My brethren in Christ living in Britain are facing lots of persecution in their country. It's only a matter of time before it starts to get violent and they feel the same sort of violent persecution that our brethren in Christ Jesus face in places like China, Nigeria, Iraq, Egypt and Pakistan. This saddens and frightens me to some degree, but at the same time I'm glad that my British brothers and sisters in Christ get to suffer for the sake of the risen Lord.
10/21/2011 UK (Mail Online)-I am very much looking forward to tomorrow’s speech by Ann Widdecombe in which she will criticise our government for its double standards in withdrawing aid from countries which persecute homosexuals while at the same time turning a blind eye to those realms around the world which persecute Christians.
Ms Widdecombe says, 'You have a better chance of earnest representation if you are a hedgehog than if you are a persecuted Christian.'
I am too old and cynical to expect anything better of governments, of whatever hue. But you might think that the leaders of the Church of England would protest more strongly against the persecution of Christians abroad and over here. Recently a seventy-five year old woman in Saudi Arabia was given forty lashes for socializing with her men friends. Christianity is illegal in Saudi – one of our most important middle-eastern allies with whom we do massive trade in weaponry. If you are caught in that country with a Bible, or with the Cross around your neck, you will be arrested by the religious police and thrown into prison.
In Pakistan, a thirteen year old girl was taunted for being a Christian by five Muslim youths who then raped her. The rapists were not charged.Churches are burned down every week in Pakistan. A man is on trial for his life in Egypt for converting to our faith. In China a house church pastor has been slung into prison for utilising superstition to undermine the law.
There have been ancient and established Christian churches in the Middle East since the time of St Paul. Now these arebreaking up as never before in 2000 years as hordes of Christians try to leave to escape persecution. In the face of endemic violence from the radical Islamists, the archbishops and bishops have set up an impotent, everlasting talking shop to promote Christian-Muslim dialogue and they issue vacuous communiqués from time to time.
Ah but surely all the atrocities are taking place in far off countries of which we know little? Not at all. Let’s come a bit nearer home:
In England a Muslim girl who converted to Christianity from Islam has been removed from the home of her carer after she chose to be baptised. She was placed in a foster home because her father beat her and threatened to send her to Pakistan for a forced marriage. Her carer, who has fostered more than eighty children, did nothing to encourage her to convert
Also in England, three CopticChristian children have been placed by social services with a Muslim foster family after their parents divorced. They were originally placed in the custody of the city mosque. The authority has refused to return the children to the custody of the Coptic Church.
And so on. The nurse who offered prayer to a patient, as part of her ministry to body and soul, is sacked. The airline worker who wears a discreet Cross is sacked also. A child was reprimanded for discussing God at junior school. Public libraries have been instructed to place Bibles on the highest shelf – as if they were some sort of pornography likely to deprave and corrupt.
In the face of all these terrible persecutions, it is easy to be seduced by the arguments of those who tell us there is a clash of civilisations between the Christian West and Islam. This is not true. Most practising Muslims desire only to say their prayers and go to the mosque and to have good relations with their neighbours of whatever faith or none. I have not come across many Muslims who object to Christmas decorations or the wearing of the Cross or the public exhibition of the Bible.
The truth is more sinister. We are dominated by a secular elite which hates Islam every bit as much it hates Christianity. This elite of atheists and metro-political despisers is also a cowardly elite and dare not attack Islam for fear of getting its corporate throat slit. But it finds it useful to invoke an allegedly outraged Islamic sensitivity in order to persecute the Christian faith.
This secular elite – the Dawkins, Pullmans, Toynbees, Graylings and the BBC entire, targets Christianity because it sees Christianity as the embodiment of those historic and traditional values which, until the contemporary reversal, made this country a place worth living in.
...
Why is the Church of England’s hierarchy not out on the streets protesting about the persecution of Christians? Because, shocking as it sounds, many of its members are effectively non-believers who reject the traditional teachings of the church – the Virgin Birth, the Resurrection and Ascension of Our Lord – and reinterpret them in secular categories as mere metaphors for social involvement. Their ideal image of Jesus Christ is that of a social worker and preacher of the multicultural society. What was it Muggeridge said of the “liberal” Christian view of Christ – that they regarded him as the Labour member for Galilee South...
...
The law of the land says we must not discriminate – except in favour of secularism. Did you know it is an offence to teach Christianity in schools as something that is true – though the 1944 Butler Education Act assumed it is true? Christianity now must be taught only as one among many religions. The only way this can be done is from the secular perspective. This is atheism by state decree.
Christianity in Britain today is under severe persecution. And it will get much worse. I do not resent this persecution. I welcome it. For it will weed out the pseudo-Christians, the wimpish bishops and the caved-in Synod. By persecution we discover who our true friends actually are.
Persecution? Bring it on, I say. We will stand for what is good and right as Christian men knowing whose subjects we are. And if there should come the day when we are murdered by the unholy alliance between the Islamist terrorist and the secular commissar, then so be it. For 'the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.'
What I am saying in today’s piece is no mere airing of my personal prejudices. I am only quoting what I have read. And this is what I have read:
'They shall deliver you up to be afflicted and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated for my name’s sake…rejoice and be exceeding glad, for so persecuted they the prophets that were before you(Source).'
And we as American Christians ought to take notice of what's happening to our British brethren in Christ Jesus. Because we could be next.
10/21/2011 UK (Mail Online)-I am very much looking forward to tomorrow’s speech by Ann Widdecombe in which she will criticise our government for its double standards in withdrawing aid from countries which persecute homosexuals while at the same time turning a blind eye to those realms around the world which persecute Christians.
Ms Widdecombe says, 'You have a better chance of earnest representation if you are a hedgehog than if you are a persecuted Christian.'
I am too old and cynical to expect anything better of governments, of whatever hue. But you might think that the leaders of the Church of England would protest more strongly against the persecution of Christians abroad and over here. Recently a seventy-five year old woman in Saudi Arabia was given forty lashes for socializing with her men friends. Christianity is illegal in Saudi – one of our most important middle-eastern allies with whom we do massive trade in weaponry. If you are caught in that country with a Bible, or with the Cross around your neck, you will be arrested by the religious police and thrown into prison.
In Pakistan, a thirteen year old girl was taunted for being a Christian by five Muslim youths who then raped her. The rapists were not charged.Churches are burned down every week in Pakistan. A man is on trial for his life in Egypt for converting to our faith. In China a house church pastor has been slung into prison for utilising superstition to undermine the law.
There have been ancient and established Christian churches in the Middle East since the time of St Paul. Now these are
Ah but surely all the atrocities are taking place in far off countries of which we know little? Not at all. Let’s come a bit nearer home:
In England a Muslim girl who converted to Christianity from Islam has been removed from the home of her carer after she chose to be baptised. She was placed in a foster home because her father beat her and threatened to send her to Pakistan for a forced marriage. Her carer, who has fostered more than eighty children, did nothing to encourage her to convert
Also in England, three Coptic
And so on. The nurse who offered prayer to a patient, as part of her ministry to body and soul, is sacked. The airline worker who wears a discreet Cross is sacked also. A child was reprimanded for discussing God at junior school. Public libraries have been instructed to place Bibles on the highest shelf – as if they were some sort of pornography likely to deprave and corrupt.
In the face of all these terrible persecutions, it is easy to be seduced by the arguments of those who tell us there is a clash of civilisations between the Christian West and Islam. This is not true. Most practising Muslims desire only to say their prayers and go to the mosque and to have good relations with their neighbours of whatever faith or none. I have not come across many Muslims who object to Christmas decorations or the wearing of the Cross or the public exhibition of the Bible.
The truth is more sinister. We are dominated by a secular elite which hates Islam every bit as much it hates Christianity. This elite of atheists and metro-political despisers is also a cowardly elite and dare not attack Islam for fear of getting its corporate throat slit. But it finds it useful to invoke an allegedly outraged Islamic sensitivity in order to persecute the Christian faith.
This secular elite – the Dawkins, Pullmans, Toynbees, Graylings and the BBC entire, targets Christianity because it sees Christianity as the embodiment of those historic and traditional values which, until the contemporary reversal, made this country a place worth living in.
...
Why is the Church of England’s hierarchy not out on the streets protesting about the persecution of Christians? Because, shocking as it sounds, many of its members are effectively non-believers who reject the traditional teachings of the church – the Virgin Birth, the Resurrection and Ascension of Our Lord – and reinterpret them in secular categories as mere metaphors for social involvement. Their ideal image of Jesus Christ is that of a social worker and preacher of the multicultural society. What was it Muggeridge said of the “liberal” Christian view of Christ – that they regarded him as the Labour member for Galilee South...
...
The law of the land says we must not discriminate – except in favour of secularism. Did you know it is an offence to teach Christianity in schools as something that is true – though the 1944 Butler Education Act assumed it is true? Christianity now must be taught only as one among many religions. The only way this can be done is from the secular perspective. This is atheism by state decree.
Christianity in Britain today is under severe persecution. And it will get much worse. I do not resent this persecution. I welcome it. For it will weed out the pseudo-Christians, the wimpish bishops and the caved-in Synod. By persecution we discover who our true friends actually are.
Persecution? Bring it on, I say. We will stand for what is good and right as Christian men knowing whose subjects we are. And if there should come the day when we are murdered by the unholy alliance between the Islamist terrorist and the secular commissar, then so be it. For 'the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.'
What I am saying in today’s piece is no mere airing of my personal prejudices. I am only quoting what I have read. And this is what I have read:
'They shall deliver you up to be afflicted and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated for my name’s sake…rejoice and be exceeding glad, for so persecuted they the prophets that were before you(Source).'
And we as American Christians ought to take notice of what's happening to our British brethren in Christ Jesus. Because we could be next.
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