Carl Moeller is president and CEO of Open Doors USA, which was founded in 1955 by Brother Andrew. The organization is involved in Bible and literature distribution, leadership training, Christian community development, and reporting about Christians in restrictive countries. Open Doors is one of the organizations participating in the International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church (November 11) to remember especially what they call “secret believers”—Muslim converts to Christianity. Moeller spoke with CT about the religious rights of Christians throughout the world.
What qualifies as persecution?
We tend to think of persecution as a continuum. People can be ridiculed and mocked for their faith, but it ends on sort of a scale with martyrdom and torture.
What is the point of prayer and aid for people in persecuted countries?
We believe that the important role that the church has to play in every culture is to be a source of hope and healing. Jesus called it salt and light. If the church leaves because of persecution or pressure, if Christians flee, where will that salt and light come from? So our job is not to remove Christians from persecution, but it’s to strengthen them. Christian support, love, commitment, prayer, physical and tangible resources so that they can remain where they are and ultimately that they can see the kingdom of God advance even in a situation as desperate as a persecution context.
Where are circumstances improving for Christians?
In a number of countries around the world, persecution is improving, but on a general scale persecution is increasing.
We have a number of places that have improved, like Vietnam. But it’s still in the top 10 worst places in the world for persecution.
Afghanistan, the last few years, has improved, but as we’ve seen this year, there’s a local persecution that’s gaining.
In particular, I would say China has improved, although I would say it’s seeing an uptick because of the Olympics.
We’ve had a lot of stability unfortunately at the top of our persecution index. The worst countries are pretty much the same countries year to year, with the exception of a few that have improved somewhat. It’s hard to point to a dramatic improvement of persecution in any country.
How do you differentiate between persecution of Christians because of their beliefs and general oppression?
We resist the temptation to claim that everyone who’s a Christian who’s killed in a certain region is a martyr for Christ. We all know that ethnic, religious, political conflict produces casualties. That’s not religious persecution per se; it’s just people caught in the crossfire who happen to be Christians.
However, we also can very clearly see in places like North Korea the government targeting Christians particularly. Refugees who’ve been caught in China, repatriated back to North Korea, and escaped from North Korea again, on their return to North Korea, they are interrogated and they are asked specific questions about their contact with Christians. They’re put into worse confines if they admit to having contact with Christians on their escape from North Korea.
Where are Christians dealing well with persecution or other violations of their religious rights?
There are of course Christians who don’t respond as Jesus would when violence is inflicted on them. They respond as many people would, with violence as well. And of course, we don’t support that, but we understand it.
Certainly in many parts of Indonesia there’s been Muslim-on-Christian violence, churches being bombed, people being killed. The Christian community there in some ways has not been a good example of showing Christ’s love for those who are persecuting them. However, I just became aware of a story of a family in Indonesia whose daughter was one of three girls who were attacked by Muslim extremists in 2004. Her face was horribly disfigured, and her friends were decapitated as they walked home from school. What was remarkable was the mothers have taken up a cause of demonstrating Christian forgiveness to the extremists in a very remarkable way. Their effort on behalf of the cause of Christ to forgive those who had done the most horrible things to their families and their daughters is a testimony of the way the Christians are called to respond.
Many times people neglect the fact that as martyrs they’re witnesses for the reality of Jesus Christ. When people die in the name of Jesus Christ, it presents a strong testimony to the culture. And in each case, where we see that Christians are publicly persecuted and killed, the church is correspondingly growing. We see hope in the face of that kind of tragedy.
What are the current trends in religious rights? What do you expect to see over the next couple years?
Certainly in the next few years, Muslim extremism will continue to have a trajectory that’s going to rise. Christians are going to be increasingly identified with a Western culture that extremist Muslims reject, even though they may be traditional members of their society. Christians will bear the brunt of a lot of that hatred of the West.
We’re seeing China change in many ways. China continues to be one of the worst abusers of human rights, with Christians being the bellwether of those abuses. And in the run-up to the Olympics, we’re seeing an increasing crackdown on house-church leaders and workers in urban areas of China.
On the other hand, China is also opening up more dramatically than any other country on our list in certain places. One of the trends in China is to be increasingly globally connected. That’s going to present more opportunities for the advance of the gospel in China over the next 5 to 10 years. I guess I’d go back to the old adage, whatever you say about China is true somewhere in China.
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Related Elsewhere:
Thirteen other organizations are promoting the International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church, which started in 1996.
Recent Christianity Today articles on persecution include:
Tortured to Death | Fourth Protestant in a year killed by government forces. (November 9, 2007)
Why Muslims Follow Jesus | The results of a recent survey of converts from Islam. (October 24, 2007)
No Mercy for Grace Churches | Central Asian republic increasingly views evangelicals as traitors. (October 17, 2007)
Christian Bookstore Manager Martyred in Gaza City | Rami Ayyad received death threats after store bombing in April. (October 8, 2007)
Christians and the Burmese Crackdown | A Burmese Pastor speaks on the situation of the church. (October 5, 2007)
Q&A: Paul Marshall | The Hudson Institute senior fellow discusses initial findings of the forthcoming book Religious Freedom in the World 2007. (September 5, 2007)
