Public Enemy: Iran's Persecution Backfires

Regime's antagonism is increasing Christianity's appeal.
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2011/june/publicenemy.html

Trevor Persaud

posted 6/01/2011

A major spike in the harassment and arrest of Iranian Christians in recent months is re-vealing just how nervous the Islamic republic is about the prodigious success of house churches, say Iranian Christian leaders.

At least 202 Christians in 24 cities faced "arbitrary" arrest between June 2010 and January 2011, according to Elam Ministries. Elam, run by Iranian expatriates, counted 80 arrests over 2008 and 2009 combined.

"[Iran] has been substantially more public in its oppression of Christianity," said Todd Nettleton, a spokesman for Voice of the Martyrs. "Announcing it on the news, having the mullahs talk about it in their Friday sermons—it's just become a lot more out in the open."

"Persecution has escalated to an unprecedented level," said Abe Ghaffari, executive director of Iranian Christians International. While Iran's historic Armenian and Assyrian congregations usually enjoy freedom of worship, Farsi-speaking house churches hosting converts from Islam work under significant threat.

"In effect, recognition of Christians in the laws of Iran has now become basically recognition of an ethnicity rather than faith," said Hussein Jadidi, a human rights lawyer who recently fled Iran after he became a target in a Christmas sweep that caught 70 other Christians.

The government is concerned, observers say, because more and more Iranian Muslims are converting to Christianity. The house church movement is booming, with converts estimated in the hundreds of thousands. Evangelists are distributing large numbers of New Testaments, and satellite television continually beams Christian programs into the country.

"The government always used to deny that Iranians become Christians," said Elam's David Yeghnazar, but now the church has become too strong to ignore. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei declared the house church network "enemies of Iran" in an October speech, which analysts labeled a rare public acknowledgement of the movement.

"Religion is regarded as part of your national identity," said Issa Dibaj, an Iranian Christian who works as an Elam translator. "If you turn away from your religion … it's as if you have betrayed your country."

"In the past, [the government] would emphasize apostasy as the crime," Jadidi said. "They've changed their tactics; now evangelism, witnessing, and changing religion have become a security crime."

But now analysts say Islam is losing credibility after 30 years of theocracy. Resentment against the reigning regime is spreading and deepening—especially since the disputed 2009 national elections.

"Before the [1979] revolution, the clerics were promising that once Iran becomes an Islamic state, it would be utopia, it would be brotherhood, and everything would be fine," Dibaj said. But since then, Iranians "have seen nothing but war and fighting and international isolation and hatred, [and] they are thirsting for change."

"The Iranian public basically doesn't trust the government anymore," Ghaffari said, "and they don't trust the Muslim clergy anymore, because they have seen a lot of double standards and hypocrisy."

Converts in smaller communities still risk persecution from their own families, but tolerance is growing in urban areas and among the younger generation. "In fact," said Dibaj, "in places like Tehran and more educated communities, if you say, 'I have become a Christian,' they will respect you because of your courage and your independent thinking."

If anything, government persecution has made Christianity much more attractive, said Yegh-nazar. "When government officials are on television telling people not to read the Scriptures, that generates more interest in the Scriptures."

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Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_Chinese_protests


Crowd in front of a McDonald's in Wangfujing on 20 February 2011

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Colo(u)r Revolutions - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_revolutions

 Colour revolutions is a term that was widely used by the media to describe related movements that developed in several societies in the CIS (former USSR) and Balkan states during the early 2000s. The term has also been applied to a number of revolutions elsewhere, including in the Middle East. Some observers^[who?] have called the events a revolutionary wave, the origins of which can be traced back to the Indian independence movement in the 1920s, the Portuguese Carnation Revolution in the 1970s, and the 1986 People Power Revolution (sometimes called the "Yellow Revolution") in the Philippines.

Participants in the colour revolutions have mostly used nonviolent resistance, also called civil resistance. Such methods as demonstrations, strikes and interventions have been intended protest against governments seen as corrupt and/or authoritarian, and to advocate democracy; and they have also created strong pressure for change. These movements generally adopted a specific colour or flower as their symbol. The colour revolutions are notable for the important role of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and particularly student activists in organising creative non-violent resistance.

Such movements have had a measure of success, as for example in Serbia's Bulldozer Revolution (2000); in Georgia's Rose Revolution (2003); and in Ukraine's Orange Revolution (2004). In most but not all cases, massive street protests followed disputed elections, or requests for fair elections, and led to the resignation or overthrow of leaders considered by their opponents to be authoritarian. Some events have been called "colour revolutions" but are different from the above cases in certain basic characteristics. Examples include Lebanon's Cedar Revolution (2005); and Kuwait's Blue Revolution (2005).