Wednesday, May 10, 2006

Open Doors: Turkmenistan, India

"Turkmenistan: * Police in Turkmenistan's capital city broke up a Christian house group meeting, confiscating personal belongings and subjecting the group to extensive interrogation. The incident occurred just hours after U.S. officials recommended that Turkmenistan be labeled one of the world's worst violators of religious freedom. After seizing materials, the officers forced the Christians to reenact their meeting activities while police videotaped them. Noting that Turkmen President Saparmurat Niyazov's 'increasingly oppressive personality cult' had effectively become 'a state-imposed religion', the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom this week recommended that Turkmenistan be added to the U.S. State Department's list of violators of religious freedom as a Country of Particular Concern.

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Please Pray:

-That those who videotaped the re-enactment of the church service will not be able to forget what they saw and will have many questions; Ask the Lord to reveal to them the answers to their spiritual questions.

-For the faith, perseverance, and witness of Christians in Turkmenistan, and particularly to those from this specific house church.

-That the situation in Turkmenistan will receive greater international attention, and that through the persecution of these Christians, more people will come to know Christ.

India: * Police in Madhya Pradesh state colluded with Hindu extremists by having Christian 'evidence' planted in a social worker's personal bag in order to charge him with 'forcible' conversion of children, sources said. Sunil Kumar Rao was helping to educate the children of poor laborers when police arrested him, even though they found no evidence that he was even a Christian, let alone trying to “forcibly” convert the children. After Hindu extremists arrived, however, police extracted planted Christian articles from Rao’s personal bag that had not been there before. Also this week, Hindu extremists slapped a 60-year-old pastor for distributing Christian literature, and a Christian man and Hindu woman were beaten for trying to get a marriage license.

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Please Pray:

-For the Lord’s presence and protection for Sunil Kumar Rao and others who are injustly arrested because they are Christians, and that their testimonies will bring glory to God.

-That justice and truth will rain down upon the nation of India and pierce the darkness that surrounds the minds of so many.

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