Free Republic

Algiers, 31 Dec. (AKI) - Lawmakers from the Algerian Islamic political party of al-Nahda have asked the government to intervene to slow down "the activities of Christian missionaries in the country". Algerian MP Muhammad Hudeibi was quoted as saying this in the local el-Khabar newspaper. "We want the government to cut down this type of activity because the expansion of evangelisation in Algeria has become an important problem and is not marginal as some think it is," said Hudeibi. For some years, the local media in Algeria have reported on the activities of a number of missionaries, particularly those from...

SEOUL: For years, under the leadership of Choi Kwang, a hard-driving missionary from South Korea, North Koreans seeking refuge in China were taken to apartments where they were put through a rigorous training course in Christianity that began daily at 6 a.m. and continued until 10 p.m. The trainees repeated out loud the words of an eight-hour-long tape recording of the New Testament. Before taking breaks for meals, Choi and the North Koreans would embrace and pray: "Let's spill Jesus's blood in North Korea! Let's become martyrs for North Korea!" By 2001, when his underground proselytizing network was broken up...

Freed Christian Hostages Recount Ordeal By Eric Young Christian Post Reporter The 21 South Koreans held hostage in Afghanistan by the Taliban recounted their six weeks of captivity on Wednesday, revealing the harsh conditions and numerous beatings they endured before being freed nearly two weeks ago. Je Chang-hee, one of the 23 Koreans kidnapped by the Taliban in Afghanistan, center, shows his clothes during a press conference with other fellow ex-hostages at a hospital in Anyang, south of Seoul, Wednesday, Sept. 12, 2007. They said Wednesday that the insurgents beat and threatened them with bayonets to force them to convert...

Cannibal tribe apologises for eating Methodists By Nick Squires in Sydney Last Updated: 3:29pm BST 16/08/2007 A tribe in Papua New Guinea has apologised for killing and eating four 19th century missionaries under the command of a doughty British clergyman. Sorcery and witchcraft are still common in some Papuan tribes The four Fijian missionaries were on a proselytising mission on the island of New Britain when they were massacred by Tolai tribesmen in 1878. They were murdered on the orders of a local warrior chief, Taleli, and were then cooked and eaten. The Fijians - a minister and three teachers...

SEOUL, Aug. 13 (Yonhap) -- Two of 21 South Koreans held hostage in Afghanistan have been released and moved to a safe area, a spokesman for the South Korean Foreign Ministry said Monday. The released hostages are Kim Gina, 32, and Kim Kyung-ja, 37, ministry spokesman Cho Hee-yong told reporters. The two, Cho said, "were released on Aug. 13 and have been handed over to our side." "We feel fortunate that at least some of the hostages have been released, but we again urge the kidnappers to immediately release all our citizens they hold hostage," the ministry spokesman said...

SEOUL, Aug. 12 (Yonhap) -- The Taliban have decided not to release any of the 21 South Korean captives yet, a self-styled Taliban spokesman said Sunday, dashing hopes of a breakthrough in the protracted hostage crisis. "Our leaders have changed their minds and decided not to free two female hostages," Yousuf Ahmadi told Yonhap News Agency by telephone.

What are Christian Korean women doing in Afghanistan anyway? Haven't there been enough horrendous incidents involving missionaries, Christian activists, peace-at-any-price zealots in both Afghanistan and Iraq to dissuade others from plunging into the morass, ostensibly to do the Lord's work? In too many cases, it's fallen to NATO or other soldiers, who risk their lives to rescue such people from their reckless courage, and refusal to recognize the dangers of their humanitarian selfishness. Especially women, foreign or not, who are Taliban targets. Presuming most are still alive, the Korean Christians held hostage by the Taliban in Afghanistan pose a huge...

A South Korean woman held hostage with 21 others in Afghanistan has pleaded for help to secure their release.The woman, who identified herself as Yo Syun Ju, told the BBC by telephone she was "sick and in a terrible situation". "Tell them to do something to get us released," she said in an interview carried out in the presence of the Taleban militants holding her captive. A group of 23 Koreans was abducted one week ago. The kidnappers have since killed one of the hostages.

Asian country one of top exporters of Christianity TU THANH HA July 23, 2007 In China, their pastors get arrested for smuggling North Korean asylum seekers. In Afghanistan, hundreds are expelled after trying to attend a rally. In Iraq, a missionary hopeful is kidnapped and beheaded. The abduction in Afghanistan last week of 23 South Korean Christians is the latest reminder that South Korea ranks second after the United States among countries sending evangelical missionaries overseas. Evangelical churches enjoyed a phenomenal growth in South Korea, helped by the fact that, rather than be associated with colonial powers, foreign missionaries were...

Rabbi Wosner, one of the leading hassidic rabbis, publishes plea in Hamodia newspaper. This comes on the heels of the court’s ruling that a Jehovah’s Witness conference may take place at the Congress Center in Haifa The leading hassidic authority, Rabbi Shmuel Wosner, called through the “Hamodia” newspaper to pray on the Fast of Esther for success in the struggle against “the edict of destruction and the spreading of missionary activity in the holy land”. The Rabbi is responding to the court’s decision to allow the Congress Center in Haifa to host the Jehovah’s Witness group. Two weeks ago, the...

Four Mormon missionaries, all Nigerian young men, were abducted from their apartment in Port Harcourt, Nigeria, on Saturday and are being held hostage. While LDS Church officials would not comment Tuesday on the captors' demands, they said they are optimistic that ongoing negotiations will resolve the matter soon. The abductions came amid escalating violence in the oil-rich Niger Delta region, which prompted the U.S. State Department to issue a travel warning on Jan. 19. Heeding the warning, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints took care to move American and European missionaries - fewer than five missionary couples -...

If music is the motor that drives Pentecostal worship, the band and choir at Ark of Salvation for the New Millennium, a little storefront church in west Harlem, could use a tuneup. Ragged and off-key at times, they are easily outclassed when they sit in with the seasoned musicians at other churches. Yet they grab attention for one simple reason: They are often the only teenagers in the room. As Pentecostalism advances across the world, winning converts faster than any other Christian denomination and siphoning believers from more established faiths, it is also suffering its own slow leak: young people...

Christianity in Sweden has a long history, but you won't find many Swedes in the pews on a Sunday. But that doesn't mean Swedish religious groups don't have the capacity to cause a stir, as Christine Demsteader reports. It seems the ubiquitous Holy Spirit has met its match in Sweden. God would probably have a pretty hard time getting a personnummer, and it would take a real miracle to prove his credentials to Migrationsverket. Quite simply, the majority of Swedes don’t think the big man exists. That’s according to a European Commission report from 2005 which states just 23 percent...

Afghan Scholars Want Korean Missionaries Out IslamOnline.net & News Agencies Abdur-Rahman's conversion to Christianity had triggered massive protests in Afghanistan. MAZAR-I-SHARIF, Afghanistan — More than 500 Afghan scholars pressed on Wednesday, August 2, for the expulsion of hundreds of South Koreans on the grounds they were seeking to promulgate Christianity in the conservative Muslim country. "They are not needed here," said Sayed Haider Hashimi, an organizer of the protest in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif, reported Reuters. "They have come to promulgate Christianity and the government should send them out." Another scholar warned the government of "bad consequences" if the...

JULIA and Richard do not look like fugitives but they could be jailed under new Indian laws to stop missionaries converting low-caste Hindus to Christianity without a magistrate’s approval. A well educated British couple with young children, they left London two years ago to teach missionary work in some of India’s poorest states, such as Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Orissa. Last week Madhya Pradesh became the latest state to pass an anti-religious conversion bill that could leave Christian missionaries open to criminal charges. Leaders of India’s 26m Christians say the bill is an attempt to intimidate and persecute them, while...

...In seven states in India, the BJP [Bharatiya Janata Party] and its allies have introduced over the past few years a number of laws that punish “proselytism.” Ivan Dias, the archbishop of Bombay...asserted that “conversion from one religious belief to another is a strictly personal matter between God and the individual concerned.” Conversions “induced by force, fraud or allurement,” the cardinal continued, are not part of the Church’s mission. Those who attack the Church must provide proof for their accusations, but they have not been able to do so... “Christians in India number only 2.3% of the total population: of...

An 8-year-old Indian boy will have use of his thumb, cut almost all the way through by a machete, thanks to a courageous opthamologist, modern technology and a Christian mission in Chiapas, Mexico. Deep in Mexico at a mission clinic built by Lubbock residents Vernon and Grace Odom, it was the last day of a three-day surgical mission in the spring. Five American and three Mexican specialists did cataract and other eye operations on more than 157 patients. The boy cut his thumb while helping chop wood in a mountain village. The father wrapped his son's bleeding hand in rags...

Life of The Blessed Joseph Vaz, Apostle of Ceylon. by S. G. Perera, S. J. Brief Life Sketch by the J. M. J. Apostolate Blessed Joseph Vaz was born at Benaulim, Goa, on the 21st April 1651. His parents, Christopher Vaz and Maria de Miranda, were devout and pious Catholics who took great pains to bring up their six children in the love and fear of God. It was, therefore, not surprising that Joseph, their third child, who was of medium height, slim and wiry, gentle and kindly, extremely pious and very loving to the poor, should have made up...

See for example this thread first. And now more good news from Iraq Some terrorists have given back Hostages they took Take another look The jihadists are starting to crack!

Christianity always seems to grow where its followers are persecuted and paradoxically seems to die away where its followers have the absolute freedom to worship. The United States seems to be one of the few exceptions so far -- despite all the freedoms and distractions that we have, there are many who practice authentic Christianity. We need to pray that this will last.China is not as fortunate as we are. Early missionaries were not always so successful in gaining new believers. My sister-in-law's mother grew up in China as a missionary child and her family had to flee when the Communists...