These articles were first published in our April edition of the newspaper, click here for more.
The Christian parents of a ten-year-old girl in Pakistan who was abducted and forcibly converted to Islam fear she could be sold to sex traffickers.
Laiba Suhail was abducted from her home in Chak 233-RB Ikhlaq Town, Faisalabad District, Punjab Province at the behest of a Muslim, Shaukat Shah. But the authorities have refused to prosecute, said her father, Suhail Masih.
Female prisoners have been subjected to inhumane treatment after praying out loud in the Women’s Holistic Penitentiary System, in Tipitapa, Nicaragua.
The women are now denied time outdoors, as punishment. Previously they were allowed out once a week. Some have also been beaten during interrogations, leaving bruising on their arms and legs. They are not allowed to have a Bible, in violation of the Nelson Mandela Rules (the United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners).
France is the first country to explicitly include the ‘right’ to abortion in its Constitution.
The French parliament officially adopted the reform proposed by President Macron’s government. It has been hailed as the freedom guaranteed to women to have recourse to abortion, but many Christians claim it is nothing but the freedom for women to kill their unborn child, calling it a new advance in the ‘culture of death’.
And a record number of abortions (over 10,000) were performed in Ireland in 2023, an increase of more than 20% over 2022.
Barcelona’s New Evangelical Hospital has been completed after two and a half years construction work.
The project began in 2016, when the city authorities decided to move the hospital from the centre, where it had been for nearly 145 years, to the Sant Martí district. This will ‘seek the welfare of the city’ by expanding social and healthcare coverage in that growing district.
Nearly half of New Zealand’s 14 Manna Christian bookstores are shutting, prompting concerns over the loss of access to Christian resources and the rise of misinformation in an increasingly digital age.
The decision was taken by owners Bible Society New Zealand. The financial challenges it faced have been exacerbated by the current economic climate, so it was deemed necessary to consolidate operations, leaving several communities without a local Christian bookstore.
The bell has chimed at a new church near Iraq’s ancient city of Ur, an initiative seeking to attract pilgrims to a country with one of the world’s oldest Christian communities.
The church is part of a complex near the pyramid-shaped Ziggurat of Ur, the birthplace of Abraham. Iraq’s Christian community once numbered around 1.5 million, but has shrunk to the low hundreds of thousands since 2003.
Christians in Burkina Faso, under threat from jihadists, are not afraid to die for their faith. Bishop Justin Kientega of Ouahigouya Diocese, in the north-east of the country, spoke out after the brutal killing of 12 worshippers during a prayer service.
He said this was just one of many incidents of terrorism that have led to the displacement of more than 2 million people. But despite the difficulties and persecution, Christians have defied terrorists’ demands to embrace Islam.
The Greek Orthodox Church regional body of Corfu has banned two local politicians after they supported legalising same-sex marriage, calling their decision ‘the deepest spiritual and moral error’.
The Bishopric said: ‘They cannot consider themselves active members of the Church. We exhort them to repent for their impropriety.’
Officials at Liberty University say they are seeking to comply with the regulations following the school’s unprecedented settlement with the federal government.
The flagship evangelical university in Lynchburg, Virginia, will pay $14 million to the US Department of Education for violating the Clery Act, a federal law. It requires institutions to report campus crime data, support victims of violence, and publicly outline policies and procedures which improve campus safety.
A church in the southern Indian state of Telangana was attacked by 200 people, and 22 Christians – including two children – were injured.
A police inspector said the dispute was over road widening, which was demanded by villagers, but members of the church had protested, saying it was encroaching on their land. He said: ‘A large mob barged into the church and started to attack the 30-strong congregation with stones and broke the church doors.’
Religious freedom watchdog Christian Solidarity Worldwide has released its latest report on violations of freedom of religion or belief in Cuba. There were 622 documented incidents in 2023, more than double the number in 2021.
Unregistered religious groups, in particular, faced harassment, threats and discrimination by government officials, including demotions and termination of employment. Children from Protestant Christian backgrounds have endured verbal, psychological, and physical abuse in school for refusing to join in pro-government activities contrary to their beliefs.
Iain Taylor