Lambs to Slaughter

Perhaps, now, that our churches are shuttered, our sacraments denied, our priests separated from us, Catholics may awaken to the suffering of the persecuted Christians around the world.

A disturbing report released by Aid to the Church in Need, a Catholic charity organized to support persecuted Christians, found a disturbing trend among U.S. Catholics. The report revealed a surprising drop in the percentage of Catholics who are “very concerned” about Christian persecution. In 2019, 59% of Catholics were very concerned, while today only 52% are very concerned. 

Catholics are clearly ill-informed on the current state of Christian persecution. As Catholic concern diminishes, the persecutions dramatically increase.

Equally troubling, the Aid to the Church survey found that Christian persecution receives the lowest level of Catholic concern, ranking in fifth place behind human trafficking, poverty, climate change and the refugee crisis as important global issues.

This growing apathy by American Catholics presents a very troubling and baffling development, since Christian persecution is spreading rapidly around the world. Catholics are failing to heed the warning and reality of a global genocide of Christians sweeping across many countries. Why? There’s plenty of data available if Catholics care to open their eyes and look at the news.

Nigerian Killing Fields

On March 8, 2020, the International Society for Civil Liberties issued a Special Report on the bloody persecution of Christians in Nigeria. According to the report, 12,000 Christians have been killed since Muslim President Muhammadu Buhari assumed office on May 29, 2015. Jihadists have driven 4 to 5 million Christians from their homes and destroyed 2,000 Churches in 57 months and killed 20 clergymen and kidnapped 50 others. 100% of the victims are Christians, as Islamic Boko Harm and the Fulani Herdsman operate with impunity under the Buhari administration. The world watches in passive silence while the systemic Christian population in Nigeria lives in terror awaiting the ongoing bloodshed by these brazen Islamic terror groups. This campaign of terror against Christians has been largely ignored by the world.

Catholics need look no further than Aid to the Church in Need, which reported in 2018 that millions of Christians are persecuted as well as the highly respected Open Doors World Watch Report on Christian Persecution. In its latest annual report, Open Doors sounded the alarm that 260 million Christians worldwide are being heavily persecuted for their faith. The findings detail the causes and places for this dramatic 6% increase.

Open Door researchers highlighted the dangerous trends this year involving Islamic jihadists:

1 Violent Islamic extremism spikes in sub-Saharan Africa and is “increasingly under threat from Islamic extremist groups. Particularly in countries or in regions where government control is weak or non-existent, these groups are killing, kidnapping and sowing chaos with impunity.”

2 Militant Islam spreads violence and fear in Southeast and South Asia. “In Sri Lanka (No. 30, up from 46 in 2019) 250 people died and more than 500 were injured in attacks on Catholic and Protestant churches and hotels on Easter Sunday.”

The overall 2019 statistics of Christian persecution are chilling and reflect an escalating global war on Christianity. Here’s just a sobering sample of Christian persecution from the extensive Open Doors World Report:

• 9,488 Churches or Christian Buildings were attacked.

• 2,983 Christians were killed for their faith.

• 8 Christians are killed everyday for their faith.

• Christianity is on the verge of disappearing in Iraq and Syria.

• In Iraq, there are now around 202,000 Christians, down from 1.5 million before 2003—an 87% reduction in one generation.

The Open Doors Report also focused on the People’s Republic of China’s persecution of Christian children:

“Christian children may face the worst persecution in China. The latest regulations forbid anyone under the age of 18 from entering church buildings or participating in church activities.

“From early 2018, we have been pressured from all sides. The Communist Party wants young people to believe that Christianity is a foreign religion and that western powers are attempting to infiltrate China on the back of religious teaching. Schools have been ordered to use this anti-religious narrative to educate the children.

“We know of some school teachers who warn children that if they follow Jesus, they may not be allowed to graduate. This creates a terrible struggle in young people’s hearts. If they admit they follow Jesus, they could lose everything they have worked for.”

Additionally, the bipartisan and independent U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom highlighted the persecution of Chinese Christians in its 2019 Report:

“As a Christian, your Bible may have been rewritten by the Chinese government, your church shuttered or demolished, and your pastor imprisoned.”

The brutal Sino de-Christianization project is now well underway, as Christian Churches are bulldozed by the CCP, all children under the age of 18 are prohibited by law, from practicing any faith, clergy harassed and detained, and icons and images of Jesus Christ are torn down and replaced with photos and teachings of Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Why are Catholics so uninformed about the dramatic surge in the global brutal persecution of Christians? Who is to blame for their apathy and ignorance about the growing danger to global Catholics?

Look no further than Pope Francis. He refuses to rattle his global pulpit to vociferously protest Christian persecution. His silence and inattention to Christian genocide has consequences—devastating ones. The laity  follows his lead of indifference and avoidance while the persecuted sheep are without a voice and a shepherd.

Papal Silence over Islamic Persecution

If anyone should be sounding the alarm about the global persecution of Christians, it should be the Vicar of Christ, Pope Bergoglio. Yet, he has consistently neglected to speak out boldly about the insidious campaign of Christian genocide by Islamists.

Instead, Catholics are subjected to his inane and absurd comments, such as, “If I speak of Islamic violence, I must speak of Catholic violence.” Obviously, Francis will not jeopardize his carefully orchestrated interfaith agenda with Islam, by criticizing Islamic violence against Christians. Criticizing Islamic violence is politically incorrect and inconvenient for the power-hungry UN globalist pontiff.

With great fanfare, on Feb. 4, 2019, Francis signed the Abu Dhabi Declaration with Grand Imam Ahmed Al-Tayyeb. The document declared that God wills the diversity of all religions. Shockingly, Francis agreed to the uniformity, parity and unity of all major religions. His submission to Islam is hailed as a major victory by the Muslims. Rest assured, the Bergoglio inter-faith dialogue and harmony tour will not be endangered by any papal protestations about Islamic jihadis on a bloody rampage against Christians.

Papal Silence over China’s CCP Persecution of Catholics

Similarly, Francis dare not criticize his bilateral partner, Chinese President Xi Jinping for fear of tainting their secret agreement. Francis remains stone-cold silent about the systemic eradication of all vestiges of Christianity in China by Xi’s brutal CCP thugs. In the past 18 months, since Francis signed the 2018 Vatican-China secret deal, persecution has been ramped up to extraordinary levels. Chinese Catholics and clergy have been brutally persecuted, terrorized out of their houses of worship, churches bulldozed, harassed, detained and forced further underground to practice their faith. Francis refuses to raise his voice in protest.

 Despite massive global persecutions of Christians, during the past seven years of his pontificate, Francis refuses to employ powerful Vatican resources to save his persecuted flock. His abject failure is apparent:

 

• No Apostolic Exhortation on Christian persecution.

• No Synod convened on global persecution of Christians or religious freedom.

• No speech at the United Nations on the global persecutions of Christians.

• No Vatican pontifical conference held on the global persecution of Christians.

Instead, he wastes his valuable papal resources, spiritual assets and his global platform on inconsequential matters, like climate change, and caters to his UN political agenda and hacks, rather than shepherding his persecuted global flock.

Is it any wonder that climate change ranks more important to Catholics than the global genocide of Christians?

Charred bodies, destroyed churches, jailed clergy and CCP propagandized bibles should outrage this pontiff. Instead, we are lectured on eco sins and the dangers of our carbon footprint.

Where is his outrage? Where is the papal encyclical decrying the global persecution of Christians?

Who could ever forget the 21 Egyptian Christian Copts, kneeling on the Libyan seashore, quietly praying the Our Father, awaiting their beheading, at the brutal hands of the ISIS?

We are watching the lambs led to slaughter.

Where is our shepherd?

He has forgotten them and ignores this warning:

Therefore take heed to yourselves and to all the flock, among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the Church of God which He purchased with His own blood.

For I know this, that after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock.”—Acts 20:28-30

The wolves are inside the gate.

Originally appeared in The Remnant Newspaper-April 2020