Today’s Headlines:

HINDU MOB IN INDIA DESECRATES CHURCH, FORCES BELIEVERS TO LEAVE

CHANGES IN IRAN’S GOVERNMENT POSE THREAT TO SATELLITE TV MINISTRY

FIJIAN PASTOR SAYS ETHNIC, RELIGIOUS RIFTS CONTINUE TO GROW

TIDE OF SECULARISM IN EUROPE BEGINS TO TURN: GERMAN CHURCH LEADER

Today’s Top Stories:

HINDU MOB IN INDIA DESECRATES CHURCH, FORCES BELIEVERS TO LEAVE

Gospel for Asia (GFA) President K.P. Yohannan has called for worldwide prayer for a pastor in northern India’s Himachal Pradesh state after Hindu radicals took over his home and church building the first weekend in December.

On Saturday, Dec. 3, a group of more than 20 Hindu extremists surrounded the home of Ramesh Masih Bhatti, pastor of the local Believers Church, and began conducting Hindu worship rituals. The group included members of the VHP (Vishwa Hindu Parishad or World Hindu Council) and its youth wing, Bajrang Dal. The mob became increasingly violent, shouting threats against the believers and brandishing large bamboo sticks. This went on all day and continued into the next morning.

On Sunday morning a police team arrived at the church at Bhatti’s request. As he and his family were praying, the radicals shouted and danced outside the church. They also yelled slogans against religious conversion. After the Christians left, the mob entered the building and declared it a Hindu temple, writing phrases praising their gods on the church wall and set up an idol in the courtyard.

Bhatti and his family have been forced to move from the building which was their home for the past 25 years, and are living with relatives. “Now the leader of the Hindus in Himachal Pradesh is threatening a massive village-by-village campaign to force Christians to convert back to Hinduism,” Yohannan wrote. (Assist News Service)

CHANGES IN IRAN’S GOVERNMENT POSE THREAT TO SATELLITE TV MINISTRY

Iran’s hard-line government could pose a threat to SAT-7, a Christian Arabic satellite television ministry, said spokesman Terry Ascott. In November, under the administration of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Iranian government fired 40 ambassadors and senior diplomats. They also dismissed those who promoted ties to Europe. In their place, the government has been putting Islamic fundamentalists at key posts, including security agencies. As these governmental changes continue there’s a question as to what could happen to Christians. “As things become more difficult, it’s more embarrassing, if you like, for church leaders to be involved with the satellite television system,” Ascott said. “So yes, it is potentially much more difficult for us in the days ahead to produce indigenous materials within the country.” (Mission Network News)

The embattled New Life Church in the Belarusian capital of Minsk has failed to overturn the state’s decision to confiscate its building and land. In October Economic Court hearings, the church attempted to challenge the validity of Minsk City Executive Committee’s Aug. 17 decision curtailing the church’s land rights and ordering the sale of its building — a cowshed it purchased in 2002. Ruling against New Life, the Economic Court claimed that the August decision was valid because the church had both used the cowshed as a house of worship and modernized it without obtaining state permission to change the designation of either the building or its attached land. Because of its lack of state-approved worship premises, New Life Church has been unable to obtain compulsory re-registration under the country’s 2002 Religion Law. Some other religious organizations face similar problems. New Life had been using the cowshed as a last resort since being barred from renting a local house of culture in September 2004. (Assist News Service)

FIJIAN PASTOR SAYS ETHNIC, RELIGIOUS RIFTS CONTINUE TO GROW

“When the righteous increase . . . the people rejoice; when the wicked rule, the people groan,” said Pastor Ratu Epeli Kanaimawi, vice president of the Association of Christian Churches in Fiji, who spoke at the Transform World conference in Jakarta last May, attended by 1,000 Christian leaders worldwide. This saying from Proverbs 29:2 is as true on the Fiji Islands as it is anywhere else in the world, he said. There are two main population groups on the islands: Indians constitute 43 percent of the population, native Fijians 52 percent. The Fijians are 99-percent Christian. The Indians are predominantly Hindu and Muslim. The significant cultural and religious differences between the two main groups has long caused an ethnic rift which political declarations mostly strengthened more than they reduced. (Friday Fax)

TIDE OF SECULARISM IN EUROPE BEGINS TO TURN: GERMAN CHURCH LEADER

Western Europe has been riding on a wave of secularism, but the tide seems to be turning, says Bishop Wolfgang Huber, leader of the mainline Protestant Churches in Germany. The past year has seen a resurgence of interest in religion, fueled by natural catastrophes on the one hand and major church events on the other. The tsunami in Asia, hurricanes in North and Central America, earthquakes in Pakistan and India and the threat of bird flu have aroused new interest in God, said Huber during the general synod in Berlin last month. Many secular people are asking questions like, “Are such disasters an expression of God’s wrath or of His impotence? Are they indications that God does not exist, or do they lead us to the point where we — in all our helplessness — seek a foothold in Him?” New interest in religion was also aroused by the death of Pope John Paul II and the election of his successor, Benedict XVI. The Catholic World Youth Day in Cologne, Germany, attracted 1 million participants, and 200,000 people came to the Protestant “Kirchentag” in Hanover. (Assist News Service)