ICC Note:
Pope Francis’ upcoming trip to Jordan, Palestine and Israel to mark the 50th anniversary a 1964 visit to the Holy Land by Pope Paul VI, has cast a spotlight on what Boston Globe reporter John Allen has called, “The Global War on Christians.” Touring the sites of increasing persecution against the region’s now-dwindling Christian populations with Rabbi Abraham Skorka, Francis’ co-author for ‘On Heaven and Earth,’ and Sheikh Omar Abboud, the Pope intends to make history traveling with the first interfaith Papal entourage in history. Grave concerns regarding the plight of Christians at the hands of radical Islamist groups, Zionist extremists, and a region increasingly destabilized by ongoing civil war in bordering Syria.
05/23/2014 Vatican (TIME) – As Pope Francis heads to the Holy Land this weekend to mark the fiftieth anniversary of Paul VI’s historic 1964 trip, he does so amidst increasing violence against the dwindling Christian population in the region.
There are even growing concerns for the pope’s safety himself after news emerged earlier this month that Jewish extremists graffitied Vatican-owned property with vitriolic taunts, including “Death to Arabs and Christians and all those who hate Israel!”
It’s clear that Francis’s trip offers a chance to lift up the realities of persecution and violence against Christians in the region. But it also provides the world an opportunity to more fully grasp what Boston Globe religion reporter John Allen calls the “global war on Christians.”
It seems that popular culture in the West is only nominally aware of this global epidemic. According to the Vatican, over 100,000 Christians are murdered by some relation to their faith every year. And just last week, a Sudanese woman was sentenced to death for marrying a Christian.
To be fair, Western media does cover these individual events, particularly if a large number of people are killed. But they have yet to cover in depth the generalized mayhem and violence against the Christian people globally. The violence goes beyond the Middle East. Christian persecution is just as prominent in India, Indonesia and Kenya among other nations. It’s hard to imagine how we can be so silent and indifferent in the face of such global violence against vulnerable populations.
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