{"id":6244,"date":"2013-07-22T02:44:30","date_gmt":"2013-07-22T01:44:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/?p=6244"},"modified":"2014-01-14T06:39:18","modified_gmt":"2014-01-14T06:39:18","slug":"christians-suffer-under-the-arab-spring","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/index.php\/christians-suffer-under-the-arab-spring\/","title":{"rendered":"Christians Suffer Under the ‘Arab Spring’"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Robin Phillips<\/a><\/p>\n

Christian minorities are facing unpreceden\"Christians<\/a>ted fear and exodus in the Middle East as they become casualties of the Arab Spring movement.<\/p>\n

Throughout the Middle East, churches are being attacked. Christians are being killed, and the population of believers continues to diminish.<\/p>\n

These concerns were raised by Joseph Wakim in his recent article, ‘Christian minorities a casualty of the Arab Spring<\/a>.<\/strong>‘<\/p>\n

Wakim writes:<\/p>\n

Emerging democracies in the ‘Arab Spring’ may have claimed an innocent casualty: Christian minorities.<\/p>\n

If the crudest consequence of elections is ‘majority rules’, then minorities need protection. Westerners who laud the ‘Arab Spring’ cannot have it both ways, waving the carrot of democracy with one hand while waving a big stick with the other hand if Islamic values prevail. While a constitution may enshrine safeguards, this depends on who constitutes the majority….<\/p>\n

It is the height of arrogance to laud Arab societies for ‘importing’ western ideologies of democracy, when in fact the new generation of Arabs have their own aspirations and ideologies. Ironically, it is the importing of ideologies of theocracy from US-allied Gulf states that has hijacked the pro-democracy uprisings, but rarely registered on the Western radar. Indeed, it is these ideologies of sectarian supremacy, rather than Islam or Muslims per se, that pose the biggest threat of extinction to the indigenous Christians.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Elsewhere in the article he gives some sobering statistics about Christianity in the Middle East::<\/p>\n

The statistics are staggering: A century ago, one in five Arabs were Christian, whereas now they number one in 20<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The sectarian war in Iraq after the 2003 US-led invasion has halved the Christian population to less than 400,000<\/a>.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

To read the entire article, click here<\/em><\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

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Find out how to join Christian Voice and stand up for the King of kings (clicking on the link below does not commit you to join)<\/strong><\/p>\n

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By Robin Phillips Christian minorities are facing unprecedented fear and exodus in the Middle East as they become casualties of the Arab Spring movement. Throughout the Middle East, churches are being attacked. Christians are being killed, and the population of believers continues to diminish. These concerns were raised by Joseph Wakim in his recent article, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6244","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t