If I asked you to name the most persecuted group in the world, you might answer Uighurs, Blacks, Muslims, gypsies, or most likely Jews. But you would be wrong. The most persecuted group throughout the world are Christians. It hardly seems likely, does it, since we are constantly told us how we evangelical Christian conservatives are “white supremacists” and have always enjoyed “white privilege.” But, of course, the leftists who tell us that are absolutely wrong. Christians, including white evangelical Christians, are the most persecuted group, suffering near genocide in some parts of the world. But let’s step back in history a moment.
The Romans had conquered Israel in 63 BC and declared Herod the King of the puppet state of Israel in 40 BC. Herod the Great was a successful king, but a brutal one, as seen when he ordered the massacre of all young infants in Bethlehem because the Magi had told him the “King of the Jews” had been born there. He walked a tense line between the wishes for independence from his people and the power and protection of Rome. While the Jews were mostly left alone by the Romans in their everyday lives, there were small annoyances. For example, a Roman soldier could accost a passing Jew and order him to carry his cloak for him for a mile, even if it was in the opposite direction that the Jewish man had been headed. By the time of Jesus’ birth, political as well as religious tensions were rising, and indeed the country was in a period of darkness spiritually, as is recorded by Isaiah the prophet in chapter 9, verse 12: “The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light: they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined.”
And indeed, the gospel of Jesus Christ the Messiah was a light in their darkness. Though He was not the radical who would lead an armed revolt to take back the sovereignty of Israel from the Romans, He brought instead a new way of life and the path to Heaven. Jesus said himself, “I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life,” (John 8:12).
Persecution of Christians began the moment the early church began following Jesus’ ascension into Heaven. Both Jewish religious leaders and Romans persecuted Christians, most often executing them. They were forced into secretive lives, using the sign of the fish to identify themselves, meeting in caves, the Catacombs with the bodies of the dead, or in thick stands of trees in the countryside. The New Testament relates the deaths of many of them. In Hebrews 11, the faith chapter, Paul speaks first of all the Old Testament saints who by faith conquered the obstacles that faced them. Then he moves to what was happening in his own time, saying “Others were tortured, not accepting deliverance, that they might obtain a better resurrection. Still others had trial of mockings and scourgings, yes, and of chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, were tempted, were slain with the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented— of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts and mountains, in dens and caves of the earth,” (Hebrews 11:35-38).
Islamic invasions across northern Africa and the Holy Land brought the plunder of churches, the rape of Christian women, the murder of priests, and the destruction of entire villages, eventually spurring Christian Europe to begin the Crusades. The Reformation and the Counter Reformation brought fighting between Protestants and Catholics that endured until the 20th Century in Northern Ireland. During the French Revolution and again in the Russian Revolution, the Church was seen as an instrument of the ruling class which was being overthrown. Priests were killed or forced to preach the gospel of the Revolutionaries. Most Christians worshiped in secret.
Even today, it is Christians and not Jews who are the most persecuted group throughout the world. In fact, despite the persecution of all the centuries since the start of the church, the 20th and 21st centuries have seen an intense increase in persecution. According to ministries such as Open Doors and Voice of Martyrs, more Christians have been killed for their faith than in all of the previous centuries combined. Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Pol Pot, Idi Amin, Mao Zedong, Fidel Castro and others “unleashed untold horrors. In prison cells, gulags, concentration camps, detention centers, torture chambers, reeducation centers, and labor camps, millions were (and still are) sacrificed on the bloodied secular altars of the proletarian utopia,” (Grant, George. A History of Persecution). And who can forget the image of a line of Coptic Christians kneeling by the sea, each with an ISIS Muslim armed with a scimitar ready to chop off their heads.
The rise of these radical jihadists has overturned any stability in the Middle East. “In 2017 a total of 99 Egyptian Christians were killed by extremist groups, with 47 killed on Palm Sunday in Tanta and Alexandria. Egyptian Christians were continuously targeted by extremist groups during 2017 and 2018. Arrest, detention and imprisonment are common in Iran, Egypt and Saudi Arabia,” (Patrick Wintour. The Guardian. UK). In Saudi Arabia, children’s school books teach them to hate Jews and Christians and the media and the government constantly incite hatred and spread propaganda against Christians. The population of Christians in the Middles East and North Africa has decreased from 20% to 2%, some of them fleeing, but many of them being killed. The report which Wintour quotes in The Guardian concludes that “The level and nature of persecution is arguably coming close to meeting the international definition of genocide, according to that adopted by the UN.”
And what of America, the land to which many, persecuted for their religious beliefs in Europe, fled in the 1600s and 1700s to establish a place where freedom of worship was protected? What of this country in which the First Amendment to the Constitution clearly states “ Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech, . . . ?” Alas, like the countries run by Hitler, Stalin, Mao Zedong, and Castro, the free exercise of religion and the freedom of speech are being curtailed. During COVID, churches were ordered to be closed and some pastors arrested for opening anyway. Christian and other conservative voices are routinely removed from YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter. Christians are sneered at. The government has attempted to force bakers and florists to participate in same sex marriages though it is against their religious beliefs. Likewise, Christian organizations and businesses were told they must provide free birth control and the morning after pill to their employees even if it was contrary to their religion.
In 2016, evangelical leaders were asked if they felt they had been persecuted in America. Thirty-two percent said yes. But when asked if they expected to be persecuted in the future, an alarming 76% agreed that would happen. Still, the persecution they expect is mostly what they would refer to as “soft persecution:” lawsuits, censoring, vile emails, and other social, financial, and political pressure. As of yet, they expect nothing like what is happening in other countries. Still, there have been church shootings, such as the one at the West Freeway Church of Christ in a Fort Worth, Texas suburb. But most church shootings so far seem to be motivated by personal grudges toward individuals in the congregation and not against Christians as a whole.
There is no doubt that under the Obama administration and the current one our freedom to exercise our religious beliefs has at times been hampered, yet we are not fired from our jobs, arrested, forced into concentration-type camps, or executed for our faith. If we grow weary of the verbal jabs we are dealt from those who do not believe in God, we must remember these words of Jesus: “If the world hates you, you know that it hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.” (John 15:18-19).
We Christians are strong in Christ. We must continue to stand up for our faith while remembering in prayer those whose persecution is far worse than we can imagine. And in this Christmas season, perhaps above any other time of year, we should persevere. Remember, we celebrate the Light that shines in the darkness of this increasingly secular world. And that Light, Jesus, will love us, sustain us through any persecution, and reward us with eternal life with Him.
So, don’t become discouraged. Rather remember the words of Jesus: “I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life,”