The need to contribute financially to their families’ is turning students, even very young ones, into cross-border porters, a trend that is growing, especially in western Iran. Increasingly, many are also victims of accidents or shot by Pasdaran.
Escape is the only alternative to the threats made by Islamic militias against those who refuse to convert, pay “taxes” or give a daughter in matrimony to a Muslim, this according to ‘Portes ouvertes’, an NGO dedicated to persecuted Churches.
As a result of ongoing violence, persecution and the forced exodus of Christians, Churches are re-structuring their pastoral activities to cope with new challenges that range from spiritual assistance, help to the poor and fighting corruption. Christian leaders must make a common front in dealing with the state, international coalition forces and terrorism.
Fifty-four opposition senators call on the government to take action to prevent further persecution and ghettoisation of Christians, sorely tried by the martyrdom of Fr Ragheed Ganni.
After last years destruction of the famous golden dome of the Ascari mausoleum, an explosion today targeted the minaret’s of one Shiite Islam’s most sacred sites. Religious leaders: “An act of terrorism to provoke sectarian violence”. No immediate word on casualties.
Sunnis and Shiites, tribal leaders, Kurds, Turkmen and Christians meet at luncheon organised by the city Chaldean archdiocese to fight those who would like to destroy peaceful coexistence between religions. Prime Minister al-Maliki’s spokesman says the government is opposed to the Nineveh Plains plan and the country’s division in ghettoes. Ayatollah al-Sistani receives Christian leaders and expressed his solidarity towards them.
New details emerge surrounding the assassination of the Chaldean priest and his three friends in Mosul. Sunni Islam’s highest authority in Iraq condemns the attacks against the Christians and lays “all blame at the door of the Government and occupying forces”. The Iraqi Ambassador to the Holy See on the Nineveh Plain project “we work to build greater unity, not barriers”.
He is a great expert on China and the Middle East. Msgr. Leonardo Sandri is appointed Prefect of the Congregation for Oriental Churches.
During the “cordial talks”, Benedict XVI and the American leader analysed the “worrying situation in Iraq”, but in a more general sense issues regarding the entire Middle East and the “critical conditions in which the Christian communities find themselves”. The two leaders “also examined contemporary moral and religious issues”, among them human rights and religious freedom
Opposition to the “Assyrian” ghetto to save Iraq’s persecuted Christians today finds a qualified representative: Fr. Saad Hanna Sirop, one of the first Chaldean priests to have been kidnapped in Baghdad, and for whose release Benedict XVI intervened. A victim of Iraq’s violent anti Christian persecution, he too views the idea of an ethnic-religious enclave as diametrically opposed to Iraq’s history and the purpose of evangelization. Moreover, Fr. Saad maintains that the project’s real aim is not protection of the Chaldean and Assyrian Christians, but to protect ambitious “personal and economic interests”.
On the eve of the meeting between the Pope and Bush, the Archbishop of Kirkuk analyses the risks of the project to assign Christians an autonomous region in the Plains of Niniveh, a solution already rejected by authoritative figures in the Vatican.
Chaldean clergyman, Father Hani, and one of the five boys accompanying him on a visit to a minor seminar in the capital are still being held but negotiations are underway to free them. Released prisoners are said to be in good conditions.
They are Fadi Isho and Philip Najim. Synod discusses the safety of Christian community and the controversial idea of an “ethnic enclave” for Iraqi Christians.
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