The United Nations held an event on religious persecution recently, specifically focusing on Christians — now the most persecuted religion in the world.
So many testimonies flowed from the United Nations conference, with a few narrated below. Those in attendance expressed courage during the conference, stating that persecution is part of the journey and they were content knowing that at the end of it all, their final destination will be with their Saviour, Jesus Christ.
The Easter bombings last April in Sri Lanka struck Christians on their holiest day of the year, killing 259 Christians and injuring at least 500. Father Neville Fernando who was there narrated.
“I entered through the main gate of the church and suddenly I heard the explosion,” he said. “I ran towards the church and saw dead bodies strewn across the floor. There were many body parts, hands, heads, legs, moistening the church floor with blood. There was lamentation and screaming of the people looking for loved ones. Such a horrible sight.”
A few months before that, an ISIS-inspired attack on Mount Carmel Cathedral in the southern Philippines left 20 dead and more than 100 injured. The Rev. Ricky Bacolcol, the celebrant of that morning’s Mass, told his story to Monsignor Romeo Saniel, who quoted him as saying, “I blessed charred bodies of people I personally knew for 20 years.”
The Vatican’s mission to the United Nations held the conference to bring attention to the fact that Christianity has officially become the most persecuted religion in the world. And it’s a deepening crisis. While attacks against Jews and Muslims are also on the rise, according to the latest statistics, eight out of 10 victims of religious persecutions are Christians.
Father Roger Landry of the Holy See’s Mission to the United Nations said the situation is dire. Mainstream media are quick to call attacks against Jews and Muslims, anti-Semitism or Islamophobia, he said, but that’s not the case when it comes to Christians.