Oaxaca, Mexico. November 1st, 2004 (ACPress.net). 
“Protestants in my town? No way! They’d better clear off or we’ll burn them!” The charming sentiments of a 23-year-old musician from Oaxaca in south-east Mexico, but tragically words that came true. Ten years ago, Jehovah’s Witnesses ­ the opposition do not distinguish between Christians and cults - arrived in Oaxaca. They were told to leave. When they returned the first time, they were kicked out. When they returned the second time, they were tied up and burnt alive.

Tensions rise as the proportion of non-Catholics increases in Mexico, now at around 12% of the population. Chiapas is the region with the highest proportion, and where there is most antagonism, followed by Oaxaca. In October 2002, an evangelical pastor had his electricity lines cut, and a month later, was dragged from his home, beaten up and threatened with death if he did not leave the area. Traditionalist Catholics are almost certainly behind the attacks, which happen frequently in the region.

In one city, when children see a Protestant they shout things like ‘Let’s beat up a Hallelujah’, threats suffered by 7-year-old Mario, whose family attend a Pentecostal church. In rural areas in the south of the country, whole families are expelled from their homes and their land, while their houses and crops are burned. They are beaten and in some cases murdered. The local authorities deny their children the chance to go to school or receive public services. Human rights observers in the USA say that religious practice is restricted in some parts of southern Mexico.

Local leaders often exploit religious tensions and differences for their own political purposes, and other underlying problems include ethnic differences, land disputes and local struggles for power. The Evangelical Commission for the Defence of Human Rights in Chiapas says 30,000 people have been turned out of their communities in the last 30 years, some of them for religious reasons.

El Salvador, November 1st, 2004 (ACPress.net). 
Nicky Cruz, converted New York gang member and now an evangelical minister, is convinced that faith in Jesus can save hundreds of youngsters caught up in gangs, and calls on society not to try and resolve the problem through repression but through God’s mercy.

Cruz is currently in El Salvador on a mission of peace and hope, and assures people that gangs are not rubbish which can be ‘cleared away’, but the product of social prejudice. “You cannot say this is the rubbish of society which must be cleaned up, because that is not the way God works. God is mercy and a God who changes people, which is why He has brought me to bring hope to El Salvador.” Cruz said he was invited to visit the central American nation 24 years ago but decided then not to go. He never thought that one day he would visit to try and rescue youngsters from the very gang life he himself had been caught up in before.

Cruz criticised the government plan to clean up the gangs, saying that gang members were the victims of discrimination, family break-up and child abuse, adding that they cannot be combated by repressive measures. Cruz thinks that grandmothers have taken on the responsibility of mothers, causing a structural problem whose root is a lack of values.

Buenos Aires, November 1st, 2004 (ACPress.net). 
The Evangelical Methodist Church in Argentina (IEMA) says it approves of the government’s plan to introduce sex education in state schools in the capital, Buenos Aires. However, the Federation of Evangelical Churches (FACEIRA) opposes the plan.

The IEMA said “We consider that education is needed which deals with the human being in its entirety, overcoming the interests of money or body-commerce, and of pleasure without responsibility or care.” On the other hand, the FACEIRA believes sex education belongs in the home, according to the convictions of the parents and free from state interference. It believes that the state will teach that homosexuality is normal and that if this ruling becomes law, then Christian schools will be forced to teach it too.

The IEMA recalls that evangelical churches have been pioneers in Latin America in the struggle for free, state education, and that they have promoted non-confessional education which illumines the conscience. “We will teach the faith in our churches and in the homes of believers, complementing and enriching the education received at school. We support the option of teaching sex education in Argentinian schools...as an opportunity to develop healthy attitudes and behaviour, and as an exercise in understanding and respecting differences.”

Bogotá, November 1st, 2004 (ACPress.net). 
Three evangelical leaders have received official recognition from the Colombian government in the past month.

On October 9th, Claudia Rodríguez de Castellanos, co-founder of International Charismatic Mission and ex-Senator with the National Christian Party, has been appointed to be the next Colombian Ambassador to Brazil. Eduardo Cañas Estrada, Pastor of Spring of Eternal Life Church in the Assemblies of God, was awarded a Congressional medal on October 6th for his work in the community. Finally, Enrique Gómez, founder and Chairman of Bethesda Missionary Centre, was made a member of the Order of José Acevedo y Gómez on September 29th.

It is undoubtedly right that the Colombian government recognise the work being done in that nation by evangelical churches to help the welfare of the community at large, and their contribution to peace in often adverse conditions. Such at least was the feeling expressed in one Colombian newspaper. The three denominations represented by the aforementioned leaders are among the largest in the country, and are comprised of tens of thousands of members.

Christians in Chad trying to reach Sudanese refugees

Chad, November 4th, 2004 (ACPress.net). 
In what the UN has called "today's worst humanitarian disaster," 50,000 Sudanese tribal people have been killed and over one million rendered homeless by Arab militias in Sudan's western Darfur region.

About 200,000 displaced persons, mostly women and children, have escaped to neighbouring Chad, where they live in crowded refugee camps with inadequate food, water and medicine. Native missionaries supported by Christian Aid in Chad are burdened to bring physical as well as spiritual aid to these suffering people, yet they currently lack sufficient resources. What has become known as the ‘Darfur crisis’ began in February 2003, when black African tribes in this western region rose up against the central government, protesting at their exclusion from natural resources and demanding fairer treatment.

In response, the Sudanese government armed Arab militias, called Janjaweed, and ordered them to put down the rebellion. These Arab militias are carrying out their task ruthlessly, attacking tribal villages and murdering innocent civilians by the hundreds. No end is in sight for the genocide. A ceasefire signed in April has been ignored by all parties involved. Native missionaries in Chad, moved by the love of Christ, want to relieve their suffering. They also hope to bring the truth of the gospel to refugees, many of whom are animists.

The crisis in Darfur is actually only part of a much wider crisis in Sudan, where civil war has been raging for over 20 years. Estimates of those killed are over the 2 million mark. Many of them are Christians living in southern Sudan, against whom the Islamic regime in Khartoum has been waging a cruel war.

New Delhi, November 4th, 2004 (ACPress.net). 
As many eyes are drawn to the growing presence of Islam in Africa and the Arab world, native missionaries in India work to reach the world's second largest population of Muslims, right within their own borders.

Statistics reveal that there are 140 million Muslims in India, second in number only to Indonesia. Native missionaries are discovering that Indian Muslims are very receptive to the gospel. There is little of the fanatic, violent ideology that characterises some Muslims in other parts of the world. In recent years, native missionaries have begun special outreach to Muslim communities, particularly in northern India where they are most numerous. Some former Muslims who have turned to Christ now minister for Him among their own people. Indigenous ministries have begun sending gospel workers to Muslim communities where they can set up a small business that brings them in daily contact with Muslim neighbours. Once relationships develop, missionaries find many are open to the truth of Christ. Islam has had a presence in India for over 1000 years; many of its followers, though they may not be religiously zealous, are too deeply rooted in centuries of Islamic belief and practice to think about change. Please pray with native missionaries as they work to spread the gospel in this fertile mission field.

New York, November 4th, 2004 (ACPress.net). 
Prayer is high on the American health agenda. In the last four years alone, the Federal government ­ equivalent of the central administration in Spain ­ has spent around 2 million euros on research into the impact of prayer on health and medicine.

Thus far, the investigation has produced more smoke than fire, though according to the New York Times, three scientists from Columbia University in the USA published a report in 2001 in which they claimed that women who prayed to get pregnant through fertility treatment were twice as likely to do so. The report has not been challenged, although apparently one of the scientists is under investigation for embezzlement.

Surprisingly enough, research into the impact of prayer on medicine began during Clinton’s presidency, but less surprising is the fact that little has been learned. This is to be unexpected when one is investigating a miracle which overcomes natural laws through divine intervention. What can science hope to explain about that? Yet the issue is not insignificant; 45% of American adults pray about their health and so scientists do battle with such ridiculous questions as: Which is more effective, for someone to pray for their own health, or for somebody else’s?, is it better if just one person prays, or should it be a whole congregation?, which religion has the best healing record?, and so on. Then there is the question of strategy: should one ask God to cure one, or rather ask Him for the strength to overcome the illness oneself?

Much of this research has been financed by the National Centre for Complementary and Alternative Medicine which operates under the auspices of the American public health system and normally investigates issues on the margins of the medical profession, such as the relationship between the body and the mind, looking at the physiological impact of things like yoga and meditation. It is better off, therefore, spending its money on prayer.

Ankara, November 4th, 2004 (ACPress.net). 
A recent trip to Turkey, mainly financed by ‘National Geograpic Magazine’, did not find conclusive evidence that the flooding of the Black Sea was caused by the biblical flood. However, it did furnish them with the chance to perfect submarine archaeology technology in the studying of a ship which sank 1,500 years ago and is well preserved.

The Bible relates a catastrophic flood caused by constant rainfall over a period of 40 days and nights. Arcahaeologists believe that the Black Sea flooded when sea levels rose and swept out of the Mediterranean into what was then a fresh-water lake. The flood was so great that the water level rose by 155 metres and submerged around 150,000 square kilometres of land. Yet scientists do not agree over what happened at the time of the flood, nor how quickly it occurred. Most date it at around 9,000 years ago and say it was gradual.

However, in 1997, two American marine geologists ­ Walter Pitman and William Ryan ­ dated the flood at around 7,150 years ago and said it was so fast and extensive that the population had to flee, some to continental Europe. Scientists had thought the matter resolved when they found a farmer’s house on a cliff in the Black Sea at a depth of 100 metres. It had been built about 7,500 years ago just before a huge wave of water flooded miles of coastline and turned the fresh-water lake into a salty sea. But when they visited the site in 2003, they found it had been ‘contaminated’ by pieces of wood which had floated there, making the site impossible to date. The expedition was led by Robert Ballard, who also worked on the Titanic wreck, and the most exciting part was the inspection of a trading ship that sank around 1,500 years ago. It is considered the best preserved example of a ship from the Byzantine period, as most of what is left on the seabed is intact. A rope tied on the mast in the shape of a ‘V’ is ven visible.

Beslan, Russia. November 4th, 2004 (ACPress.net).  
A few weeks ago, we published the story of two Christian brothers, Sergey and Taymuraz Totiev, who both lost children in the terrorist attack in Beslan.

Instead of turning their grief into anger, the Totievs set an example in their community by showing Christian love and forgiveness in the midst of tragedy. Now, Christians in Beslan are uniting to spread this gospel of peace, making plans to establish a Christian Comfort and Reconciliation Centre. Christian leaders saw that the suffering of hundreds of families in Beslan had the potential to lead either to hatred and violence or to redemption and reconciliation. They want to point despairing families towards God in their time of need.

The proposed Centre would accomplish this through three means: first, by providing medical help to those still recovering from injuries. Secondly, the Centre would give food and clothing to poor families and to those who suddenly find themselves without income after the death of a parent. Most importantly, the Centre would provide Christian counselling to the hundreds of people reeling from depression and confusion. Please pray for Christian leaders in Beslan as they bring he hope of Christ to the suffering.

Source: Christian Aid. Editing: ACPress.net
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