Perceptions of Religion and Politics!

It's not often that I feel I have to stand on a podium in a secular enviroment, complete with
megaphone and declare in ringing tones, "I am an unashamed evangelical Christian and I feel a
little bit persecuted here!", the latter part of the sentence being, of course, because I am
English and I am therefore a bit nervous about mentioning that I feel. But Sir Elton John's comments the other week did make me feel, well not so much persecuted, but rather annoyed (and that's because his comments on religion seemed contradictory and generalised. Just as it is wrong to generalise gays, I think it is wrong to generalise Christians).
The persecuted bit is because it is another sign that I feel that if I and others of my ilk declare that we are Christians, there is the fear that this simple statement will translate in some people's minds as, "I am a bigot, a fascist, and I will treat you as evangelism fodder and proceed to spout Biblical chapter and verse at every given opportunity!".
Strange as it may seem, most of us are normal human beings. We sleep, we wake, we sometimes swear (well, some of us), support a football team with almost slavish devotion, enjoy having sex (well, apart from those of us who are celibate for one reason or another obviously!), and those of us who are conservative minded when it comes to morals (and most of us are different), a lot of us do happily vote Labour in the UK, Democrat in the US, Socialist in France etc.. Plus some of us have a suspicion that, when it comes to democracy, God is not politically partisan!
Not all of us are swift to condemn, not all of us refuse to accept people as they are. For
example, I am not impressed by promiscuity, but, being human, I understand it and refuse to sit in judgment and finger point at those who are! And to break stereotypes even further, two
friends of mine are a lesbian couple who are devout, and one of whom thinks that my sense of
humour is a bit too liberal for her liking!
Put simply, evangelical and conservative Christians are varied, just like everyone else. What
unites us is that we believe, are unashamed to believe, and happily share what we believe for
the simple reason that we believe that Christ died for our sins and rose again! And why do I
write all this and feel embarrassed to do so? Well, it is simply because I am a tad tired at
all the sweeping statements that get made about Christians, especially those who are Catholic
and those who are Evangelical, or even both! Strange as it may seem, fundamentalists
like Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, and Richard Dawkins ( ;) ). get up our nostrils as well. But then it's okay for the rest of you, we have to forgive them, not least because we are called to, and not least because we all need forgiving!

Paul Burgin (CPF Co'ordinator)

Christians in Iraq

"20 YEARS…MORE CHRISTIANS IN IRAQ"

These were the words that I could barely make out from the headline in the Guardian newspaper a woman was reading on the London Underground recently.
I could just about make out these words, through a sea of bodies in a packed train carriage, and I was intrigued to see the article.
So I bought a copy of the paper assuming that the article would be about the increase of
Christians in Iraq since coalition forces entered the country – thinking there would be
increasing routes for Christian groups to enter Iraq, offer assistance, and impact local
communities.
I couldn’t have been more wrong. When I opened the paper and read the headline clearly, I
noticed it actually read, "In 20 years, there will be no more Christians in Iraq". The quote
came from the new Iraqi minister for human rights, who is a Christian.
I read that on January 29 this year, following demonstrations by Muslims around the world in
response to the Danish cartoons, bomb attacks devastated seven churches in Baghdad, Mosul, and Kirkuk, killing 16. The article stated that, according to the UN High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), "although Christians made up less than four per cent of the [Iraqi] population – fewer than one million people – they formed the largest group of new refugees arriving in Jordan’s capital Amman in the first quarter of 2006". Also, UNHCR said that in Syria "44% of Iraqi asylum seekers were recorded as Christians" since they began registrations in December 2003, and, according to the Catholic Bishop of Baghdad, half of all Iraqi Christians have fled Iraq since the 2003 US-led invasion.
The Christian community in Iraq is facing killings, kidnappings and death threats, on a daily
basis, as they have been associated with the coalition forces or supporting the west.
The article concluded that "now Iraqi Christian leaders are bitter that the west has done so
little to protect them", and that this could have a detrimental effect on the future of the
Christian community in Iraq.
Recently, the Barnabas Fund reported that in Iraq during September 2006 there was a car bomb attack on a cathedral, killing 2 and injuring at least 17; two attacks on a church in Mosul, including a rocket attack; and a bomb attack outside a church in Basra. Although these attacks may be related to the now infamous Pope’s speech, it still demonstrates the devastating problems the Christian community face in Iraq. Of course, currently in Iraq such attacks affect the whole community, not just Christians, but these examples show that there are continued attempts to target Christian communities and places of worship in Iraq.

Aidan Liriano (CPF Co'ordinator)