These articles were first published in our October edition of the newspaper, click here for more.
The Dutch Parliament is debating a new draft transgender law which would allow anyone over 16 to change the gender on their birth certificates via a civil officer – without a statement from a physician or psychologist, as is now the case.
The court would decide cases involving children aged under 16, where the opinions of their parents/guardians about the change would not be decisive.
A 28-year-old Christian has been killed in a machete attack. Samaila Sabo Awudu was in Yola, in northeast Nigeria, as part of his National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) duty. He was assaulted in his bedroom by at least five men with machetes at about 1.30a.m.
University graduates in Nigeria must do one year of national development service with the NYSC. Awudu was serving at the Elkanemi College of Islamic Theology in Yola. The killers somehow barred the doors of the other corps members before assaulting Aduwu and leaving him for dead.
A Christian father and son have been killed by Islamic State terrorists near the town of Al-Qantara East, Egypt.
Salama Waheeb Moussa and his son Hani Waheeb Moussa were shot dead, seemingly at random, while working on their family farm. Their bodies were discovered by police after their family lost contact with them. Hani leaves behind a wife and two young daughters. IS has increased its operations in Northern Sinai recently as the Egyptian army has sought to combat it, with many operatives moving into cities on the west side of the Suez Canal to escape the military offensive.
More intense restrictions are being placed on churches’ online ministries as China’s new internet religious regulations are implemented. Now, only religious groups with government approval are permitted to share information on the internet.
Both registered churches and house churches in China have encountered varying levels of suppression. As a result, a church in Henan Province told its congregation to drop out of group chats and not send any religious messages on WeChat, China’s popular social media platform and a church in Fujian Province has shrunk its digital ministries.
Two Christians accused of blasphemy, including one who has spent four years in jail, have now been granted bail by the Supreme Court of Pakistan.
Patras Masih and Raja Waris walked free as lawyers demanded an end to the misuse of Pakistan’s controversial blasphemy laws. ‘Granting bails is not the solution’, said Minorities Alliance Pakistan President Akmal Bhatti. ‘The blasphemy laws are being used as a weapon to target minorities and to settle personal enmities, and it’s about time the government puts an end to it.’
The Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C., has returned a 1,000-year-old handwritten Gospel manuscript – looted from a monastery by Bulgarian troops in 1917 – to the Greek Orthodox Church.
The manuscript, one of the world’s oldest hand-lettered Gospels, was stolen from the Kosinitza Monastery during World War I. The museum bought it at a Christie’s auction in 2011. A formal return ceremony has taken place at the monastery, which is in northern Greece.
The Hanoi High People’s Court has upheld a nine-year prison sentence against Vietnamese freedom of religion or belief (FoRB) activist and journalist Pham Doan Trang.
Her family and foreign diplomats were barred from the courtroom. She pleaded not guilty, against her lawyers’ advice that a guilty plea was more likely to shorten her sentence. Trang was first arrested in 2020 and was not permitted to meet her lawyer for over a year. She was convicted of anti-State propaganda after a one-day trial.
Islamist militants have beheaded two Christian men during an attack on a minibus in Macomia district, Cabo Delgado, northern Mozambique.
A statement by IS-Mozambique declared: ‘By the grace of God Almighty, the soldiers of the Caliphate … killed two Christians, beheading them, and shooting them with weapons.’ Cabo Delgado is now called ‘the Land of Fear’, because of the brutal violence meted out against Christians and moderate Muslims. Mozambican and allied forces had started to drive the Islamists back in late 2021, but the insurgency now appears to be spreading.
A Christian evangelist has been burnt to death by his own family, in the Bankura district of West Bengal.
The victim, known as Madhavan, was the sole convert to Christianity in his extended family. When he visited his family for a wedding, his children destroyed his Bible and verbally harassed him. His family also pressured him to renounce his faith, but he refused. Subsequently, his wife and son entered the church and beat him badly. He was then dragged into a nearby forest where petrol was poured over him and he was burnt alive.
At least 17 Christians in the Boga area of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) have been killed in a series of attacks by the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), a militant group affiliated to Islamic State.
Two Anglican ministers were killed in the first attack. Then two church buildings were set alight, killing at least seven churchgoers, followed by three further atrocities. Further attacks took place on 27 & 29 July and 1 August. Local Anglican minister the Reverend Besisa Birahure said ‘As things become harder, may God sustain us to stand firm.’
Under the theme ‘100 years following Jesus’, more than 1,200 Baptists from all over Spain participated in a special convention organised by the Evangelical Baptist Union of Spain to mark its centenary.
The Union is keen to plant new churches in 15 cities where there is still no Baptist presence by 2030, a vision underpinned by the signing of the ‘Baptist Covenant’, which commits Baptist churches to spread the gospel across Spain.
The Pentecostal Christian Church of Cuba has resigned from the Cuban Council of Churches (CIC).
The CIC is an ecumenical platform controlled by the Communist Party. It controls all official religious activity, silencing free evangelical churches that do not adhere to it. The move means that not only will Pentecostals lose their legal protection, they will also face the hostility of the dictatorial regime. One pastor said: ‘Other denominations look set to announce their withdrawals shortly. These are all brave decisions.’