“Rescue me from my enemies and teach me to do your will”
[Feb.13.2022] Ten Iranian Christian converts have been ordered in the Khuzestan Province to undergo “re-education” classes led by Islamic clerics.
According to the US Christian Post, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) agents told the 10 Christians, eight of which have been cleared in November 2021 of any crime, that they will have to attend up to 10 sessions with Islamic clerics on the 29th of January.
According to Article 18 of a non-profit organization that advocates for religious freedom and tolerance for Christians in Iran, the IRCG was responsible for 12 of 38 documented incidents of Christians being arrested or churches being raided in 2021. In April 2021, the IRCG arrested four Christian converts in the southwestern city of Dezful and charged them with “propaganda against the Islamic Republic” for participating in a house church.
As per persecution watchdog International Christian Concern (ICC), the “mandatory Islamic re-education classes directly conflict with the rulings of the Civil and Revolutionary Court of Dezful that said the group ‘merely converted to a different religion.”
The ICC’s statement declared that “The court noted that this apostasy could be punished under Islamic Sharia law but was ‘not criminalized in the laws of Iran.’ “ICC added that the courts ruled on the other charges that the Iranian Christian converts faced, that they “didn’t carry out any propaganda against other groups.”
As per Open Doors USA’s fact sheet on Iran, Christian converts from Islam face the highest risk of persecution by the government. The fact sheet stated that the Iranian government sees the growth of the Christian church in the country as “an attempt by Western countries to undermine Islam and the Islamic regime of Iran.”
Because of this, Christian house groups are often raided while their leaders and members are arrested, persecuted, and handed down long prison sentences for “crimes against national security.”
In Iran, which is an Islamic republic, Shia Islam is the official religion. Muslim citizens are prohibited from converting or renouncing their religious beliefs. Converting from Islam is even punishable by death.
Meanwhile, Christians are also prohibited from sharing the Gospel with Muslims. Proselytizing is a criminal offense in Iran.
Under these circumstances, Christian converts in Iran secretly hold their faith. Despite the limitations on religious conversion, a 2020 survey on 50,000 Iranians over the age of 20 found that 1.5% of the respondents identified as Christian.
‘GAMAAN’, a Netherlands-based research group said, “The number of Christians in Iran is without a doubt in the order of magnitude of several hundreds of thousands and growing beyond a million.”
Iran was ranked ninth in the list of countries that persecuted Christianity by Open Doors in 2022 and was designated by the US State Department as a country of special concern for violating religious freedom.(Source: Christian Today, Christianity Daily Edited)
Rescue me from my enemies, Lord, for I hide myself in you. Teach me to do your will, for you are my God; may your good Spirit lead me on level ground.(Psalms 143:9-10)
Dear God, please guide the Iranian church that is under persecution and forced to undergo Islam education because of their conversion to Christianity so that they can do Your will even amid suffering. May the government accept the court’s ruling to stop the persecution and punishment of Christians, and let the Islamic Revolutionary Guards lose their power. May You hold the faith of hundreds of thousands of Iranian believers and lead them by Your Spirit, so that when the time comes let them raise the banner of the cross high and proclaim Your reign.
Prayer 24·365
prayer@prayer24365.org
