RLPB 696. China: Persecution Looms Over Hong Kong

Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin | RLPB 696 | Wed 07 Jun 2023
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CHINA: PERSECUTION LOOMS OVER HONG KONG
By Elizabeth Kendal

In March 2018, TIME magazine published an article by Laignee Barron entitled Guerrillas for God: How Hong Kong’s Pastors Are Delivering the Message to China’s Christians. ‘Hong Kong,’ writes Barron, ‘with its greater freedoms and religious liberties, has played a vital role in oxygenating the growth of Christianity on the mainland… While Christianity is undoubtedly thriving in mainland China, faith is permitted only in official, “patriotic” churches; unregistered houses of worship may be prolific, but they are also subject to periodic crackdowns… For these underground congregations – which are illegal, if often ignored – the Hong Kong Christian establishment offers a vital lifeline, supplying everything from monetary support, to Bibles, to blacklisted Christian literature, to training and assistance founding new churches. The gospel is smuggled over the border in every format imaginable: broadcast on pirate radio waves and disseminated through USB flash drives.’ Barron quotes Hong Kong’s retired Catholic Cardinal Joseph Zen who explains that the mainland churches ‘need our help because we are in the freer world and they are not'.

Even as those words were being published, changes were underway [see RLPB 665 (5 Oct 2022)] that would hasten Hong Kong’s removal from ‘the freer world’. At a meeting of the National People’s Congress in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, President Xi Jinping was elected to a second term and Chinese Communist Party (CCP) legislators were amending the constitution to remove presidential term limits. If Xi spent his first term (2013-2018) consolidating power, escalating repression and testing policy (mostly in his old stomping ground of Zhejiang), he would spend his second term establishing his authority – especially over Hong Kong. In early 2019, Beijing made controversial changes to Hong Kong’s Basic Law. This triggered protests, which in turn triggered a violent crackdown. For twelve months Hong Kong resembled a war zone. In February 2020, with the protests subdued, President Xi installed Xia Baolong as Director of the State Council’s Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office. A ‘ruthless enforcer’ and close ally of Xi, Xia Baolong gained infamy among Chinese Christians when he led the CCP’s 2014-15 campaign to remove crosses and demolish churches in Zhejiang province [RLPB 538 (26 Feb 2020)]. On 30 June 2020 Beijing passed national security legislation into Hong Kong (HK) law, bypassing HK’s legislative council, effectively ending the ‘one country, two systems’ era [RLPB 555 (24 Jun 2020)].

 Selling Sinicisation.
Hong Kong 18-19 May 2023
(China Christian Daily, 23 May 2023)

On 18-19 May 2023, for the first time ever, a seminar on ‘The Sinicisation of Christianity’ was held in Hong Kong. The event was jointly hosted by the China Christian Council (CCC, an official umbrella organisation for China’s Protestant churches), the Three-Self Patriotic Movement (TSPM, the government-controlled Protestant body) and the Hong Kong Christian Council. The Chinese delegation of 24 attenders included TSPM chairperson, Rev Xu Xiaohong, who presided over the seminar, CCC president, Rev Wu Wei, five TSPM academics and other clergy. Around 120 Protestant leaders from Hong Kong attended the seminar. 

The CCP portrays sinicisation as ‘Christianity with Chinese characteristics’, and a positive step towards a healthy nationalism that rejects colonial impositions. In practice, however, sinicisation requires religion (Christianity and Islam) serve the State/CCP. Indeed, the primary obligation of sinicised Christianity is to lead the people to love and obey the CCP. According to the high level CCC and TSMP officials who addressed the May seminar, sinicised Christianity is ‘patriotic’ Christianity, and true Hong Kong Christian patriots will sinicise their churches – as occurs on the mainland. The implication is that anyone who rejects the order to register with and function as a tool of the CCP will be branded unpatriotic and treated as a threat to national security – as occurs on the mainland.

The May seminar undoubtedly heralds the end of an era for Hong Kong’s estimated ‘850,000 Christians (12.4 percent of the population), roughly 1500 churches, 35 Bible Colleges and multiple Christian media organisations [RLPB 514 (7 Aug 2019)]. Five years after that TIME magazine article was published, Hong Kong is no longer ‘in the freer world’. Beijing will now move to fully assimilate the Church in Hong Kong into the mainland’s CCP-controlled Church. As on the mainland, the choice facing Hong Kong’s Christian leaders is: (a) to submit and assimilate with the CCP-controlled Church to avoid persecution, OR (b) to move underground and assimilate with the mainland’s unregistered (and therefore illegal), sorely persecuted Church. A very dark period of arrests and persecutions looms.


PLEASE PRAY THAT OUR MERCIFUL GOD WILL:

* fill Hong Kong’s pastors and leaders, ‘with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so [they might] walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him: bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; being strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy' (from Colossians 1:9-12 ESV). May the Church in Hong Kong receive all the wisdom she will need to navigate the increasingly treacherous path ahead.

'Who among you fears the Lord and obeys the voice of his servant [Jesus]? Let him who walks in darkness and has no light trust in the name of the Lord and rely on his God' (Isaiah 50:10 ESV).

* grant the Chinese Church patience and persistence in prayer, along with endurance and faithfulness in glorious hope as the Lord works out his eternal purposes concerning President Xi Jinping, the Chinese Communist Party, the nation of China, and the Chinese Church that will one day be free!

AND just as the Church in Hong Kong has long supported the Church on mainland China through the provision of education and much needed resources, may China’s long-persecuted house church movement be preparing, even now, to support the faithful Church in Hong Kong to endure the coming persecution.

‘Woe to him who builds a town with blood and founds a city on iniquity! ... For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea’ (from Habakkuk 2:12-14 ESV, emphasis mine).


SUMMARY FOR BULLETINS UNABLE TO RUN THE WHOLE ARTICLE
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PERSECUTION LOOMS OVER HONG KONG

On 18-19 May 2023, for the first time ever, a seminar on ‘The Sinicisation of Christianity’ was held in Hong Kong. The seminar undoubtedly heralds the end of an era for Hong Kong’s Church. Promoted as religion with ‘Chinese characteristics’, Sinicisation requires religion (Christianity and Islam) to serve the State/CCP. Indeed, the primary obligation of sinicised Christianity is to lead the people to love and obey the CCP. According to the high-level religious officials who spoke at the seminar, sinicised Christianity is ‘patriotic’ Christianity, and true Hong Kong Christian patriots will sinicise their churches. The implication is that anyone who rejects the order to register with and serve the CCP will be branded unpatriotic and treated as a threat to national security – as occurs on the mainland. Persecution looms. Please pray.

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Elizabeth Kendal is an international religious liberty analyst and advocate for the persecuted Church. The Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin (RLPB) is a donor funded ministry. To support this ministry visit www.ElizabethKendal.com

Elizabeth has authored two books: Turn Back the Battle: Isaiah Speaks to Christians Today (Deror Books, Melbourne, Australia, Dec 2012) which offers a Biblical response to persecution and existential threat; and After Saturday Comes Sunday: Understanding the Christian Crisis in the Middle East (Wipf and Stock, Eugene, OR, USA, June 2016). She is also an Adjunct Research Fellow at the Arthur Jeffery Centre for the Study of Islam at Melbourne School of Theology.

For more information see www.ElizabethKendal.com

RLPB 646. May Update, Inc. Hong Kong, Nigeria, Gulf of Guinea, India, Iran, Pakistan, Sudan, Uganda

Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin | RLPB 646 | Wed 25 May 2022
RLPB is published weekly to facilitate strategic intercessory prayer.

View archives at Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin (RLPB) blog.  

MAY 2022 UPDATE
by Elizabeth Kendal

DURING THIS PERIOD, WE PRAYED CONCERNING:

* CHINA [RLPB 643 (4 May)], where new 'Measures for the Financial Management of Religious Sites', placing all church finances in the hands of the Communist Party will come into force on 1 June; and where state surveillance and social control grows ever more repressive by the day. Please pray.

UPDATE HONG KONG: On 11 May, police arrested Cardinal Joseph Zen (90) – bishop emeritus of Hong Kong and religious liberty champion – for his role as a trustee of the 612 Humanitarian Relief Fund, established in 2019 to help pro-democracy protesters pay their legal fees. He was released on bail later that day. Cardinal Zen and his four co-accused faced court on 24 May. Though initially arrested for ‘conspiracy to collude with foreign forces’ under the city’s national security law, all five of the fund’s former trustees and its secretary were instead charged with failing to register the fund as a society with police, a non-national security offence that can incur a fine for a first conviction. That said, many believe Beijing is preparing to crack down on religious liberty in Hong Kong. Please pray.

Concerning Cardinal Zen, Benedict Rogers writes: ‘Just hours after appearing in court … Cardinal Zen was doing what he does each day: praying, preaching and celebrating the Eucharist.’ While the focus of the service was ‘China, Hong Kong and the Uyghurs, with typical generosity of spirit and reciprocity, Cardinal Zen devoted his prayers to the Church in Myanmar [Burma]…Such solidarity is beautiful.’ AMEN

* BURMA (Myanmar) [RLPB 644 (11 May)], where hundreds of thousands of Christian ethnic Chin, Kachin, Karenni and Karen are displaced - many in the jungle without adequate food, shelter or medical care - as the monsoon season sets in. It is a Christian crisis of monumental proportions. Praise God that the Free Burma Rangers was recently able to deliver aid and bring encouragement to some 800 mostly ethnic Karen stranded on the Burma side of the Thai-Burma border. That said, the need is enormous. Please pray and give generously (James 2:15-17).

'Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me', (Jesus; from Matthew 25:31-46 ESV).

* NIGERIA [RLPB 654 (18 May)], where the horrific lynching of a Christian college student on campus by fellow students, in the far north-west city of Sokoto has sent shock-waves through the nation. Tensions are soaring and there is a risk that 'Islamic rage could spread like wildfire'.

UPDATE: BLASPHEMY FIRES IGNITE ACROSS NORTH
- 'blasphemy' may become pretext for wide-scale attacks on Christians.

Blasphemy fires

BORNO. Following the horrific 12 May lynching of Deborah Emmanuel in Sokoto (in Nigeria's far north-west), a Muslim woman in Borno (in Nigeria's far north-east) posted a comment on Facebook. She said Deborah 'will never rest in peace since she has decided to abuse the most important person in the history of mankind [Muhammad]. May worm(s) eat her up till the day of judgment.' In turn, a Christian graduate from the University of Maiduguri named Naomi Goni responded with a tweet deemed offensive to Muslims. Islamists accused Naomi of blasphemy, sparking a firestorm. As tensions soared and threats to Naomi's life multiplied on Facebook, police opted to detain Naomi for her own protection. On Tuesday 17 May, hundreds of Muslims protested in the streets of Maiduguri demanding that the police hand Naomi Goni over to them so they could kill her in accordance with Sharia [Islamic] Law. Fearful that the rioters might overrun the police station, the police handed Naomi over to military authorities in Maiduguri. Tensions are soaring. Please pray.

BAUCHI. On 20 May, after Friday prayers, Muslim men rioted in Katanga, in the north of Bauchi State (which is north of Plateau State in North-East Region) over allegations that a local Christian woman named Rhoda Jatau (40), a healthcare worker, had written a blasphemous on-line comment. The allegation sparked a firestorm. Muslims mounted a manhunt for the woman, intending to kill her. Fortunately for her sake, Rhoda had managed to flee the area ahead of the rioting. Six homes and seven shops belonging to Christians were burned in the pogrom, and about 20 people were injured, including a Pastor of an ECWA [Evangelical Church Winning All] church. Rhoda remains in hiding. Tensions are soaring. Please pray.

I cry aloud to God, aloud to God, and he will hear me... (Psalm 77).

MAY 2022 ROUND-UP - also this month:

* GULF OF GUINEA: FATAL TERROR ATTACK IN TOGO; GHANA ON ALERT
Update to RLPB 625, Sahel: Terror attacks in Togo and Burkina Faso, 23 Nov 2021.

Regional map, showing location
of Togo's Kpendjal Prefecture.

In the early hours of Wednesday 11 May, around 60 gunmen on motorbikes crossed from eastern Burkina Faso into TOGO and attacked the Kpékpakandi military base, in Togo's northern Kpendjal Prefecture. Taken by surprise, the base was quickly overrun. A fierce firefight ensued, lasting several hours. Togolese troops from a nearby base rushed to provide support, only to hit an improvised explosive device (IED) planted strategically on the road. Eventually, the jihadists ended the assault and fled back over the border with their dead. The highly sophisticated attack claimed the lives of eight Togolese soldiers and left 13 wounded. It was the first fatal terror attack to hit Togo since analysts warned that Islamic jihadists in the Sahel were seeking to 'expand south into the countries of the Gulf of Guinea: Ivory Coast, Ghana, Togo and Benin, all of which border Burkina Faso' [RLPB 625 (23 Nov 2021)]. No group has claimed responsibility, but analysts suspect the militants were aligned with Al-Qaeda's Group for Support of Islam and Muslims (JNIM). In neighbouring GHANA, the Minister of National Security warned the nation: 'There is good reason to believe that the terrorists operating within the region have Ghana as a target...' Security has been increased at all places of worship. Religious leaders and managers of public spaces have been urged to be vigilant and take extra measures to ensure the safety of their people. Please pray.

* INDIA: KARNATAKA ENACTS ANTI-CONVERSION LAW
- democracy fails to deliver, so the BJP opts for dictatorship.

Karnataka, in India's south-west, had been considering enacting anti-conversion legislation since at least September 2021 when MP Goolihatti Shekhar, of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), appealed for a law to stop the 'rampant religious conversions' plaguing the state [RLPB 621 (26 Oct 2021)]. The Karnataka Right to Freedom of Religion Bill 2021 was passed by the state legislative assembly (lower house) on 23 December 2021. However, the BJP failed to muster enough support in the legislative council (upper house; where BJP is one short of a majority), whose approval is required for any law to come into force. Unwilling to accept defeat or rise to the challenge of further debate, the BJP-led government opted to adopt non-democratic means. On 17 May, Karnataka's BJP-led government enacted the anti-conversion law by ordinance with the signature of the state governor.

The law prescribes imprisonment of three to five years along with a fine ranging from 25,000 to 100,000 Indian rupees (US$330-1,330) for conversion due to 'force, undue influence, coercion, allurement or by any fraudulent means or by promise of marriage'. Anyone wanting to change religion will have to file a declaration before government authorities at least 30 days in advance, citing the reasons for their decision. The law prohibits 'mass conversions', defined as 'where two or more persons are converted'; while 'reconversion' to an 'immediate previous religion … shall not be deemed to be a conversion under this Act'.

FULL TEXT (pdf)
The Karnataka Protection of Right to Freedom of Religion Bill, 2021
(LA Bill No. 50 of 2021)

As Father Cedric Prakash, a Jesuit human rights activist notes, the law violates Article 25 of the Indian Constitution which guarantees the freedom to profess, practise and propagate religion to all citizens. 'The law can now punish a Christian or a Muslim for a simple humanitarian act like providing alms or other help such as free education to a child from a poor Hindu family, calling it an attempt to convert,' he said. Please pray.

* IRAN: ARMENIAN-IRANIAN GETS TEN YEARS' JAIL
- for teaching Christianity to Persian converts.

Anooshavan Avedian
(courtesy Article 18)

On 5 May Article 18 reported that Armenian-Iranian Anooshavan Avedian (60) had been sentenced to ten years in prison followed by ten years of deprivation of social rights (e.g. employment) for his church activities. The judge found Anooshavan guilty of 'propaganda contrary to and disturbing to the holy religion of Islam' (i.e. teaching Christianity to Persians, who are supposed to be Muslims). It is an extraordinarily harsh sentence, doubtless designed as a deterrent. Anooshavan was arrested along with Persian converts Abbas Souri (45) and Maryam Mohammadi (46) at a house-church gathering in Narmak, North Tehran, in August 2020. Others present at the gathering were forced to sign commitments to refrain from engaging in Christian activities. The three were eventually bailed after submitting property deeds. They were sentenced on 10 & 11 April 2022. The two Persian converts received harsh, albeit non-custodial punishments, including fines, ten years of deprivation of social rights, as well as two-year bans on travel abroad and two years of exile from their home province of Tehran or any adjacent province. They are also obliged to report regularly to offices of the Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS). All three Christians will appeal. Please pray.

* PAKISTAN: GOD INTERVENES FOR A CHURCH IN PESHAWAR
Update to RLPB 632, Christians in Peshawar Gravely Imperilled, 9 Feb 2022

On Sunday 15 May Islamic terrorists assassinated two Sikh businessmen in Bata Tal bazaar in Sarband on the southern outskirts of Peshawar. The killers used the same modus operandi as those who assassinated Reverend William Siraj on Sunday 30 January [RLPB 632 (9 Feb)]: two men on a motorbike (a driver and a shooter) shot and killed their targets in broad daylight before speeding away. Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP) has claimed responsibility. One day earlier, on Saturday 15 May, an ISKP commander and a would-be suicide bomber were killed during a Counter-Terrorism Department raid on their base in the Wali Abad area of Pishtakhara, on the southern outskirts of Peshawar. Pakistan media reports (Dawn, 15 May): 'A highly placed official told Dawn that the terrorists were planning to hit a church in the provincial capital [Peshawar]. 'The police have already issued a threat alert about a possible attack on a church in Peshawar,' the official said while requesting anonymity. Praise God for this intervention and please continue to pray for Pakistan's exposed and imperilled Church, in particular the Church in vulnerable Peshawar.

* SUDAN: CONVERT COUPLE CHARGED WITH ADULTERY

Hamouda Tia Kafi (34) and Nada Hamad Shukralah (25) of Al Bageir, Al Jazirah state, were Muslims when they married in 2016. However, in 2018, after Hamouda converted and became a follower of Jesus, his wife's family sought and won a sharia court decision to dissolve their marriage. In April 2019 Sudan's military exploited popular protests and ousted Islamist dictator Omar al-Bashir in a military coup. A struggle for the heart and soul of Sudan ensued [RLPB 502 (15 May 2019)]. Subsequently a civilian-led transitional government enacted reforms aimed in part at de-Islamising Sudan. In July 2020 laws were amended to remove a whole raft of Sharia-based provisions. Public flogging was abolished and apostasy was decriminalised [see RLPB 559 (22 July 2020)]. Subsequently, in 2021, Hamouda's wife, Nada converted to Christianity and returned to her husband with their two children. Furious, Nada's brother accused the couple of adultery based on Sudan's 1991 Sharia-based criminal law. Hamouda and Nada were arrested on 17 August 2021 and subsequently bailed. On 25 October 2021 Sudan's Islamist military ousted the reformist, civilian-led transitional government and seized power in a military coup [RLPB 621 (27 Oct 2021)]. Hamouda and Nada's trial has now commenced. If found guilty, the couple - who are members of a Baptist church - could be sentenced to 100 lashes and a year in exile. The next hearing is scheduled for 7 June. Please pray.

* UGANDA: CONVERSION AND RETALIATION IN EASTERN REGION

Map showing location of Mbale.
Kibuku is around 40km west of Mbale.

MBALE DISTRICT. Bishop Amon Sadiiki - a former Muslim, now convert Christian pastor, apologist and evangelist - had been debating Muslims in an open-air evangelistic event in Mbale for four days during Ramadan when, on 28 April, eleven Muslims converted to become followers of Jesus Christ. As he was leaving Mbale at about 8 pm, two Christian organisers of the event insisted they escort the bishop home as many Muslims appeared quite agitated. After setting off on their motorcycles, they soon realised they were being pursued by two other motorcycles carrying Muslims brandishing knives and shouting 'Allahu Akbar' [Allah is greater]. The Muslims ambushing the bishop launched into a frenzied knife attack. The bishop's escorts - Peter and Moses - called for help, which came mercifully from the nearby Christian-founded Mugiti High School. By the time he was rescued, the bishop had suffered serious injuries to his stomach, head and legs, and was losing a lot of blood. Clinging to life, Bishop Sadiiki was hospitalised in a private clinic in Mbale. Days later, on 3 May, Muslims attacked the bishop's son Frank Amon Sadiiki (21) as he travelled home from visiting his father in hospital. Frank was ambushed and struck on the legs with a bladed weapon before an oncoming vehicle scared away the attackers. Bishop Sadiiki told Morning Star News that he and his family were unsafe and in need of prayer. Please pray.

KIBUKU DISTRICT. On Friday morning 6 May, a team of believers from the Malakachomo Revival Church of God visited the home of local Islamic leader Sheikh Musyoya Anasi after learning that his wife was terribly ill. For the past two years Sheikh Anasi's wife had been suffering from an inflamed breast and acute pain in her throat that left her unable to swallow dry food. After prayer for healing, the breast inflammation eased and Anasi's wife rose, asked for food, and ate some cooked bananas. Anani said, 'These miracles led me and my wife to give our lives to Jesus as Lord and Saviour.' However, some Muslims reported the conversions to the mosque. Later that day, after Friday prayers, a mob of Muslims armed with clubs and machetes marched towards the church shouting 'Allahu Akbar' [Allah is greater]. They burned the church and the home of Pastor Wilberforce Naaya, demolishing them entirely. Though several Muslims were arrested, Christian security remains tenuous. Please pray.

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Elizabeth Kendal is an international religious liberty analyst and advocate, and is an Adjunct Research Fellow at the Arthur Jeffery Centre for the Study of Islam at Melbourne School of Theology.

She has authored two books: Turn Back the Battle: Isaiah Speaks to Christians Today (Deror Books, Melbourne, Australia, Dec 2012) which offers a Biblical response to persecution and existential threat; and After Saturday Comes Sunday: Understanding the Christian Crisis in the Middle East (Wipf and Stock, Eugene, OR, USA, June 2016).

See www.ElizabethKendal.com

RLPB 555. June Update. Incl. Turkey, Syria, Hong Kong, Iraq, North Korea, Pakistan

Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin | RLPB 555| Wed 24 Jun 2020

RLPB is published weekly to facilitate strategic intercessory prayer.

Please forward this prayer bulletin widely and encourage others to sign up to the Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin blog. "The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective." (James 5:16 NIV) 

 

JUNE 2020 UPDATE

By Elizabeth Kendal

In my distress I called upon the Lord; to my God I cried for help. From his temple he heard my voice, and my cry to him reached his ears.  Psalm 18:6 (ESV)

JUNE 2020 UPDATE - during this period we prayed concerning

* TURKEY [RLPB 552 (3 June)], after a 'Conquest Day' spectacular in which neo-Ottoman and Islamist Turks celebrated the 567th anniversary of the Ottoman conquest of the Byzantine capital, Constantinople; a conquest which saw the city ransacked, the churches looted and the citizens raped, slaughtered and enslaved. This is how the now UNESCO world-heritage listed Greek Orthodox cathedral, the Church of Hagia Sophia (Church of Holy Wisdom), became the booty of imperialist Ottoman Islamic forces.

UPDATE: COUNCIL OF STATE TO RULE ON 2 JULY

Turkey's Council of State will rule on the status of Hagia Sophia on Thursday 2 July. In a poll run by pro-government newspaper Yeni Safak, 73.3 percent of 2,414 respondents answered 'Yes' to the question of whether Hagia Sophia should be converted into a functioning mosque. Bolstered by the poll, President Erdogan expects the Council of State will rule that the cabinet decree of 1934 - which saw Hagia Sophia converted from a mosque to a museum - be annulled. Expectation is high that Hagia Sophia will at least be open to Muslim prayers, even if it must retain its status as a museum (for now). Hagia Sophia's conversion to that of a functioning mosque would signify a great leap forward in the Turkish Islamist long march to reverse Ataturk's secularising reforms. The issue of Hagia Sophia's status serves as a barometer with which we can measure imperialist and supremacist, ethnic (Turkish) and religious (Islamic) pressure, now clearly rising in Turkey. The trend bodes ill for Turkey's remnant Greek, Assyrian and Armenian Christians (the descendants of genocide survivors), as well as for Turkey's growing cohort of Christian converts from Islam. Please pray for the Church in Turkey.

* INDONESIA [RLPB 553 (10 June)], after Indonesia's Communications and Information Ministry had a local language Bible app removed from the Google Play Store at the behest of the governor of West Sumatra. This further consolidates the terrible precedent already established in West Java (where local officials have even defied the Supreme Court) that governors are free to enforce Islamic norms depriving citizens of their liberty, contrary to the spirit of Pancasila and the religious freedom provisions guaranteed in Indonesia's constitution. Please pray.

* SYRIA [RLPB 554 (17 June)], after the US government's 'Caesar Act' came into force, essentially placing long-sanctioned, war-ravaged Syria in a state of economic siege.

UPDATE: 'A DIABOLICAL ACT'

Archbishop Joseph Tobji of Aleppo

Maronite Archbishop Joseph Tobji (49) of Aleppo recently spoke to the Vatican's Fides news agency concerning the US Caesar Act, which elevates sanctions against Syria to the level of an economic siege. The Archbishop told Fides that the US claim that the sanctions are 'targeted' is a lie 'that not even a child would believe'. The Archbishop insists the sanctions are designed 'to increase the suffering of the population to fuel popular discontent and thus produce regime-change. But,' he adds, 'this way of acting is criminal. Putting an entire people in distress at a time like this, where there is also the spectre of the pandemic around the world, is inhuman.' Archbishop Tobji laments that the US government is willing to go to any lengths to pursue its goals, 'even to sacrificing millions of people, poor people and families'. He condemns this as 'a diabolical act'. [More on this next month.] Please pray for the Church in Syria. [See: RLPB 554 (17 June) for prayer points.]

JUNE 2020 ROUND-UP - also this month

* HONG KONG, CHINA: AUTONOMOUS NO MORE

On 22 May China's Premier Li Keqiang announced that the National People's Congress would write national security legislation into Hong Kong (HK) law, bypassing HK's legislative council [see RLPB 551 (26 May 2020)]. A three-day legislative session was held in Beijing over 18-20 June, in which senior Chinese lawmakers reviewed the draft legislation for the first time. Another three-day session will commence on 28 June, during which many believe the new national security law will be passed in time for the 23rd anniversary of Hong Kong's return to Chinese rule on 1 July. According to reports, Beijing will set up a dedicated central government office in Hong Kong to manage national-security affairs; provisions in the new national-security law will supersede existing Hong Kong legislation; and China's legislature will be empowered to issue judicial interpretations on the law, meaning Beijing will have the final say over how the law will be implemented. As RLPB has warned repeatedly, the impact this will have on the Church in HK - and indeed on the Chinese Church long served by the Church in a free and autonomous HK - will be devastating. Please pray: may the Lord grant divine wisdom to the Church in China.

* IRAQ: TURKEY BOMBS NORTHERN BORDER REGIONS

In August 2014, ISIS ethnically cleansed Northern Iraq's Nineveh Plains of its indigenous Assyrian Christian inhabitants. While some 70,000 Assyrians fled east to Erbil, some 60,000 headed north to Dohuk Governorate, historically an Assyrian region. On 20 and 21 June, Turkish jets bombed the area around Dohuk's Zakho district. Close to the Turkish border, Zakho is home to almost 200,000 mostly Kurdish and Assyrian civilians. While NATO-member Turkey claims to be fighting 'PKK terrorists', anxious Christians are preparing to flee yet again. On 20 June bombs fell close to the Christian village of Bersev, home to some 300 minority families. Civilian casualties and property damage have been reported. Please pray for Iraq's betrayed, abandoned and gravely imperilled indigenous Assyrian Christians.

* NORTH KOREA: HOPES FADE AS TENSIONS SOAR

On 16 June the Kim regime in Pyongyang blew up the inter-Korean liaison office at Kaesong, North Korea. The next day it announced that it would deploy troops to the demilitarised zone (DMZ), particularly to the Kaesong Industrial Complex and the Mount Kumgang Resort. Located in the currently defunct Kaesong Industrial Zone, the inter-Korean liaison office was opened in 2018 as a venue in which officials from the two Koreas could meet and work through the details of various projects aimed at reducing tensions and facilitating rapprochement. The sensational demolition sends a clear message: co-operation is over. Pyongyang claims to be retaliating against North Korean defectors and activists in the South who regularly launch balloons carrying anti-regime leaflets and other 'unauthorised materials' into the North. However, the reality is more complex. In January, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, NK closed its only active border, its border with China. The border closure has served to compound the difficulties caused by US sanctions; the result is a serious shortage of food and medicines throughout the state. The Kim regime is frustrated and growing increasingly desperate. On Thursday 25 June, the Koreas will commemorate the 70th anniversary of the start of the Korean War. Activists on both sides of the border are preparing to launch propaganda leaflets (hopefully that will be all that is launched!). Tensions are soaring. Please pray.

Once the centre of Korean Christianity [CBN video], Pyongyang under the Soviet-appointed Kim Il-sung sank to become one of the world's most severe human rights abusers and persecutors of Christians. 'There can be little doubt that an intensive and furious spiritual battle is underway over North Korea, and over its integration into East Asia (the spiritual powerhouse of the future!)' [RLPB 490 (20 Feb 2019)]. Please pray that the unprecedented steps taken in 2018 and 2019 will not have been in vain. Please pray that this extraordinary opportunity for positive change will not be lost. Please pray for the long-suffering, severely persecuted Church in North Korea ... may the Lord deliver her.

Background: (in chronological order)

North Korea: Reasons for Hope (RLM, 13 March 2018)

RLPB 446, A Step in the Right Direction (14 March 2018) 

RLPB 458, US-NK Summit (Singapore) (6 June 2018)

RLPB 471, A Stalemate in need of a breakthrough (5 Sept 2018) 

RLPB 490, US-NK Summit (Hanoi) (20 Feb 2019)

* PAKISTAN (1): WAITING FOR JUSTICE

Imran Masih 
(Aid to the Church in Need)

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Pakistan's courts face a massive backlog of cases. Unfortunately, appeals against blasphemy convictions are not on the court's priority list. Having spent six years on death row, Shafqat Emmanuel Masih (who is paralysed) and his wife, Shagufta Kausar (who worked as a caretaker in a Christian school), were due to have their appeal heard by the Lahore Court of Appeal on 8 April [RLPB 539 (4 March)]. The Christian couple from Gojra, Punjab, were tortured and sentenced to death in 2014 for allegedly sending blasphemous text messages to an Islamic cleric, despite being illiterate. Their appeal has been delayed without a new date being announced. Please pray. Christian grocer, Imran Masih of Faisalabad, received a life sentence for blasphemy in July 2009. He was cleaning out his shop and burning off the rubbish when he was accused of burning pages that allegedly contained Arabic-language verses from the Quran. According to his lawyer Khalil Tahir Sandhu, Imran's appeal has been postponed almost 70 times over the course of nearly eleven years. Imran Masih's next hearing date at Lahore High Court has been set for Monday 6 July. Please pray.

PAKISTAN (2): THE LAW AS A WEAPON

Anwar Masih of Lahore was arrested on 2 June for insulting the Prophet Muhammad. In a case that may be the first of its kind in Pakistan, the complainants are the man's wife and daughter. It is alleged that Anwar's wife, Kausar Parveen, and daughter, Samreen, ran a beauty parlour in Lahore and that Kausar had an illicit affair with Akash Maqsood, a Muslim. She also secretly married him, converted to Islam and become pregnant with his child. When Anwar discovered the deception, he was understandably shocked and furious. In his anger he railed against his unfaithful wife and against Islam. The daughter filmed the outburst on her phone and presented it as evidence. The Centre for Legal Aid Assistance and Settlement UK is a Christian charity dedicated to helping persecuted Christians in Pakistan. Its director Nasir Saeed explains: 'This is another example of the misuse of the blasphemy law where a daughter gets rid of her father and a wife her husband, simply because he cannot accept what they have done. Masih will have to wait years and years to prove himself innocent and has no future.' Please pray.

Shagufta (l) and Shafqat (r)

[NOTE: In the case of Shafqat Emmanuel Masih and Shagufta Kausar (pictured right), it seems likely that a 'Christian' neighbour with whom the couple had a dispute may have framed them for the capital crime of blasphemy so as to punish or get rid of them. Lord have mercy!]

* IN BRIEF

* Violent persecution against Christians continues without relief across Hindu Nationalist India. See https://morningstarnews.org (South/Central Asia / India). Please pray.

* Islamic jihad in the form of farm invasions, ethnic cleansing, abductions and terror continue without relief throughout the north and volatile Middle Belt of President Muhammadu Buhari's Nigeria. Visit https://silentslaughternigeria.com and check the incident tracker; and https://morningstarnews.org (Sub-Saharan Africa / Nigeria). Please pray.

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Elizabeth Kendal is an international religious liberty analyst and advocate. She serves as Director of Advocacy at Canberra-based Christian Faith and Freedom (CFF) and is an Adjunct Research Fellow at the Arthur Jeffery Centre for the Study of Islam at Melbourne School of Theology.

She has authored two books: Turn Back the Battle: Isaiah Speaks to Christians Today (Deror Books, Melbourne, Australia, Dec 2012) which offers a Biblical response to persecution and existential threat; and After Saturday Comes Sunday: Understanding the Christian Crisis in the Middle East (Wipf and Stock, Eugene, OR, USA, June 2016).

See www.ElizabethKendal.com 

RLPB 551. May Update, incl. Hong Kong (China), Nigeria, Papuan Provinces (Indonesia), Turkey

Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin | RLPB 551| Wed 27 May 2020
RLPB is published weekly to facilitate strategic intercessory prayer.

Please forward this prayer bulletin widely and encourage others to sign up to the Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin blog. "The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective." (James 5:16 NIV)

MAY 2020 UPDATE
By Elizabeth Kendal

'... have no fear of [those who persecute you], for nothing is covered that will not be revealed, or hidden that will not be known.' (Matthew 10:26 ESV)

MAY 2020 UPDATE - during this period we prayed concerning:

* CHINA [RLPB 548 (6 May)], where the law which deems all unregistered religious activity illegal is now being mercilessly enforced. The crackdown will force hundreds of thousands of unregistered house-churches deep underground and put numerous resistant pastors in prison. Please pray.

* CHINA [RLPB 549 (13 May)], where even registered - i.e., legal - Chinese Communist Party-approved churches are facing ever more restrictions, obligations and closures as the CCP seeks to curtail the growth of Christianity by drastically reducing both the visibility and availability of churches. Please pray.

UPDATE: HONG KONG

BACKGROUND: Article 23 of the Hong Kong's Basic Law stipulates that the Hong Kong (HK) Special Administrative Region 'shall enact laws on its own to prohibit any act of treason, secession, sedition, subversion against the Central People's Government ...'. (emphasis mine). The HK government tried to enact such a law in 2003 but backed down in the face of massive protests. Xia Baolon is a protege of President Xi, a CCP heavyweight and the head of China's cabinet-level office that oversees HK affairs [RLPB 538 (26 Feb)]. In late April Xia met with HK Chief Executive Carrie Lam to pressure her to introduce national security legislation as stipulated by Article 23. By 21 May, Beijing had run out of patience.

Radio Free Asia (24 May 2020)

HONG KONG LOSES ITS LIBERTY

On Friday 22 May China's Premier Li Keqiang announced that the National People's Congress currently meeting in Beijing would write national security legislation into Hong Kong law, bypassing - 'and thus fatally neutering' - HK's legislative council. This, as Benedict Rogers of Hong Kong Watch notes, 'effectively ends "one country, two systems" in Hong Kong.' The decision will be passed (rubber stamped) by a vote of the Congress on Thursday 28 May. As noted in RLPB 514 (7 Aug 2019), Hong Kong - home to 850,000 Christians (12.4 percent of the population), some 1,500 churches and 35 Bible Colleges - has long been 'a vital nerve centre for [Christian] media' and 'the springboard for evangelising on the mainland'. HK's loss of freedom will be a massive blow to the Church in China. Please pray.

* INDONESIA [RLPB 550 (20 May)], as Islamic State-aligned terror groups Jamaah Ansharut Daulah (JAD) and the Poso-based Mujahidin Indonesia Timur (MIT) escalate their terrorist rhetoric and activity. The escalation is a direct response to Islamic State incitement. Having labelled the COVID-19 pandemic Allah's vengeance on Islam's enemies, IS is inciting its followers to exploit the crisis to launch terror attacks on 'infidels' (Christians) and 'apostates' (Muslims who depart from 'true [IS-approved] Islam'). Please continue to pray.

MAY 2020 ROUND-UP - also this month:

* NIGERIA: SECURITY FALLS APART

click on image
to enlarge.

Violent attacks on Christian individuals and communities continue apace, without respite. While there are more than can be listed, I will mention just one. At around midnight on 11 May, Fulani Muslim militants raided the predominantly Baptist community of Gona Rogo Village, Kajuru Local Government Area, southern Kaduna State. They broke into the home of Jonathan Yakubu (36), killing him, his wife Sheba and three of his seven children: daughters Patience (15), Revelation (9) and Rejoice (6). Jonathan's other wife, along with children Isaiah (13), Ziporah (10) and two infants, survived with machete cuts and bullet wounds. (Source: Peace & Social Justice research team, Silent Slaughter Campaign.) In total, 17 Christians were killed in the midnight attack on Gona Rogo; homes were burned and cattle stolen. This is terrorism in pursuit of ethnic-religious cleansing. For more on Nigeria, visit https://silentslaughternigeria.com and check the incident tracker and https://morningstarnews.org (Sub-Saharan Africa/Nigeria). Please pray.

* PAPUAN PROVINCES (INDONESIA): RISK OF MORE VIOLENCE

On Friday afternoon 22 May two health workers affiliated with the local COVID-19 task force were shot as they travelled through the remote and mountainous Wandai district in Papua's Central Highlands' Intan Jaya Regency. While Amalek Bagau (30) survived and has been hospitalised in a critical condition, Eniko Somou (39) died from his wounds. The Indonesian military (TNI) immediately blamed Papuan separatist militants (OPM) and launched a manhunt. However, the OPM denies responsibility and insists the two men were shot by TNI and National Police personnel. The shooting comes just five weeks after TNI soldiers allegedly shot dead two young Papuan men in Mimika Regency. Eden Armando Bebari (19) and Ronny Wandik (21) were shot dead while out fishing, having apparently been mistaken for members of an armed separatist group. For the sake of Papua's imperilled Church, please pray that violence will not escalate; please pray that the mostly Javanese Muslim Indonesian military will be withdrawn from the mostly Melanesian Christian Papuan Provinces.

* TURKEY: ERDOGAN STOKES THE FIRE OF ISLAMIC ZEAL

Spouting inflammatory Islamic triumphalist rhetoric, Turkey's President Erdoğan is, once again, stoking the fire of Islamic zeal. During a coronavirus briefing on 4 May, Erdoğan insisted: 'We do not allow terrorist leftovers of the sword in our country to attempt to carry out [terrorist] activities. Their number has decreased a lot but they still exist.' Turkish journalist, Uzay Bulut explains: 'Leftover of the sword' is a commonly used insult in Turkey that often refers to Christians who survived the Ottoman Empire's 1915 genocide of Armenians, Greeks and Assyrians. In a national address on 12 May, President Erdoğan vowed to continue the fight against terrorism and foreign enemies, including the 'Armenian and Greek lobbies' which he labelled 'evil forces' targeting Turkey. This is dangerous rhetoric, rooted in racial-religious hatred and bordering on incitement. Please pray.

In early May, Turkey's Religious and Foundation Employees' Union (Diyanet Bir-Sen) publicly called for the first Friday prayer after the coronavirus pandemic to be performed in Istanbul's world heritage listed Hagia Sophia, the Church of Holy Wisdom, built by the Emperor Justinian in AD 537. On 10 May President Erdoğan's communication chief, Fahrettin Altun, published a tweet implying that Turkey's Muslims would soon have what they long for: Hagia Sophia  as a functioning mosque (it is currently a museum). On 15 May Turkey's Religious Affairs Directorate announced that mosques will re-open on 12 June. Three days later, on 18 May, President Erdoğan announced that mosques meeting certain conditions would partly reopen to worship with Friday prayer on 29 May: i.e., on Conquest Day, the day Muslim Turks celebrate the Ottoman conquest of the Byzantine capital, Constantinople, which fell to Ottoman Muslim forces on 29 May 1453. The conversion of Hagia Sophia would indicate that the days of Kemalist secularism are over and that Ottoman Islam is back!

Uploaded to YouTube on 23 March 2020
source: MEMRI (23 March)

President Erdoğan routinely stokes Islamic zeal during Ramadan, before elections and in the lead-up to Conquest Day. This year his efforts have acquired a new level of urgency as he seeks out ways to perpetuate his popularity and consolidate his position amidst the economic crisis brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic. The situation is deeply concerning. Please pray for the Church in Turkey.


But let all who take refuge in you rejoice; let them ever sing for joy, and spread your protection over them, that those who love your name may exult in you. For you bless the righteous, O Lord; you cover him with favour as with a shield. (Psalm 5:11-12 ESV)

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Elizabeth Kendal is an international religious liberty analyst and advocate. She serves as Director of Advocacy at Canberra-based Christian Faith and Freedom (CFF) and is an Adjunct Research Fellow at the Arthur Jeffery Centre for the Study of Islam at Melbourne School of Theology.

She has authored two books: Turn Back the Battle: Isaiah Speaks to Christians Today (Deror Books, Melbourne, Australia, Dec 2012) which offers a Biblical response to persecution and existential threat; and After Saturday Comes Sunday: Understanding the Christian Crisis in the Middle East (Wipf and Stock, Eugene, OR, USA, June 2016).

See www.ElizabethKendal.com 

RLPB 549. China: Government Wants Fewer Churches

Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin | RLPB 549 | Wed 13 May 2020
RLPB is published weekly to facilitate strategic intercessory prayer.

Please forward this prayer bulletin widely and encourage others to sign up to the Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin blog. "The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective." (James 5:16 NIV)

By Elizabeth Kendal

INTRODUCTION
HONG KONG: WIPING OUT THE MIDDLE GROUND

On 18 April Hong Kong authorities arrested 15 of the region's most high profile senior pro-democracy leaders 'on suspicion of organising, publicising or taking part in several unauthorised assemblies'. In recent years, the Hong Kong democracy movement has split. On one side there is the old guard of pan-democrats who have long worked with Beijing to advance peacefully the 'One Country, Two Systems' agreement. Beijing had long been happy to work with these pro-democracy leaders, but as veteran journalist and commentator Lee Yee explains, 'Following the rise of Xi Jinping in late 2012 ... all of that changed.' Under Xi, Beijing started exercising more and more control over Hong Kong. In 2016 a new youth-led movement emerged advocating 'localism' (a separate identity for Hong Kong). It seems this faction has also now split between those who steadfastly reject violence and those who believe violence may be necessary to force change. Seasoned with realism, the old-guard pan-democrats have persistently sought to establish an acceptable middle ground. Yet this is the group Beijing targeted in the 18 April sweep. Today, Beijing is boasting of having nabbed 'Hong Kong independence gang leaders'. But, as Lee explains, in arresting men and women who 'have consistently been the most mild advocates of democratic norms in the territory', the Communist authorities 'have, in effect, wiped out what remained a middle ground. Now the only choices open to Hong Kong people are: align yourself with a totalitarian regime or rise up to resist and oppose it. There simply is no Third Way.'

See: The End of the Third Way, by Lee Yee, 21 April 2020.

Reading Lee Yee's analysis of Beijing's actions in Hong Kong makes one wonder if the same policy might one day be rolled out across the mainland with regards to China's churches; or indeed if it has already begun!

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CHINA: GOVERNMENT WANTS FEWER CHURCHES
- state-sanctioned churches being closed, merged and re-purposed

Inside the TSPM's Chongyi Church, Hangzhou (2015)

Under President Xi, Chinese Communist Party (CCP) repression and persecution of CCP-approved churches has commenced and is escalating rapidly. For the Protestant, state-sanctioned (i.e. legal) Three Self Patriotic Movement (TSPM), the persecution commenced with the forced removal of TSPM pastors who criticised the regime's acts of aggression, in particular the CCP's campaign against the Cross in Zhejiang [see RLPB 255, The CCP and the Cross over Zhejiang (9 April 2014)]. The Zhejiang campaign led to the arrest (on false embezzlement charges) and on-going persecution of  Pastor Joseph Gu (Gu Yuese), pastor of one of the largest TSPM churches in the country: Chongyi Church in Zhejiang's capital, Hangzhou (pictured) [see RLPB 343, A New Cultural Revolution is Upon Us (10 Feb 2016)]. In the years since then, TSPM churches across the country have faced increasing levels of CCP interference and harassment; many have been forced to remove crosses and Bible texts and replace them with images of President Xi and pro-CCP slogans.

Having registered with the Chinese government (i.e. the CCP), TSPM member churches are obliged to operate under its oversight and submit to its restrictive rules, most salient of which is to never criticise the CCP. As in all denominations, pastors in TSPM churches are diverse: from faithless CCP stooges eager to advance themselves at any cost, through to evangelicals who submit through gritted teeth so the gospel might be preached in an open, accessible and essentially protected TSPM property. To varying degrees, most are just trying to find the middle ground in an exceedingly complex, difficult and fluid environment. If the CCP wipes out the middle ground, Christians will be left with two stark choices: total absorption into CCP structures, or high-risk secret meetings in illegal 'underground' fellowships amidst Cultural Revolution-style violent persecution. There will be no Third Way.

TSPM church in Nie village:
cross and words “Christian Church” removed;
repurposed as “Integrated Cultural Service Center
of Nie village, Yangmiao town,
Gaoxin district, Jiaozuo city.”
(Bitter Winter 4 Jan 2020)

Bitter Winter reports (2 May 2020) that, at a conference in Fujian Province in September 2019, directors of TSPM churches were informed that, in order to stem the rapid growth of Christianity, Beijing had decided to reduce the number of places of worship. Over 200 of Fujian's TSPM meeting venues were selected to be closed, merged and re-purposed. In the firing line are secondary venues affiliated with large TSPM churches. Despite being affiliated with the registered parent TSPM church, these venues are being deemed unregistered and illegal. TSPM churches that are deemed too close to other TSPM churches are similarly being shut down and merged with other TSPM churches. Redundant church properties are confiscated, 'de-Christianised' and 'repurposed' for use by the CCP.

Bitter Winter also reported (4 Jan 2020) that a major take-over of some 150 churches took place across two cities in the central province of Henan in September 2019 and that TSPM churches did not escape. In Jiaozuo, a prefecture-level city in northern Henan, three TSPM churches were forcibly acquired and re-purposed. Pastors who resisted were threatened with re-education; most acquiesce out of fear. Bitter Winter reports concerning one TSPM church forcibly acquired in Jiabu village, Wuzhi County, north-west Henan: 'After the church was emptied, government employees put up a signboard that read "Joy Charity Institute of Group 3, Jiabu, Dafeng town, Wuzhi County" on the church's eastern gate. On its western gate, they put up another signboard that read: "Dafeng Town CCP Committee Base-Level Party School".' My thoughts (E.Kendal) on this: at least they got the signs right! For just as the sun rises in the east every dawn, joy and charity will rise over China. Likewise, just as the sun sets in the west every dusk, so too will the sun set on the CCP ... by the grace of God, in answer to the prayers of many (2 Corinthians 1:11). Until that 'day' comes, the Church in China needs our prayers.


PLEASE PRAY THAT OUR ALMIGHTY GOD WILL

* fill the Chinese Church, especially her pastors and leaders, 'with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so [they might] walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him: bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; being strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy' (from Colossians 1:9-12 ESV). May the Church receive all the wisdom she will need to navigate the increasingly treacherous path ahead.

* protect, sustain, supply and encourage Chinese believers who are this day in prison or facing increased persecution and hardship simply because of their faithfulness (Luke 12:4-7).

'Who among you fears the Lord and obeys the voice of his servant [Jesus]? Let him who walks in darkness and has no light trust in the name of the Lord and rely on his God' (Isaiah 50:10 ESV).

* grant the Church (in China and the world) patience and persistence in prayer, along with endurance and faithfulness in glorious hope as the Lord works out his eternal purposes concerning President Xi Jinping, the nation of China, and the Chinese Church that will one day be free!

'Woe to him who builds a town with blood and founds a city on iniquity! ... For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea' (from Habakkuk 2:12-14 ESV, emphasis mine).


SUMMARY FOR BULLETINS UNABLE TO RUN THE WHOLE ARTICLE
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CHINA'S GOVERNMENT WANTS FEWER CHURCHES

Under President Xi, Chinese Communist Party (CCP) repression and persecution of legal, CCP-approved churches has escalated. For the Protestant, Three Self Patriotic Movement (TSPM) it started with the removal of pastors who criticised CCP policies. Since then, the CCP interference and harassment has only escalated. Multitudes of TSPM churches have been forced to remove crosses and Bible texts and replace them with pictures of Xi and pro-CCP slogans. In mid-2019, Beijing determined that, to stem the rapid growth of Christianity, it had to reduce the number of churches. Multitudes of TSPM churches are now being closed, merged and re-purposed. As the CCP wipes out the middle ground, Christians will have to choose between total absorption into CCP structures, or illegal, high-risk secret meetings amidst Cultural Revolution-style persecution. Please pray.

------------------------------------------------------------
RAMADAN: 24 April – 23 May
RLPB recommends: 30 Days of Prayer for the Muslim World
https://www.30daysprayer.com/
------------------------------------------------------------

Elizabeth Kendal is an international religious liberty analyst and advocate. She serves as Director of Advocacy at Canberra-based Christian Faith and Freedom (CFF) and is an Adjunct Research Fellow at the Arthur Jeffery Centre for the Study of Islam at Melbourne School of Theology.

She has authored two books: Turn Back the Battle: Isaiah Speaks to Christians Today (Deror Books, Melbourne, Australia, Dec 2012) which offers a Biblical response to persecution and existential threat; and After Saturday Comes Sunday: Understanding the Christian Crisis in the Middle East (Wipf and Stock, Eugene, OR, USA, June 2016).

See www.ElizabethKendal.com 

RLPB 538. Feb Update: Iran, Burkina Faso, Cuba, Hong Kong (China), Nigeria, Pakistan, Turkey

Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin | RLPB 538 | Wed 26 Feb 2020
RLPB is published weekly to facilitate strategic intercessory prayer.

Please forward this prayer bulletin widely and encourage others to sign up to the Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin blog. 'The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.' (James 5:16 NIV)
 
By Elizabeth Kendal

FEBRUARY UPDATE - during this period we prayed concerning:

* INDONESIA'S PAPUAN PROVINCES [RLPB 535 (5 Feb 2020)], where indigenous Melanesian Christians displaced by Indonesian military (TNI) operations are increasingly dying from totally preventable illness, infection and starvation. More than 260 displaced Papuans have died in overwhelmed and struggling, mostly church-run, camps in the past 12 months. They are dying because the government in Jakarta refuses to withdraw the TNI, meaning the Papuans cannot return to their homes. They are dying because Jakarta refuses to open the region to international assistance, or even to recognise the displaced Papuans as victims of conflict so they might receive humanitarian aid from their own government. This obscene disregard for Papuan life reeks of racial-religious contempt and discrimination. Please pray.

* IRAN [RLPB 536 (12 Feb 2020)], as Iranians headed to the polls to elect a new parliament, and as Christians continue to suffer high levels of surveillance, interference, harassment, intimidation, repression and violent persecution at the hands of a desperate Islamic regime.

UPDATES

(1) ELECTIONS: As was guaranteed (due to the purging of centrists and reformists), conservatives and hardliners now dominate Iran's new parliament (Majlis). In the capital, Tehran (a hotbed of dissent), only around 25 percent of registered voters bothered to participate in the sham election; unsurprisingly, all 30 seats went to conservatives and hardliners. Nation-wide the turnout was only 42 percent - the lowest since the Islamic Revolution of 1979 - presenting the regime with a crisis of legitimacy. Conservatives and hardliners now occupy 221 out of 290 seats, whilst centrist and reformist representation has dropped from 121 to 20 seats. The remaining seats are held by independents. As long as Rouhani (a centrist) remains president, the hardliners will continue to deflect responsibility and blame all economic hardship on him. Persecution will escalate! While it might appear bleak, God is at work. Persist in prayer.

(2) PERSECUTION: as was reported in last week's Update from Iran, Fatemeh (Mary) Mohammadi (21) has been cruelly beaten, humiliated and incarcerated in the notorious Qarchak prison, where she awaits a decision on whether or not she will be released on bail. Please pray.

* BURKINA FASO [RLPB 537 (19 Feb 2020)], where violence - including Islamic jihadist violence against Christians - is spiralling out of control ahead of this year's general elections, scheduled for November.

UPDATE: The New Humanitarian (TNH) has released a news feature entitled 'How jihadists are fuelling inter-communal conflict in Burkina Faso' (20 Feb 2020). It provides an excellent summary of how the cycle of violence is being perpetuated. As TNH explains, Islamic jihadists recruit disgruntled Fulani youths. These 'young men who have been radicalised' [RLPB 501 (8 May 2019)] subsequently perpetrate acts of murderous violence. Because the government cannot secure the whole country, local self-defence militias are emerging to fill the gap. When communities are attacked, these militias exact revenge on their Fulani neighbours, accusing them of complicity in the jihadi terror. The Islamists then exploit Fulani trauma to recruit more Fulani youths to their cause, which seems to be the destabilisation of Burkina Faso, be that for political and/or economic gain. Christians have not retaliated and remain exceedingly vulnerable. Also, whether they realise it or not, the Fulani are being exploited. Forces with evil agendas are working to shred the social fabric by means of ethnic and religious conflict. May the LORD intervene to prevent it! [See prayer points in RLPB 537 (19 Feb).] Please pray.

FEBRUARY ROUND-UP - also this month

* CUBA: CHRISTIAN JOURNALIST THREATENED AGAIN

Yoé Suárez 

Yoé Suárez (born 1990) is a highly regarded, award-winning independent journalist and author in Cuba. In February 2019 Cuba's Communist regime labelled Christians 'counter-revolutionaries' and 'enemies of the state', primarily due to their defence of Biblical marriage and family, which conflicts with the state's neo-Marxist ideology [RLPB 491 (26 Feb 2019)]. Suárez's problems began when he started reporting on Cuban Church issues - particularly persecution - for various Christian digital news platforms. On 5 February Suárez received a subpoena to report to the police station. There he was questioned for almost three hours. An officer, who identified himself as Captain Enrique, informed Suárez that he was banned from leaving the country and threatened his wife and young son. Suárez has been detained and questioned on four previous occasions, including that reported in RLPB 517 (28 Aug 2019). The pressure on the Cuban Church is unrelenting. Please pray.

* HONG KONG, CHINA: ENTER, XIA BAOLONG

On 13 February Beijing announced that Xia Baolong (67), the Vice-Chairman of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, would now also serve as Director of the State Council's Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office. Xia Baolong is a close ally and protege of President Xi Jinping, having served as Xi's deputy in Zhejiang. As Communist Party chief in Zhejiang (December 2012 - April 2017), Xia Baolong ordered and oversaw the campaign to remove crosses and demolish churches in Wenzhou and throughout the province [see RLPB 255, The Communist Party and the Cross over Zhejiang (9 April 2014)].

Xia Baolong vs the cross in Zhejiang.
Taking the battle to Hong Kong.

Ying Fuk-tsang, Dean of the Divinity School of the Chinese University of Hong Kong, explains: '[President] Xi has a high estimation of the fact that Xia takes the party's interests first and that he is a ruthless enforcer. That is why Xia has been brought back to the front-line now that cracking down on "anti-China" forces has become [the] top priority in Beijing's policy toward the SAR [Special Administrative Region].' Xia will report directly to President Xi, who will rule Hong Kong indirectly through Xia. China Analyst, Dr Willy Wo-Lap Lam (Jamestown Foundation), believes Beijing will now move decisively to establish 'patriotic education', foil plots that threaten national security and stifle HK's civil society, especially its Church [see: RLPB 514, 'Crackdown or Breakthrough' (7 Aug 2019)]. Beijing's crackdown will not be shocking like a descending sledgehammer. Rather, it will be quiet like a bloodless strangulation. Yes, the situation appears bleak - persecution will escalate - but God is at work. Please persist in prayer.

* NIGERIA: VIOLENCE SPIRALS OUT OF CONTROL

On 8 January unidentified gunmen kidnapped four young seminarians from the Good Shepherd Major Seminary in Kakau, southern Kaduna State [RLPB 534 (29 Jan 2020)]. On 1 February the Seminary issued a statement on the fate of the seminarians. One seminarian had been released, having fallen gravely ill after a severe beating; he had been found dumped on the side of the Kaduna-Abuja Highway in a critical condition on 18 January and transported to St Gerard's Catholic Hospital in Kaduna. On 31 January, after two other seminarians were released, the Reverend Fr Dr Joel Usman issued a call requesting prayer for the remaining captive seminarian, Michael Nnadi (18), a student of philosophy. The next day, however, Fr Usman had to report that Michael Nnadi had been 'found dead'.

Violence and crime are spiralling out of control in Nigeria, especially the violent crime of kidnapping for ransom. Calls for President Buhari's resignation are growing louder by the day. Meanwhile the government is pushing through two highly controversial bills designed to tackle what it maintains is the real problem: 'fake news' and 'hate speech' on the internet. Please pray.

* PAKISTAN: PLIGHT OF THE DHIMMI

Huma Younus (14)

[Dhimmi: 'protected person', i.e., a Christian whose right to life is 'protected' as long as they live as a subjugated, right-less, second-class citizen under Islam. Warning: resistance to dhimmi status triggers removal of 'protection' and resumption of jihad.]

CHRISTIAN GIRL ABDUCTED;
COURT ELEVATES SHARIA

Huma Younus (14) was abducted from her home in Karachi's Zia Colony in Sindh Province on 10 October 2019 while her parents were out of the house. She was transported to Dera Ghazi Khan in Punjab Province (more than 370 miles away), where she was forcibly converted to Islam and married to Abdul Jabbar, her abductor. In Pakistan it is virtually impossible to make a case against forced conversion as many imams are willing to issue conversion certificates, no questions asked! Consequently, Huma's parents sought the court's intervention on the grounds that their daughter is under-age. They maintain that the marriage is invalid because the Sindh Child Marriage Restraint Act forbids marriage under the age of 18 years. To that end, Huma's parents submitted various documents, including her baptismal certificate, as proof of her age.

However, at the minutes-long hearing on 3 February, Sindh High Court judges Muhammad Iqbal Kalhoro and Irshad Ali Shah ruled that the marriage was valid because Sharia (Islamic Law) mandates that a girl may be married once she has had her first menstrual cycle. To clarify: the judges elevated Sharia over the law of the land. The ruling sets a horrendous precedent. Investigating officer, Akhtar Hussain, has been given one month to determine the girl's age. The family suspects that Hussain is colluding with the abductor and that the results will be falsified. They desperately want Huma to be 'placed in a women's shelter and removed from her rapist'. The next hearing is scheduled to take place on Wednesday 4 March. Please pray!

* TURKEY: ASSYRIAN PRIEST vs NEO-OTTOMAN STATE

Father Sefer Bilecen (known as Father Aho) is the caretaker-priest at the 1500-year-old Mor Yakub (Saint Jacob) monastery in Nusaybin in Turkey's south-eastern Mardin Province. Arrested on 9 January, Father Aho has been charged with 'aiding and abetting a terrorist organisation' for giving food and drink to militants linked to the banned PKK (Kurdistan Workers' Party) when they come to the monastery requesting or demanding it [RLPB 534 (29 Jan 2020)]. The charge is absurd; this is pure persecution arising from racial-religious hatred. Father Aho's next hearing is scheduled to take place on Thursday 19 March. Please pray.

------------------------------------------------------------

Elizabeth Kendal is an international religious liberty analyst and advocate. She serves as Director of Advocacy at Canberra-based Christian Faith and Freedom (CFF) and is an Adjunct Research Fellow at the Arthur Jeffery Centre for the Study of Islam at Melbourne School of Theology.

She has authored two books: Turn Back the Battle: Isaiah Speaks to Christians Today (Deror Books, Melbourne, Australia, Dec 2012) which offers a Biblical response to persecution and existential threat; and After Saturday Comes Sunday: Understanding the Christian Crisis in the Middle East (Wipf and Stock, Eugene, OR, USA, June 2016).

See www.ElizabethKendal.com