World in Brief

A six-year-old boy who took Christian booklets to school as gifts for classmates landed his parents in trouble with authorities, it was reported in June.

The boy’s act led to the headteacher calling the police who then raided the parents’ home, seizing Bibles, Christian pamphlets and CDs of worship songs. The couple were charged with possessing religious literature that did not bear a government ‘control mark’ and were fined the equivalent of three months wages. They lost their appeal against the fine.

After eight weeks of peaceful protest and much prayer, the government dropped proposals to restrict the freedoms of believers and the activities and funding of churches, it was reported in June.

The breakthrough came during parliamentary voting on the second reading of the amendments to the Religious Denominations Act 2002, when all the controversial changes were suddenly dropped. Church leaders, with support from thousands of Christians across Bulgaria, had prayed in public, often in severe weather.

Extremists left 29 dead in northern Burkina Faso after twin attacks on 9 and 10 June.

Nineteen people were murdered in the town of Arbinda and ten were killed in nearby Namentenga province. The person reporting the attacks said there were no more Christians left in the former town, as those left alive had fled.

Police investigated two separate incidents of theatre owners receiving death threats in June. This was because they scheduled screenings of Unplanned, the pro-life movie which tells the story of Abby Johnson leaving her job with Planned Parenthood to become a spokesperson in the pro-life movement.

The irony of the pro-choice movement trying to stop people having a choice to see the film was not lost on the theatre owners. The police said the threats were ‘credible’ and the theatre owners feared for the safety of their families.

Jiang Rong, a member of Early Rain Church and the wife of Pastor Wang Yi, was released on 10 June after six months in detention.

Pastor Wang and several church members remain in detention. Jiang was released on bail pending trial and has been reunited with her son. The post also reported that another church member was released on bail at the same time.

Seven Protestant denominations in Cuba, including the five largest in terms of membership, joined together to launch a new Cuban Alliance of Evangelical Churches on 11 June in a show of inter-denominational unity.

A statement signed by the leaders of the seven denominations noted that they are motivated to work together in the defence of biblical values. They did not feel represented by the Cuban Council of Churches, which has been seen to work too closely with the government.

On 10 June, a mob of Muslim extremists attacked Christians in the Upper Egyptian village of Ishnin, following the Islamic call to prayer.

The hardliners were responding to leaflets distributed about a Facebook post that offended a local Muslim religious leader. The account had been hacked, but this did not stop the house being attacked by a mob.

Over 30 Pentecostal Christians were reported as arrested at the end of June in northeast Eritrea, whilst they were praying in three separate locations.

50% of Eritrea’s population belongs to the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Eritrea and 48% subscribe to Sunni Islam.

An evangelical church in central Ethiopia was ordered to vacate its building in May, ten years after it started meeting there.

The Mekane Yesus Evangelical Church in Robe, a town in Bale zone, was ordered by the Oromia Regional State Authorities to leave its premises within 30 days. Church meetings with local officials so far have not changed their mind. Complaints had been made about noise, which sources said seemed odd as mosques make more noise, even during the night.

A blind pastor, Balu Saste, his wife, and ten other Christians were found innocent in June of charges of making ‘forced conversions’, brought against them under India’s anti-conversion laws.

The pastor and his wife had been stripped, beaten and detained in jail after a mob stormed a church building in a village in Madhya Pradesh state, beating and harassing worshippers. The mob then threatened to burn down the building with the Christians locked inside. The police charged all those arrested with contravening anti-conversion penal codes.

The Assyrian Presbyterian Church in Tabri, a 100-year-old church and National Heritage site, was shut down suddenly by officials in early May.

The church had previously been allowed to operate and hold services as long as preaching occurred in the Assyrian language. Christians from the Assyrian and Armenian communities are considered by the government to be a recognised minority, and although this church had restrictions placed upon it in 2011, they had still been able to hold services.

Boko Haram warned Christians in south-eastern Niger on 11 June to flee, telling them they had three days to leave or be killed.

The message was delivered by a freed Christian woman who was abducted by the Islamist group on 7 June. Church ministers in Niger who work close to zones of conflict are now taking refuge with other Christians in the relative safety of the capital.

A Muslim mob burned out a church in Maradi city on 15 June. This was in protest over the arrest of an influential imam who later apologised for his incorrect comments criticising a new religious law. It was these comments that sparked the attack.

A total of 178 protesters were arrested during the violent demonstration.

The cleric had been detained in custody after labelling a new government law for religious practice in Niger as ‘anti-Islamic’. The law introduces a formal religious building control process, including a requirement to declare funding sources.

A worshipper who bravely tended to victims of a suicide bomb attack at a Sri Lankan church despite being severely injured himself, died on 4 June after spending 40 days in intensive care.

Arun Prashanth collapsed while helping others in the immediate aftermath of the Islamist terrorist attack on Zion Evangelical Church. Arun, the sole family breadwinner who cared for his widowed mother, was very active in Christian ministry. He was known as someone who was always available to help out anyone in need.

Half of all Americans are church members, down from 70% in 1999, according to a Gallup poll published in June.

While most of the decline is attributable to an increase in the percentage of those with no religion, membership has fallen nine points among those who are religious. Gallup found the percentage of Americans who report belonging to a church, synagogue or mosque at an all-time low.

In mid-June, Rhode Island’s governor signed the Reproductive Privacy Act into law, allowing late-term abortions on unborn babies, including part-birth and dismemberment abortions.

Furthermore, New York looks set to became the first city to pay for abortions through direct funding if the city council approves a $250,000 proposed allocation. Although other cities fund abortion through government-run insurance, it is thought New York would become the first city to set aside money specifically for abortion.