Overview of Persecution in the Church Today
I. INTRODUCTION
A. Most people in the Western Church have no idea of the persecution that goes on in the rest of the church. For
the Western Church, persecution is something they read about in the bible or is something a missionary speaks about
when visiting their church. But for most of the church in the rest of the world persecution is a daily reality.
B. According to the United States State Department, Christians in over 60 countries face the realities of massacre,
rape, torture, mutilation, family division, harassment, imprisonment, slavery, discrimination in education and employment,
and even death.
C. The modern-day Persecuted Church is well documented, despite some reports to the contrary. Christian
Challenges, March 1998, has an excellent repot on ”Christian Persecution” (p 38). It is likely that “more Christians have
been martyred in the 20th century than in ALL OTHER CENTURIES COMBINES”! The official statistics in Russia indicate
that between 1917 and 1989, two hundred thousand bishops, priests, deacons, monks, and nuns were executed by the
Soviet regime by crucifixion, shooting, strangulation, drowning, etc. This figure does not include the laity. Another half a
million died in slave labor camps. Two or three million Armenian Christians were killed by Turks and Kurds, and many
Greek and Assyrian believers. Then, too, Sudanese and other African Christians can be added to the list, victims of
Islam. Red China has added to the toil of victims.
D. Incredibly, more than 200 million people in over 60 nations are being denied their basic human rights for one
reason only: they are Christians. The main reason Christians are being persecuted today is the simple fact that
Christianity is growing fastest in countries where human rights are being violated or do not exist.
E. Literally hundreds of thousands of people today are being killed, brutalized, sold as slaves, imprisoned, tortured,
threatened, discriminated against and arrested solely because they are Christians. They are being subjected to
persecution and suffering, the extent of which we can hardly begin to comprehend, because of their faith.
II. TODAY’S MARTYRS
A. In David B. Barrett’s book “Today’s Martyrs”, he states that in this year alone approximately 165,000 Christians
will die because of their faith in Jesus Christ. According to Barrett, more than 43 million Christians have been martyred
since the crucifixion of Jesus 2,000 years ago.
B. Contributing writer for Barrett’s book, German missiologist Professor Thomas Schirrmacher, writes that no other
religious community has been persecuted as hard as Christians. Persecution is on the rise due to the expansion of
Islamic and Hindu extremism as well as the appearance of new dictatorships in Africa. “There is no telling how many
Christians are being tortured, harassed or oppressed”, states Schirrmacher.
C. A persecution index provided by Open Doors with Brother Andrew lists 28 countries with strong or even massive
persecution. In another 23 countries Christians suffer discrimination and in some regions severe harassment.
D. According to the “Geneva Report 2001” put out by the World Evangelical Fellowship (WEF), “At the beginning of
the new millennium, religion remains a deeply relevant and central aspect of human life and behavior despite the view
of some skeptics who echo Nietzche’s timeworn claim that “God is dead”. Yet of the world’s six billion inhabitants only 3%
(150 million) identify themselves as atheists. With varying degrees of commitment, two billion Christians, 1.2 billion
Muslims, 786 million Hindus, and 362 million Buddhists, not to mention adherents of hundreds of smaller religions, affirm
the relevance and importance of a spiritual dimension in life and society. In fact, the trend over the past few decades
has been an increase in religious commitment and activity in the face of growing secularization”.
E. “It is necessary to pay particular attention to the suffering faced by Christians globally due to its sheer magnitude.
No doubt, many people would find it surprising, even unbelievable that at the beginning of the 21st century the largest
faith group being persecuted is the Christian faith. It has been estimated that over 200 million Christians in at least 60
countries are denied fundamental human rights solely because of their faith. Moreover, persecution of Christians often
serves as an indicator of the status of religious freedom for other minorities since where Christians are persecuted other
religions tend also to suffer.”