochester earlier this year to work in countries where Islam is the majority religion. Nigeria is split almost half and half between Christianity and Islam. There are about 17 million practising Anglicans in...

Washington, D.C. (July 29, 2009) – International Christian Concern (ICC) has learned that Islamic extremists killed a pastor and razed five churches in the city of Maiduguri, Nigeria, on July 27. The extremists also attacked two churches in the Nigerian city of Potiskum. Yakubu Sabo, a husband and father of seven, was hacked to death with a machete by members of a violent Islamic militant group know as Boko Haram (which means “education is prohibited”). Sabo pastored a Church of Christ congregation in Maiduguri. Deeper Life Church, Evangelical Mission, and Church of the Brethren are three of five other churches...

A Christian woman who faces 40 lashes for wearing trousers in Sudan made a dramatic appearance in court yesterday to fight her case. Lubna Ahmed al-Hussein walked into the packed hearing in the same green slacks that got her arrested. Under Islamic laws used in parts of the country, it is illegal for a woman to wear trousers rather than long skirts in public. But the law is not supposed to apply to non-Muslims like Miss Hussein, a former journalist who works for the United Nations. And it is only imposed sporadically in the capital, Khartoum, where she was arrested....

From website: "Top Thinkers of The Early Church" "Many people who know a lot about the Bible know little about what happened right after the time of the Bible, after Jesus and His apostles. This is the period of time from A.D. 100 to A.D. 500. Few Christians are aware that the very greatest of all thinkers, scholars, and leaders of this time were found on the continent of Africa. The five individuals selected [and discussed below] all lived in North Africa."

A congressionally mandated commission has blacklisted Nigeria as one of the world's worst abusers of religious freedom, in a controversial decision made with dissent from at least one of the panel's members. The ranking is linked to the government's role in religious discrimination and retribution in the large West African country. Although official policies do not encourage or promote such actions, the commission faults the authorities for failing to prevent violence along religious lines. "The toleration by Nigeria's federal, state and local governments of systematic, ongoing and egregious violations of religious freedom has created a climate of impunity, resulting in...

Nairobi (ENI). A row is simmering between the Seventh-day Adventist Church in western Kenya and Muslims in the country over reported attempts to convert to Christianity Sarah Obama, the grandmother of U.S. President Barack Obama. 'We had invited her to grace our meeting in Kisumu which was to mark the end of a three-week convention, but although she had prepared, she did not attend,' Lewis Ondiek, SDA central Nyanza executive director, told Ecumenical News International. Some members of her family had stopped Sarah Obama from attending the service, which was led by an Australian evangelist, John Jeremic. Apart from stating...

A Protestant church in Kenya is trying to convert US President Barack Obama's step-grandmother to Christianity against her will, a Muslim group said Monday, condemning the move as provocation. The Seventh Day Adventist church in the western town of Kisumu had invited 87-year-old Sarah Obama -- a Muslim -- to a function on Saturday, where she was allegedly to be baptised. According to relatives in her village of Kogelo, "Mama Sarah", as she is popularly known in the US president's paternal homeland, was surprised by the offer and declined to attend. "I regret the attempt by the Christian religion to...

NAIROBI: A Protestant church in Kenya is trying to convert US President Barack Obama's step-grandmother to Christianity against her will, a Muslim group said Monday, condemning the move as provocation. The Seventh Day Adventist church in the western town of Kisumu had invited 87-year-old Sarah Obama -- a Muslim -- to a function on Saturday, where she was allegedly to be baptised. According to relatives in her village of Kogelo, "Mama Sarah", as she is popularly known in the US president's paternal homeland, was surprised by the offer and declined to attend. "I regret the attempt by the Christian religion...

The LDS Church reached a milestone last week when we ordained our first black African general authority. Elder Joseph W. Sitati of Nairobi, Kenya, was admitted to the First Quorum of Seventy. During General Conference, Sitati was presented for a sustaining vote of the entire church membership, including those of us watching from home with a bag of Doritos. It was such a momentous occasion that I thought a second vote was required. "All those who can sustain the idea that this sort of thing was about dang time, please manifest by ..." Sorry. That was irreverent, I know. It's...

Pope Benedict flew from Cameroon to Angola on Friday with an unusual traveling companion -- a turtle. Just before he left Cameroon, the pope met a group of Baka Pygmies, hunter-gatherers from the country's rain forests. They came to the grounds of the Vatican embassy in the capital Yaounde and gave him the turtle of about 30 cm (one foot) long. The Vatican said it was not yet clear if the turtle -- which has not yet been named -- would be left in Angola or find a new home in the Vatican gardens.

YAOUNDE, Cameroon (CNS) -- A group of Pygmies showed up to give Pope Benedict XVI an unscheduled send-off from Cameroon, and presented him with a live turtle to take back with him to the Vatican. The 15 Pygmies from the Baka ethnic group came to the pope's residence at the apostolic nunciature in Yaounde March 20 as the pontiff was preparing to leave for Angola. They built a ceremonial hut out of leaves in the garden of the residence, and the pope came out to greet them. The Pygmies, including grandparents, parents and children, sang songs and danced to the...

A Sudanese priest recently had an eye-opening introduction to the U.S. Episcopal Church. John, a clergyman from the Episcopal Church of Sudan, sent an inquiry to the "justice missioner" on the website of the Diocese of Newark. The justice missioner responded to John's email and informed him that her focus was advocacy for people with disabilities, people of color, and the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex community. Although fluent in English, John found this language incomprehensible. He knew Americans talked openly about homosexuality, but he was bewildered by the terms "transgender" and "intersex." John asked the justice missioner if...

Priest's mission in Kenya went beyond church. Father John Kaiser during his first years in Kenya, in the 1960s. He was one of the few American members of the London-based Mill Hill Missionaries society, which needed priests in Africa. John Kaiser was warned by other priests that his style in confronting the Moi government was too reckless. Kaiser knew he was in danger but kept speaking out -- until he could no longer do so. By Christopher Goffard, First Of Three Parts February 8, 2009 Reporting from Lolgorien, Kenya -- Wherever he went, the man of God carried his shotgun....

Uganda's army has accused the Lord's Resistance Army rebels of hacking to death 45 civilians in a Catholic church in the Democratic Republic of Congo.Capt Chris Magezi said the scene was "horrendous... dead bodies of mostly women and children cut in pieces". The attack happened on 26 December. A rebel spokesman has denied responsibility for the killings, which follow a collapse in the peace process. The UN says at least 189 people were killed in several attacks last week. Some reports say more than 100 people were killed in the church alone. The armies of Uganda, South Sudan and DR...

Religious leaders in Ethiopia on Monday urged lawmakers to amend the country's constitution to ban homosexuality in a move they argue could further strengthen existing codes. At a meeting in the Ethiopian capital, nearly a dozen religious figures, including heads of Ethiopia's Orthodox, Roman Catholic and Protestant churches, adopted a resolution against homosexuality, which they termed as "the pinnacle of immorality." They also blamed homosexuality for the rise in sexual attacks on children and young men. "This is something very strange in Ethiopia, the land of the Bible that condemns this very strongly," said Abune Paolos, the patriarch of Ethiopia's...

Once again Muslims who do not get their way turn violent. The latest case is over the results of a local election in Nigeria. The winners were the Christian backed ruling party the People's Democratic Party . The Muslims claimed the election was rigged and started rioting. This time the Christians fought back as hundreds of people have been killed.

Kenya (MNN) ― A longstanding effort to replace a church with a mosque in Kenya's northern town of Garissa culminated in an attack by 50 Muslim youths this month that left the worship building in ruins. Compass Direct reports the gang stormed the building of Redeemed Gospel Church and pelted the congregation with stones, sending many Christians fleeing while others became embroiled in fistfights. Ten Christians received hospital treatment for minor injuries and were released. Jonathan Racho with International Christian Concern says anti-Christian violence is growing in Northern Kenya. "It's a part of Kenya where Muslims make up the majority,...

COMMENTARY: About 50 parishioners were locked into the Assemblies of God church before it was set ablaze. They were mostly women and children. Those who tried to flee were hacked to death by machete-wielding members of a mob numbering 2,000. The 2008 New Year Day atrocity in the Kenyan village Eldoret, about 185 miles northwest of Nairobi, had all the markings of the Rwanda genocide of a decade earlier. By mid-February 2008, more than 1,500 Kenyans were killed. Many were slain by machete-armed attackers. More than 500,000 were displaced by the religious strife. Villages lay in ruin. Many of the...

The gay bishop of New Hampshire should resign in order to save the Anglican Communion, a senior African archbishop said today. The call came from the Rt Rev Dr Daniel Deng, the archbishop of Sudan, and followed a strongly worded statement that accused the US Episcopal church of exposing Anglicans to ridicule and damaging their credibility in a multi-religious environment. African bishops who signed the statement rejecting homosexual practice said they could not accept it as part of their church. They reiterated their opposition to developments in the US and Canada, where gay clergy are ordained and where same-sex relationships...

After being yanked from a bus just outside of her hometown in Algeria, 35-year-old Habiba Kouider was searched and questioned about her faith. When police found several Bibles and books about Christianity, they detained the Christian convert for 24 hours and brought her before a state prosecutor. The official gave her two options: Convert back to Islam or face charges. Kouider now faces three years in prison for "practicing non-Muslim religious rites without a license." She is one among dozens of believers arrested this year on religious grounds. Many Christians fear ominous times are ahead for Christians in Algeria, a...

Having recently replaced a predecessor who was a pro-Mugabe flunky, the new Anglican bishop of Harare is denouncing the geriatric dictator’s endless tyranny. “We, the Anglican Church of the Diocese of Harare (CPCA) are shocked and dismayed by the continuous Police interference with Sunday services and the increased brutality causing casualties,” Bishop Sebastian Bakare recently wrote. “Many of our Parishioners were assaulted and beaten, several of our parishioners of St Monica's Church in Chitungwiza were brutally assaulted and had to be admitted to hospital.” Late last year Bakare replaced pro Mugabe enthusiast Nolbert Kunonga as Bishop of Harare. With support...

TORIT, Sudan - Bishop Akio Mutek of southern Sudan sees a warning of his people's demise in schoolbooks. As Arab Muslim fundamentalists attempt to take over Sudan and subject its citizens to strict Islamic rule, officials in Khartoum are revising history books that used to describe Arab migration as beginning from Arabia in the 13th century, when the blacks were already in the country. Now they say that Arabs entered Sudan along with the black African population that is predominant in the south. "In 10 or 15 years, they will say that the Arabs were from this area originally," ...

FAMED American pastor, Dr Rick Warren has said he supports the decision by Ugandan bishops to boycott the forthcoming Lamebth conference in England, United Kingdom. The conference brings together Bishops of the Anglican Communion from all 38 Provinces of the Communion every 10 years. "The Church of England is wrong and I support the Church of Uganda(CoU) on the boycott,"Dr Warren said on Thursday shortly after arriving in Uganda. The Bishops are protesting the Church of England's tolerance a homosexuality. Announcing the boycott in February, Archbishop Henry Luke Orombi said that Uganda's action had been prompted by the invitation of...

‘Our country has become a Christian nation,’ says Zambia’s First Lady Her husband, the President, has been publicly baptized at a Lusaka Baptist church By Dan Wooding The First Lady of Zambia has stated that her country has become a “Christian nation.” Mrs. Maureen Mwanawasa (mwah-nah-WAH-sah), made this statement during an interview with me for ANS and also Safe Worlds IPTV at the recent 3rd Annual Global Summit on AIDS and the Church held at Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, California, hosted by Pastor Rick Warren and his wife, Kay. I asked the first lady, a Christian, like her husband,...

Christians in Ethiopia have long claimed to have the ark of the covenant. Our reporter investigated "They shall make an ark of acacia wood," God commanded Moses in the Book of Exodus, after delivering the Israelites from slavery in Egypt. And so the Israelites built an ark, or chest, gilding it inside and out. And into this chest Moses placed stone tablets inscribed with the Ten Commandments, as given to him on Mount Sinai. Thus Jews came to revere the ark as an earthly manifestation of God. The Old Testament describes its enormous powers—blazing with fire and light, halting rivers,...

Radical Muslims Attack Christians in South West Ethiopia International Christian Concern - 10/31/07 Ethiopia (International Christian Concern) - In mid October 2007, radical Muslims attacked houses belonging to Christians, burned down a church http://www.persecution.org/suffering/ICCnews/newsdetail.php?newscode=6344&title=radical-muslims-attack-christians-in-south-west-ethiopia

NIGERIA: TEN CHRISTIANS KILLED IN MUSLIM RAMPAGE IN KANO Compass Direct News, CA Oct 5, 2007 NIGERIA: TEN CHRISTIANS KILLED IN MUSLIM RAMPAGE IN KANO STATE Homes, churches destroyed as 500 people are displaced; government slow to respond. TUDUN WADA DANKADAI, Nigeria, October 5 (Compass Direct News) – A Muslim rampage last week in this town in the northern state of Kano resulted in the killing of 10 Christians and the destruction of nine churches, according to eyewitnesses. Another 61 people were injured and more than 500 displaced in the September 28 disturbance, touched off when Muslim students of Government...

http://allafrica.com/stories/200710190699.html [allAfrica.com] 20 Oct 2007--The Anglican Church's Province of Central Africa has expelled the bishop of Harare, Nolbert Kunonga, and declared his post vacant after he withdrew the diocese from the province alleging rampant homosexuality in the church.

As religious violence breaks out again in Nigeria in a row over cartoons of Mohammed, a Christian student has been describing how he had to run for his life after being accused of drawing of the Muslim prophet Muhammed. According to reports from Kano State, at least nine Christians were killed and churches, businesses and homes were burned after rumours that Christians had drawn a cartoon of the Prophet Mohammed and displayed it on a wall of a mosque. Under Islam any depiction of God or Mohammed is considered blasphemous. The incident echoes the uproar in Nigeria that followed the...

Anglican churches in Zimbabwe have expressed their intention to pull out of the Central African province in opposition to other churches which were in favor of homosexuals. Three of five dioceses in Zimbabwe had "unanimously agreed" to sever ties with dioceses in the Central African province, saying it will not "stand with homosexuals," a cleric at Harare diocese, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, told Agence France-Presse. The cleric noted that according to the Diocesan Act adopted by the Harare diocese in August and put into effect on Aug. 4, the Zimbabwe church body will "dissociate and sever relationship...

"All these people brought Christianity to us, but now the church is growing here [in Africa] like wildfire, it's spreading everywhere, while the church in England is withering, the church in the States is going completely, and there has been a cry, 'Why don't you come? You should have come here a long time ago to evangelize,' " said Archbishop Bernard A. Malango, the Anglican primate of Central Africa. "We need to send missionaries, even to Britain; we need to send missionaries to the United States, and we need to send missionaries to Canada, because those who brought the church...

CALDWELL, N.J. (CNS) – Immaculee Ilibagiza knows what it is like to rely on the power of prayer. With nothing other than rosary beads and prayer to sustain her, she survived the 1994 Rwandan genocide by hiding in a small bathroom with seven other women for 91 days. She lived through the systematic slaughter, when an estimated 800,000 people -- including most members of her family -- were brutally murdered in the central African nation. She told her story of survival to students at the campus of Dominican-run Caldwell College April 18, just two days after a lone gunman killed...

Nigeria’s top Muslim leader said that he meant no harm against Christians when he urged a Muslim group last week to counter Christian evangelism by spreading Islam. Alhaji Saad Abubakar III, the Sultan of Sokoto and spiritual leader of Nigeria’s 70 million Muslims, clarified to African journalists meeting in his palace last weekend that he was quoted out of context and that he never meant any violence against Christians, according to Nigeria-based Daily Champion newspaper Monday. “I am not a violent person. Islam is not a violent religion and we had no intention of calling for a jihad; not in...

The Rt. Rev. Dr. David Zac Niringiye, Bishop of Kampala, Uganda preached in the Church of the Good Samaritan and placed the issues facing the Anglican Communion in proper perspective. The controversies facing Anglicanism are not about human sexuality but about the Gospel. The consecration of V. Gene Robinson as a bishop in the Epsicopal Church only proves the problem has a long history. The bishop spoke clearly and without compromise as he framed the struggles in American Anglicanism: “We can discuss symptoms about how we lost our way, how the ECUSA lost its way, and what happened over a...

The Holy See has warned that there will be “serious consequences” for a rebel African archbishop if reports that he is to work with the author of the Da Vinci Code on a new novel about exorcisms are true. Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo, the unpredictable African faith healer and exorcist, is reported to have agreed to work with Dan Brown on the project. The agreement was said to have been reached at a meeting in Houston, Texas, attended by representatives of Dan Brown, Sony Pictures, Random House publishing company and Target, an American company which intends to finance the film. Participants...

St. Famille Catholic Church in Kigali on Satuday, August 12, held a special mass in memory of Bishop Aloysius Bigirimwami, the first African bishop for the French-speaking countries of Rwanda, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). The memorial service, which brought together various religious leaders from all over the country, attracted a mammoth congregation, the state-owned New Timers newspaper reported. Bishop Bigirimwami was appointed the first African bishop of the Belgium colonies and the sixth African Bishop for the whole of Africa in 1952. "Today we are here to remember and mark twenty years since Bishop Bigirimwami,...

LAGOS, Nigeria -- It's eight hours into the service, and the congregation is still dancing. Shout, they're told. Yell out to the Lord. Their cries melt into a muggy night with the odor of sweating bodies, jasmine and the tropical musk of the Nigerian bush land. "Hallelujah," rumbles the head pastor as the church band kicks into a new number. "Hal-le-luuuuuuu-jah." Even from the heights of the pulpit, he can't see the far edges of the crowd. More than 300,000 people have come for the once-a-month, all-night, Pentecostal-style revival, led by a preacher most simply call "Daddy." Given the standards...

This translation of a televised conversation reveals a rare glimpse into the outlook of Muslim scholars who are concerned about Christianity’s growth.

TIME 100: AKINOLA MAKES TIME MAGAZINE'S TOP 100 LIST The People who shape our world Archbishop Peter Akinola The Strength of a Lion By RICK WARREN May 1, 2006 Nigerian Anglican Archbishop Peter Akinola captured headlines last year for leading the worldwide revolt of evangelical Anglicans against the ordination of gay bishops in the U.S. by the Episcopal Church. But to caricature his ministry with that one issue would severely underestimate his importance. Akinola personifies the epochal change in the Christian church, namely that the leadership, influence, growth and center of gravity in Christianity is shifting from the northern hemisphere...

IRVING, Texas – On the 25th floor of a luxury office tower, a church most people have never heard of is planning to save America. Its leaders believe Jesus has sent them to spread a difficult truth in the United States: Demonic forces are corrupting society and only spiritual warfare can stop them. Call it the message. The messenger comes from Nigeria. The Redeemed Christian Church of God was founded in Lagos by men and women who were once the target of missionary work themselves. Now their church has become one of the most aggressive evangelizers to emerge from the...

Dear Friends:A number of you have asked about the editorial “Gospel of Intolerance” that appeared in the Washington Post last Sunday, February 26. It was written by John Chane, Bishop of Washington, and was a very pointed attack on the Primate of the Church of Nigeria, Archbishop Akinola, and, by implication, those in this country who align themselves with him.While there are a number of related points raised in the editorial the underlying issue is the proposed legislation in Nigeria with regard to Same-Sex Marriage. If enacted, this legislation would include the possibility of a jail sentence for those who...

Lambeth Palace has applauded the Episcopal Church of the Sudan’s (ECS) decision not to break with the Episcopal Church in protest to the actions of the 74th General Convention on human sexuality. At a recent meeting of the Provincial Synod, the Sudanese Church condemned recent innovations to Church teaching, but decided to continue in prayerful dialogue and Eucharistic fellowship. The Sudanese General Synod’s statement was “a helpful response to the issues facing the Communion today,” the Rev. Jonathan Jennings, Lambeth Palace press officer, told The Living Church. Long unable to meet due to the nation’s civil war, the Jan. 23-29...