The Persecution of Christians, around the world.

[Soldier4Christ]

Houston's Bible monument

There's a discussion on this here  http://forums.christiansunite.com/index.php?topic=12746.0
Brother.  This is just more of the same ongoing attempts to validate their reasons to eradicate any and all vestiges of the Christian religion from the public eye.

[Shammu]

So I see now..................

Well this is one I would say is "worthy" of being in both places.

[Soldier4Christ]

Not a problem with that.   

[Soldier4Christ]

Embattled church regains tax status
Government accused of 'grabbing' money meant for rebuilding after fire


The pastor of an African-American church in Wichita Falls says he believes a court ruling in favor of his congregation gives hope for a future that might not have been otherwise.

Liberty Legal Institute has announced the end of a property tax dispute that was resolved in favor of the Full Gospel Powerhouse Church of God in Christ. At issue was an estimated $20,000.

This was a great victory for the church," said Hiram Sasser, director of the institute's litigation division. "This relief will allow them to move forward as a church body."

The agreement between the church, in a predominantly white Texas neighborhood, and the Wichita County Appraisal District settled the church's claims of religious discrimination by the government officials.

The issue developed a few years back, when the congregation's building was destroyed in an apparently accidental fire. Without money to rebuild immediately, the land was left vacant.

The taxing district, however, then concluded that although the land was owned by a tax-exempt organization, the property taxes would have to be paid because it wasn't being used for church activities.

"We applaud the appraisal district and Wichita Falls for seeing the injustice and waiving the taxes," said Sasser. "The city and appraisal district should be commended for ending this suit and restoring the hope for this small church."

The discrimination complaint, which had been filed in 2005, accused the district of violating the Constitution by denying Full Gospel Powerhouse tax-exempt status on property, while granting it to other churches in the same and area and having similar circumstances.

"The church burned, and they tried to rebuild," Sasser said. "Right when they had the money to rebuild for themselves, the tax collector swooped down and grabbed it."

Institute spokesman Jonathan Saenz said the demand for property tax payments of thousands of dollars a year actually was preventing the congregation from moving forward with its rebuilding plan.

"The church was really under this extremely heavy burden of taxes," he said.

Pastor Theuophilus Thompson said those tax bills, for 1998-2001, would "pretty much clean up everything we had."

"We hope that this will clear up all the clouds that were over our heads," Thompson told local television KUAZ-TV.

[Soldier4Christ]

Machete attack survivor working on rehab
Christian high school girl was only victim left alive in ambush by Muslims

The only survivor of a machete attack by radical Muslims on four Christian high school girls successfully has had surgery on her massive injury, and officials with Voice of the Martyrs say they are working on additional treatments for her.

As WND has described, Noviana Malewa and three of her friends were walking on a school path Oct 29, 2005, when they were assaulted by jihadists wielding machetes. Three of the girls were decapitated and Noviana suffered a massive slash that ran from her cheek to her neck.

After being under police protection for several months, there were negotiations so she could be moved from her hiding place to the location of her hospitalization, according to an announcement from VOM yesterday.

She recently underwent surgery in Surabaya, Indonesia, to address a number of complications from the injury, as well as the scarring, officials said. She had suffered from an involuntary tick in her eye, and another near her mouth, because of the deep cut.

She also had severe nerve damage and a dislocated jaw, and deals with severe and sudden pain as well as the emotional trauma of having survived such a gruesome attack, officials said.

VOMedical said it was pleased to be able to help so far, and will continue to provide what help will be useful.

"She must daily massage her face to stimulate nerve growth and expose her scarring to infra-red beam treatment for five minutes," VOM said. "Neuro-medicine therapy and skin salves must also be administrated on a daily basis."

Help from a plastic surgeon reduced the scarring, which boosted her morale, officials said.

VOM sources in Indonesia said the attack happened as the four girls were walking through a cocoa plantation on their way to a private Christian high school in Posa Kota subdistrict.

Noviana, now 16, and Theresia Morangke, 15, Yarni Sambue, 15, and Alfita Poliwo, 17, were ambushed by six masked Islamic terrorists, who decapitated the three. Noviana survived because the sword slash did not make a direct connection and she ran away bleeding.

Authorities reported the heads of the three girls were found in bags on the steps of a church and along a road, carrying a message, "We will murder 100 more Christian teenagers and their heads will be presented as presents."

The Pakistan Christian Post reported that Noviana recalled streaming with blood.

"All I could do was pray to Jesus for his help,' she said.

The report said Muslim-Christian violence killed almost 1000 people on Sulawesi between 2000 and 2002, and a peace agreement has not halted the bombings, shootings and other attacks on Christians near Poso.

Voice of the Martyrs was launched by Pastor Richard Wurmbrand, who spent more than a decade in a prison for his Christian faith, and later wrote, "Tortured for Christ."

[Soldier4Christ]

Christian preacher injured when bus rams SUV
But he says Muslim militants' reports of his death premature

A Christian man whose witnessing enraged Muslims is recovering from his injuries after a bus driver rammed into his SUV, driving shards of broken glass into his arms, according to a new report from Voice of the Martyrs.

Because of the potential for danger to other Christians, relatives and acquaintances, many of the details of the recent attack on the minister known as Andrew were being withheld.

But the report said he was en route to visit a group of 17 families whose members have converted from Islam to Christianity when his vehicle was rammed by a bus.

"His left elbow was broken from the impact, and his right forearm was embedded with glass and severely lacerated in five places," the VOM report said, so the group is working to provide continuing medical care for him.

The ministry, which was launched by Rev. Richard Wurmbrand, author of "Tortured for Christ" relating his experiences representing Christ in war-torn Europe, focuses on getting help, support, and the Gospel to persecuted Christians worldwide.

The group said drivers of four buses had been hired by a militant Muslim group to crash into Andrew's SUV, and one succeeded. Immediately after the crash, the bus driver ran from the scene and reported that he had "killed the targeted Christian preacher."

However, while two others from the militant group were racing to the scene to confirm the fatality, Andrew's driver drove the smashed SUV to a nearby hospital, where the unconscious Andrew was admitted.

At the hospital, doctors cleaned some of his wounds and removed some of the glass shards, but when Andrew's brother, also a medical doctor, arrived he quickly checked Andrew out and took him to another physician where the rest of the glass was removed from his arms.

Then Andrew, who has been threatened because of his Christian witness in the past, was driven several hundred miles to a large city for a period of recuperation, officials said.

Ominously, during that trip, Andrew took four calls on his mobile phone, where callers told him, "Now you are going to heaven with your Isa (Christ)."

A pin was installed in his elbow to hold together a broken chip, and further surgery and physical therapy may be needed, officials said.

"Despite all of this hostility and opposition, Andrew remains determined to continue his ministry to Muslim-background believers," the VOM said.

[Shammu]

Christian executions lead to violence

By IRWAN FIRDAUS, Associated Press Writer 45 minutes ago

PALU, Indonesia - Three Christian militants were executed by firing squad early Friday for leading attacks on Muslims six years ago that left at least 70 people dead, sparking fresh sectarian clashes on restive Sulawesi island, police said...
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Mobs torched cars and police posts in several villages before security forces restored order, said Poso police chief Maj. Rudy Sufahriyadi. Elsewhere they blockaded roads and threw stones at houses and government offices. At least three people were hurt.

The men were taken before the firing squad at 12:15 a.m. (2:15 p.m. EDT Thursday), said a senior police officer who asked not to be identified because he was not authorized to speak to the media. Family members later said they had received confirmation of their deaths.

Christian executions lead to violence

[Shammu]

Indonesia executes 3 Christians over Muslim deaths

By Crack Palinggi 23 minutes ago

PALU, Indonesia (Reuters) - Three Christian militants convicted of leading a mob that killed Muslims were executed by an Indonesian police firing squad early on Friday amidst tight security in Central Sulawesi province, police said.
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Fabianus Tibo, Marianus Riwu and Dominggus Silva had been sentenced to death in 2001, after being found guilty of leading a Christian mob in an attack that killed more than 200 people at an Islamic boarding school during Muslim-Christian clashes in the Poso region of Central Sulawesi.

The convicts' priest, Jimmy Tumbelaka, said they had been officially declared dead at 3 a.m. (2000 GMT Thursday), although police officials have said they were actually executed hours earlier.

"According to valid information I received they were shot in a sitting position with their hands tied. Two were blindfolded while Marinus Riwu refused to be blindfolded," Tumbelaka told Reuters.

The bodies of Tibo and Riwu were flown to their hometown while Silva was buried in the provincial capital, Palu, where the executions took place, police spokesman Muhammad Kilat said.

Another police officer, who declined to be identified, said

the executions had taken place near the city's airport.

The trio had originally been scheduled to be put to death in August in Palu but the executions were postponed at the eleventh hour after demonstrations by thousands of Indonesians and an appeal from
Pope Benedict.

Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, president of the world's most populous Muslim nation, rejected the men's appeals for a pardon last year. They had appealed again for clemency last month.

Authorities turned down a request for their bodies to be laid out in the Santa Maria church in Palu, Tumbelaka said.

"We are disappointed they didn't get a proper religious service and customary rites," he said.

Hundreds of Christians had been praying for the convicted men at Santa Maria starting from late Thursday night. A heavy police presence at the church was reinforced after the executions, including personnel from para-military mobile brigade units.

SECURITY FORCES DEPLOYED

About 4,000 police and soldiers had been deployed in Palu, provincial police spokesman Kilat said earlier this week. "We are increasing our vigilance to anticipate any untoward incidents."

Human rights groups had urged Indonesia not to proceed with the executions. On Friday Isabelle Carton, South East Asia researcher at Amnesty International, said: "We are deeply disappointed that despite the debate on the death penalty that the case had sparked across Indonesia, the state went ahead and killed these three men."

In recent weeks there have been sporadic attacks, mainly targeting Christians, in Poso, where two people were killed this month in separate bomb blasts.

Muslim-Christian clashes erupted in Central Sulawesi from late 1998 to 2001, killing an estimated 2,000 before a peace accord took effect.

Elsewhere in Indonesia's sprawling archipelago, three Islamic militants are on death row for their leading roles in the 2002 Bali nightclub bombings that killed 202 people.

The attorney-general's office said on August 21 their executions would be delayed for a judicial review planned by defense lawyers.

Indonesia had last carried out an execution in March 2005 when a woman in East Java province was put to death in a multiple murder and mutilation case.

Around 85 percent of Indonesia's 220 million people follow Islam, but some areas in eastern Indonesia have roughly equal proportions of Muslims and Christians.

Indonesia executes 3 Christians over Muslim deaths

[Soldier4Christ]

'Religion of peace' followers torch Christian churches 
Hundreds seek refuge as mobs riot over alleged 'insult' to Muhammad

Nearly a dozen Christian churches have been burned and hundreds of people forced to seek refuge in a police station by Muslims who rioted through the Nigerian city of Dutse, and they blamed their actions on a "comment" made by a Christian woman.

According to a Reuters report, authorities in the city imposed a night curfew this week to try to quell the violence allegedly triggered by a statement by a woman that Muslims said was a blasphemy to Mohammad.

Scores of houses and shops owned by Christians also were burned in the Jigawa state capital city, police spokesman Haz Iwendi reported. There also were some injuries, but no fatalities, he said.

"Eleven churches and so many houses and shops were burned," he told Reuters. "The house of the Anglican bishop also was ransacked."

Another report from Africa News quoted police spokesman Kieran Dudari as saying the situation was "unfortunate."

The Christian aid organization Barnabas Fund said the conflagration destroyed two-thirds of all Christian churches in the area, including St. Peter's Anglican Cathedral, and there were reports that the state's governor himself was attacked when he tried to calm the mob.

Hundreds of heavily armed police officers were called in to patrol the city, eventually providing some calm amidst the ashes, the organization said.

The Barnabas Fund noted Muslims already were in an uproar worldwide because of a recent comment from the pope where he cited a historic document that describes Islam as violent.

"There have been attacks against Christians in the Palestinian territories, Somalia and Iraq," the group said.

"There have also been many verbal protests. The Islamic cleric Yusuf al-Qaradawi, a so-called moderate who had justified violence in the past, called for 22nd September to be a 'day of rational anger' across the world and warned Muslims not to attack churches," the Fund said. "Sadly his warning against violence does not seem to have been heeded."

Al-Qaida in Iraq has publicly threatened Christians, saying, "We will destroy the cross … then all that will be accepted will be conversion or the sword. May God enable us to slit their throats, and make their money and descendants the bounty of the mujahideen," according to the Fund.

"Muslims are always saying that Islam is a religion of peace," said Fund International Director Patrick Sookhdeo. "But many Christians in the Muslim world know differently. For them, Islam has been and remains a religion which metes out violence."

The organization said it is launching an online drive to raise funds for the victims of the violence, as well as the eventual reconstruction of the burned church facilities.

Joseph Hayab, of the Christian Association of Nigeria, told Reuters that the woman's comment was a tit-for-tat remark after a derogatory comment was made about Christianity.

"Her comment was in retaliation to uncomplimentary remarks made by her colleague about Jesus," he told the news service. The woman was detained briefly by police, then released, and that's what triggered the rioting, he said.

According to a report, more than 1,000 Dutse residents remained camped in an open field at state police headquarters a day later, too terrified to return to their homes.

The comments from the pope that have left the Muslim world calling either for his death or his conversion to Islam came as he quoted 14th-century Byzantine emperor Manuel II Paleologus.

"He said, I quote, 'Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached," the pope quoted, according to a CNN report.

The Organization of the Islamic Conference said that statement shows a "deep ignorance" of Islam.

The pope apologized that people were offended by his quotation, but he stopped short of denying its truthfulness.

[Soldier4Christ]

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