Shaun Groves
You’ve heard of the persecuted church but what about the persecuting church? Me neither, until I traveled to Ecuador several years ago.
There I worked with a church – laying brick to build a school – who had lost a pastor not long before we arrived. He was burned alive by Catholics angered that the evangelical church had moved in across the street.
In El Salvador we heard similar stories of churches persecuting other churches.
In Ethiopia it was the Orthodox Church beating and killing Christians.
All in the name of Jesus and for the protection of the one true version of the one true faith.
Now, it’s Nigeria, where child “witches” are killed at the order of evangelical pastors.
My questions are these: Can we Christians in the West exert any pressure or influence on the Church throughout the world to stop this? Can Catholics in America flex, somehow, the muscle of their Church against Catholics killing evangelicals in South America? Can Orthodox Americans take some kind of action that could spare fellow Christians of another stripe in Ethiopia? Can evangelicals in America do anything to save the lives of children accused of witchcraft in Nigeria? What can be done to stop the persecuting church? Any ideas?
The Bargain Shopper Lady says:
That is so sad. We can pray.
rich says:
this is nothing new and has been going on at least since the reformation. see calvin, luther, etc. it’s the dirty little secret of the reformation that most don’t know or talk about…
we do it to each other here in the US too, we just commit murder in our hearts.
Amy says:
Good questions. What can we do? I agree with Bargain Shopper Lady that the biggest thing we can do is pray. I don’t how we’d intervene……anyone else?
Jared says:
In the gallery in the link you provided, there is mention of an organization working in Nigeria against these atrocities. The link is http://www.steppingstonesnigeria.org
In addition to prayer, I do see that their website gives instructions on how to donate to their cause.
mamasboy says:
In order for these things to stop, there must be dialogue and mutual respect. Also, if people outside the situation are to influence people within their respective groups to repent, those people in the outside world need to be informed. It is important, though, to establish the mutual respect first, so that accusations brought against people in a far off land are listened to and not perceived as probable misrepresentations about a given community.
The one thing that I noticed about the situations listed above is that A) They typically involve a group that has power persecuting a minority and B) Protestants are always involved. One doesn’t hear about Catholic on Orthodox or Orthodox on Catholic violence. I think that is because Catholics and Orthodox have made great strides in dialoguing with each other in an attitude of mutual respect. There may be tense disputes about stolen property in Russia during the Communist era or Lithuanian Catholics rebuilding churches and attracting numerous Orthodox converts, however they still talk and pray together and it helps to remind people that they are brothers and sisters in Christ who should act like it. Catholics are a minority in Ethiopia. Why is there only Orthodox on Evangelical violence?
If Evangelicals want this to stop, they should gather and approach the Catholic/Orthodox churches and ask why it is happening. Send a delegation or something. Perhaps an ecumenical group could be put together to publicize this and approach the Catholic/Orthodox bishops about trying to do something about the situation. Frankly, I doubt that Catholics in the US are informed about this. Regarding influencing Protestants, good luck. I’ve no idea how to do that.
Back when I was a Protestant, I brought a Catholic friend of mine to meet Richard Bennet.
http://www.bereanbeacon.org/
He was a former Irish priest who had his car bombed when he left the Catholic Church (he wasn’t in the car at the time). I considered him to practically be a martyr and someone who understood Catholicism and its errors from the inside. However, when I saw how he interacted with my Catholic friend, I was ashamed. He was incapable of dialogue, terribly insulting and disrespectful. Probably most sad, was that he didn’t even know the basics about Catholic belief misrepresented it at every turn. I also found out that when he left the Catholic church, he had gone through at least one church and trashed it, smashing all the statues and committing some pretty rash vandalism. Basically, he was a violent jerk himself, in a time and part of the world where religious differences had intense political overtones. I didn’t really understand this until I had met the man myself, seen him interact with my friend and had the errors of his presentation of “Catholic” belief exposed. If I had just talked to others, I would have probably continued to think that he was a poor persecuted ex-priest, end of story. While there is no excuse for violence, having met the man, I doubt that he would have experienced the persecution that he did if he had left the Catholic Church respectfully, without lying about Catholic teaching and vandalizing Church property in Ireland at a time when the IRA and British where basically at war.
If you would like to do something about this, e-mail me offline and we can discuss ideas for ending at least some of the violence.
MB
MamasBoy says:
Two questions. #1 for Shaun, #2 for everyone.
1) Are you going to offer any ideas for solutions yourself?
2) Where can I find more information on Catholic on Protestant violence? For instance, when I search google for
pastor “burned alive” ecuador catholics
I get your blog as the top link. I get zero websites returned when googling
“Protestant pastor” “killed by catholics”
I tried searching Voice of the Martyrs and all I came up with was a story in Lebanon.
http://www.persecution.com/news/index.cfm?action=fullstory&newsid=461
As you can see, I’m not having much luck here. Mostly what I’m getting are references to the Irish/English and intra-English battles, if anything. Any one have an idea on improving my search efficiency?
MB
Jared says:
MB, despite your calls for “mutual respect” and understanding, your comments convey a tone of anti-Protestant bias, and while I’m sure you would deny the charge applies, the implicit message in your first comment appears to be that the victims in these cases deserve it, especially if they are Protestants.
Are you really wanting to suggest that this is all the fault of Protestantism?
Do some research (not carefully selected Google phrases with strategic quote-marks) on the rise of evangelicalism in Latin America. Catholic persecution of Protestants is happening.
But that’s neither here nor there. This shouldn’t be about age old schism.
People are being hurt and killed. Children are being abused and abandoned.
I hesitate to answer the question at the top of your second comment, b/c it feels like a “who’s heart is bigger?” test, but as I’ve criticized you, I think I ought to answer it. I personally am doing the following:
a) providing exposure to these atrocities in Nigeria by blogging about it
b) asking people if they know personally of any missionaries or mission organizations in this area who are working to combat this tragedy, with the intention of supporting them financially and through prayer
c) researching Stepping Stones Nigeria to see what specifically they are doing to combat this tragedy, with the intention of supporting them financially
d) praying
e) continuing to proclaim the gospel of the kingdom of Jesus in my relationships, my ministry, my support of foreign mission work, and my participation in local mission work.
Shaun Groves says:
1) Are you going to offer any ideas for solutions yourself?
I have none. I was hoping you guys could help me help them.
I think Jared’s list offers some good suggestions. I know a guy who might know some missionaries in the area. It’s a long shot, but I’ll ask. Other than supporting their work, I’m not sure what can be done from over here.
I was hoping there was some sort of way to get our denominational leaders here to exert pressure on the church leaders in Nigeria and elsewhere. But I don’t know how that’s done or even if it can be done. I’m deeply disturbed by what Christians are doing to each other in the name of CHrist but totally at a loss for what I (we) can do to stop it. For now, I’ll just pray.
noelle says:
That’s heart-breaking. With so much information being passed through the internet, I think that would be a great place to start. I’m not really sure about this, so I’d have to check into it, but could we (through letters, e-mail, etc…) contact the UN officials and government officials of Nigeria? I know that’s what Voice of the Martyrs does on behalf of Christians who are persecuted in different countries.
MamasBoy says:
Jared,
You (and probably others) have misunderstood me, yet I can’t point to any particular part of the comment that seems to be the cause, so I will assume that you misunderstood the whole thing. Please, forgive the length of this comment.
You said, “Are you really wanting to suggest that this is all the fault of Protestantism?”
No, of course not. Such an idea is nonsensical. There is no excuse for murder in the name of Jesus. No murderer will inherit the kingdom of God. Such people have rejected the rule of God in their life on earth and without sincere repentance have chosen an eternity in hell. Matthew 25:40-41 comes to my mind.
The presence of dialogue between Catholic and Orthodox and the relative lack between Protestants and the two groups is (in my mind) a matter of fact, but it does not imply that the blame is on Protestants. There is a greater cultural gap to bridge and a lack of clarity sometimes on how to proceed with such a dialogue. I mentioned the good relations Catholics and Orthodox have for a couple reasons. 1) It offers hope for the situations listed above. If Catholics and Orthodox can dialogue and work through their differences without resorting to violence, then they should be able to do the same with Protestants. 2) There may be some lessons learned from the experiences of reconciliation between Catholics and Orthodox that can be applied to the current tensions between those two branches of Christianity and Protestantism.
The reason that I mentioned Richard Bennett was not to blame him for the violence that happened to his car or the threats he received. In fact, I clearly stated that “there is no justification for violence.” However, he is the only example I have in my own experience of Christian on Christian violence. He was somebody I met through a mutual friend doing door-to-door evangelism. I at one time considered him to be an innocent virtual martyr for his faith, when it turned out that he was also a violent persecutor himself. When pursuing mutual respect between factions of any sort, it is important to impartially recognize all violence on both sides, should it exist. I offered my own past naivety merely as a caution to others.
Also, I brought it up to remind people that sometimes politics plays a greater role than religion in “religious” violence. Personally, I don’t think the IRA is a religious organization anymore than I think the Basque separatists are a religious organization. They are primarily a political organization, and the solution to IRA violence had to be a political one. They weren’t going to listen to any religious leaders. It is important to understand the true nature of a dispute so that the appropriate people can be approached regarding a solution. Perhaps it is not only a religious solution that should be sought, but a political one as well.
I will try your search suggestions on the rise of Protestantism in Latin America. The problem I foresee with such an approach is that it searches for what I’m not really interested in. I don’t want to read 100 articles on the rise of Protestantism to find the one or two that document violence against them. That said, I’ll still give it a try if that’s all people have to offer.
Sorry for the long comment. I hope that cleared up the misperceptions. It is not my intent to blame Protestants for violence against them. My intent is to learn more about it and to find ways to stop it.
MB
Shaun Groves says:
I understand, MB.
MamasBoy says:
Shaun,
All this time, I thought you were holding out on us with a brilliant solution.
Here are a couple brainstorming ideas that I had.
1) Try to involve Evangelicals and Catholics Together. They are an organization devoted to fostering unity that has connections among both Catholics and Protestants.
2) Start a letter writing campaign to US State department (don’t they document abuses of religious freedom?) and the governments of the countries where the abuses took place.
3) Start a letter writing campaign to the Vatican and copy the local Catholic bishops and the bishops where the abuses took place.
4) Inform the media about all letter writing campaigns.
5) Get together a couple pastors from your local area and try to set up a meeting with your local Catholic bishop to see if he has any ideas.
6) Try to involve various grassroots groups like homeschoolers, bloggers and local churches.
7) Try to involve radio DJs and people with pulpits to preach from.
8) Perhaps most important… Research and document the abuses very well, so that people can check on your references without relying on hearsay. I’m not saying that word of mouth is necessarily wrong, but when starting a campaign, one needs to build credibility. I’m still on the research part right now.
Regarding the question, “Can Catholics in America flex, somehow, the muscle of their Church against Catholics killing evangelicals in South America?”
Honestly, the Catholic Church in America doesn’t have much “muscle” to flex down south. The American bishops have no more say in how to run things in South and Central America than the bishops of California have in running the Catholic churches in Nebraska: basically none. The only power they have is that of the influence of peers and prayer. Even Rome’s influence is often limited to that of a moderator and pastor. She can tell people not to use violence to solve problems (and has), but if people on the ground don’t listen, the recourse she can take is limited.
MB
keith says:
Here’s what Ezekiel may have said after watching the video.
Thus says the Lord God, “Woe shepherds of Nigeria who have been feeding themselves! Should not the shepherds feed the flock? Those who are sickly you have not strengthened, the diseased you have not healed, the broken you have not bound up, the scattered you have not brought back, nor have you sought for the lost; but with force and with severity you have dominated them.
Behold, I am against the shepherds, and I shall demand My sheep from them and make them cease from feeding sheep.”
For thus says the Lord God, “Behold, I myself will search for My sheep and seek them out. I will feed My flock and I will lead them to rest,” declares the Lord God. “I will seek the lost, bring back the scattered, bind up the broken, and strengthen the sick; but the fat and the strong I will destroy. I will feed them with judgment.”
Janet Aldrich says:
I can’t remember who was asking now, but Mexico is one place where the Catholic church has not been kind to Protestants. Chiapas state has seen villages burned out and people forced to unemployment.
In fact, I’d almost “bet” (I don’t gamble, but you know what I mean) that a lot of the Catholic/Protestant strife is in Mexico and Central and South America.
Orthodox/Protestant problems are almost all Eastern Europe, with some happening in Eritrea (due to how Isaias Afwerkas’ government “recognizes” religious groups).
I wasn’t aware of the “witch” burning; that horrifies me.
Now, how do you change this? I don’t know; I wish I did. A lot of it arises from the fact that the “persecuting” church is entrenched in the government, so the government winds up acting as the harassing arm of the church, directly, or indirectly by condoning the behavior.
Some of it is culturally entrenched. Protestantism is viewed as a “new” religion many places, and one that is doctrinally very different from the “older” faiths. In some of the former Soviet Islamic countries, it’s pretty much treated as though it were a cult.
I think the comment that the best thing we can do is pray is a good one. The change has to start at the heart, and that takes the Lord.
jma
Anny says:
I cant believe that the middle ages continue till now…