johannesburg — Sources say Christianity is in a deadly crisis in more than half of Africa’s 54 countries. Christian groups contacted by Fox News Digital said their members are being persecuted, killed and expelled in 28 countries on the continent.
The situation in Nigeria is the worst. Mission organization Open Doors US told FOX News Digital that 9 out of 10 Christians killed for their faith in 2023 were in Nigeria. The number is likely to be even higher,” the study said.
“Nigeria is one of the most dangerous places on earth to be a Christian,” Open Doors US CEO Ryan Braun told FOX News Digital. “Of the approximately 5,000 Christians murdered for their faith around the world in 2023, a whopping 82% were in Nigeria.”
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Families gather to bury their loved ones killed by militants in Mayanga village in Nigeria’s central Plateau state on December 27, 2023. (Kim Masala/AFPTV/AFP via Getty Images)
Nigerian research groups InterSociety, International Civil Liberties Union and the Rule of Law call the killing of Christians in Nigeria a genocide and put the death toll even higher, at more than 8,000 between January 2023 and the end of January 2024. of Nigerian Christians have been killed or kidnapped. Most of them were reportedly brutally murdered with knives. According to InterSociety, more than 18,500 Christian places of worship were destroyed across Nigeria between 2009 and 2023.
And the genocide continues, Intersociety’s Emeka Umeagbalasi told FOX News Digital.
“An estimated 500 to 600 Christians are believed to have been hacked to death in Nigeria from January to the first week of April 2024, claiming to be Christians,” Umeagbarasi said. “They are being killed, raped, expelled, their homes and sometimes churches set on fire, and in some cases forced to publicly convert to Islam while enduring the throes of death.”
“The rise of Islamic extremism in Africa has clearly increased the targeting and persecution of Christians,” Todd Nettleton, host of the Voices of Martyrs radio network, told FOX News Digital. He said these attacks ranged from “well-known groups such as Nigeria’s Boko Haram and Somalia’s al-Shabaab to lesser-known but equally violent groups such as northern Mozambique and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. ” he added. .
Pastor Zakaria survived one of the many recent attacks. He lives in a village near Mangu town in Plateau State (Middle Belt of Nigeria). In May 2023, there was a wave of attacks by Fulani militants in the area. (Open Door USA)
“Currently, Open Doors’ US 2024 World Watch List lists 28 countries on the African continent, countries where Christians routinely face repression, harassment, and violence because of their faith in Christ. is.”
Despite an estimated 46% of the population being Christian, Nigerian Christians are also often uprooted from their homes, and Open Doors US’s Brown says, “Political instability, conflict and Of the 34.5 million people displaced by extremism, an estimated 16.2 million are Christians.
Brown added: “Fulani extremist (Islamist) herdsmen want to claim land in central Nigeria, where the best grazing land is located, and they attack Christian villages, kidnap residents and destroy their homes. They are burning down land, destroying crops and claiming their land.” . ”
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Al-Shabaab fighters conduct military exercises in the Sukaholaha area of Mogadishu, northern Somalia, on September 5, 2010. (AP Photo/Farah Abdi Warsame, File)
Persecution in Nigeria is not new. Boko Haram Islamic extremists kidnapped Maryam Joseph when she was just 7 years old. Nine years later, she managed to escape and said, “I suffered so much at the hands of these heartless, merciless people. They caged Christians like animals.” They changed my name to Aisha, which is a Muslim name, and warned me not to pray as a Christian or they would kill me.”
Emmanuel Joseph, a Catholic teacher, witnessed the recent attacks on Catholic and Baptist churches in Lubu, Kaduna State, Nigeria.
“Mass had just started when we heard the gunshots. Parishioners started running everywhere,” Joseph said. “They invaded the church grounds and shot and killed three members who had left the church. They also attacked a local Baptist church and abducted 36 members, mostly women, including one man. We are alive and looking to God for safety, trusting that He will fight back for us. All we think about is how to stay.” ”
Matthew Manwoso Ndagoso, the archbishop of Nigeria’s Kaduna state, claimed that “religious persecution in the north is systematic,” adding, “I cannot build a church, but the government is hiring imams to teach in schools. They’re hiring, they’re paying salaries. They have the money to build every year.” The mosque is within the budget, but the construction of a church is not allowed. ”
A boy sells pious items during a pilgrimage to Yagum, outside Ouagadougou, on February 5, 2023. (Olympia de Mesmont/AFP via Getty Images)
Reports of persecution continue to pour in from the Sahel region, including Chad, Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso. Bishop Justin Quientega of the latter country told ACN that parts of his diocese have become no-go areas as jihadists work to impose a radical form of Islam on the population. .
“The terrorists gathered people together and told them not to go to school,” he said. “They teach men to grow beards and women to wear the Islamic veil.”
Persecution of Christians is on the rise in Sudan, Open Doors US’s Brown said.
“165 churches were closed,” Brown said. “Some have been attacked and destroyed. In Sudan and many other places, those opposed to the Christian faith are taking advantage of this unstable situation to violently attack our brothers and sisters. As we pray for an end to the violence, we remember these brave men and women and pray for their protection as they continue to risk so much.”
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On December 15, 2023, a Sudanese man walks through the courtyard of a church in the former Umm Ghurja refugee camp in Gedaref province, eastern Sudan. (Ebrahim Hamid/AFP via Getty Images)
About 8.2 million people have been displaced by Sudan’s year-long civil war, according to figures released this month by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. But Christians are a minority here, at an estimated 5% of the population.
Sudanese researcher Eric Reeves told FOX News Digital that it’s hard to argue that church burnings are a special attack on Christians when, for example, so many buildings of all types are bombed in Sudan. He said it was difficult.
“There is certainly a fundamental aversion to the presence of Christians in Sudan dating back to Bashir’s regime and even longer, leading to the confiscation of church property and various forms of curtailment of Christian activities. However, the current situation is too chaotic to generalize.”
Christians are also being targeted in Mozambique. According to ACN, missionaries, priests, and Christians in general had to be evacuated from the northern region of Cabo Delgado.
According to ACN, “Islamist militant activity has intensified in the region, creating an atmosphere of fear and insecurity.”
UNHCR says more than 1 million people have been displaced since fighting began in 2017.
A photo taken on June 27, 2021 with a mobile phone shows the scene of a Catholic church after an explosion in Beni city, North Kivu province, Democratic Republic of the Congo. (Alan Uyakani/Xinhua via Getty Images)
So far this year, there have been reports of attacks, destruction and burning of houses of worship by Islamic State-affiliated groups in at least 12 communities in Mozambique.
“Our people carry only what they can on their heads or on their family’s bicycles,” Bishop Antonio Juliasse of Pemba in northern Mozambique told ACN. “Their biggest risk is becoming a forgotten face of other wars around the world.”
A State Department spokesperson told Fox News Digital that officials are “deeply concerned about the increasing level of persecution around the world, including of Christians. “We note with grave concern that reports are increasing and becoming more widespread. No one should ever do this.” You have to worry about your personal safety and the safety of your religious facility.
“Members of, or those wishing to join, Christian communities face restrictions on their right to freedom of religion or belief in all parts of the world, including in Africa, and are subject to repeated terrorist attacks by mobs and violent extremists. and are the targets of violent attacks.
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State officials walk past a wounded man being treated for wounds in a hospital bed after an attack by gunmen at St. Francis Catholic Church in Owo Town, southwestern Nigeria, June 5, 2022. (AFP via Getty Images)
“The State Department regularly engages with all levels of government to advocate for improvements in religious freedom, including ending violations affecting Christians. We regularly discuss these issues. The U.S. government and the Office for International Religious Freedom are using this as a springboard for advocacy efforts throughout the year and beyond. .”
Todd Nettleton of Voice of the Martyrs told Fox News Digital he wants more action.
“It is important for our government and other governments of the free world to identify and condemn those who attack and persecute religious minorities, whether governments or terrorist groups,” Nettleton said. “The State Department annually publishes a list of countries of particular concern, which is a start, but we hope to do more to highlight the suffering of religious minorities facing violent attacks in Africa and elsewhere. There must be something that can be done.”
A Boko Haram flag flies at an abandoned command post in Gambar, which has been deserted since Chadian forces drove it from the border town on February 4, 2015. (Stefan Yass/AFP via Getty Images)
“Religious freedom is often referred to as the “first freedom,” so it is important that our government and It should be an important element in interactions.”
“The U.S. government should insist that the Nigerian government end impunity,” Open Doors US’s Brown told FOX News Digital. “For too long, groups such as extremists and Fulani militants have carried out violence against Christians and various ethnic groups with impunity. We call on the Nigerian government to “We need to take a strong stance against those who are victims of violence and urge them to break the growing cycle of violence.” across sub-Saharan Africa.
“We need the U.S. government to take a strong and vocal stance against these attacks and the anxiety they create.”
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People are evacuated after an attack by armed groups in Bokkos, north-central Nigeria. (AP)
Burkina Faso’s Bishop Quientega said Christians were prepared to die for their faith in Islam rather than being forced to do so.
“Many of them accept the possibility of death,” Kientega said. “They refuse to remove the cross and refuse to convert. They always find other ways to live and pray their faith.”
Fox News Digital reached out to the Nigerian President’s Office, the Nigerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the U.S. Embassy in Nigeria, and the Nigeria Police Force for comment, but did not receive a response.
