No religious group is persecuted so terribly as Christians

By Dr Tom Goodfellow

THE CONSERVATIVE WOMAN

January 28, 2026

LET me state from the outset that I regard anti-Semitism to be horrific. The sight of Oxford students marching in London shouting ‘globalise the Intifada’ or ‘from the river to the sea’, implying that all Jewish people should be exterminated, makes me ashamed of my country.

The attack on the Manchester synagogue, and Jewish children too frightened to go to school is beyond the pale. The October 7 massacre and the atrocity on Bondi Beach are simply the most dreadful manifestations of ‘the oldest hatred’. Innocent Jewish victims of this behaviour have my sympathies and fullest support.

However, it is concerning that while the media focus on such dreadful things, a bigger picture is ignored, which is the appalling persecution of Christians in many parts of the world. This is confirmed by latest World Watch List annual ranking of the 50 countries in the world where Christians face the most extreme persecution just published by Open Doors. The numbers are quite dreadful.

In November for example hundreds of children were abducted by terrorists from their Catholic school in north Nigeria. Since the notorious Chibok abduction in 2014, when more than 200 schoolgirls were kidnapped, such abductions have escalated, almost exclusively Christian children. Many of the girls taken in 2014 were forced to convert to Islam and married to terrorists (ie raped). There are a number of terrorist groups in Nigeria, and Christians are repeatedly targeted, tortured and killed, and church buildings destroyed.

Nigeria is not alone in Africa. There is extreme violence against Christians in Somalia, Yemen, Libya, Sudan and Eritrea. In Pakistan and India Christians are regularly persecuted. If a Muslim does not like his Christian neighbour all he needs to do is accuse him of disrespecting a copy of the Koran, and he will be immediately arrested and tried for blasphemy, almost certainly found guilty and imprisoned, and his family expelled from their home.

The very worst country in the world however for persecution against Christians is North Korea where the only worship tolerated is that of the evil little fat man who leads the country. No public profession of Christianity of any sort is permitted and secret believers are regularly betrayed, arrested, tortured and confined in concentration camps. Their families, even if not Christian, may also be rounded up and imprisoned. Bibles are illegal, as are secret radios for believers to listen to Christian broadcasts. Children are encouraged to betray their parents. The list of oppression is endless.

The Iranians traditionally are a very spiritual nation with a deep love of poetry and music. Despite an Islamic regime which is virulently hostile to Christianity many Iranians are becoming Christians in face of the severe risks this involves. Believers from a Muslim background are regarded as apostates and may be given long prison sentences where they are treated worse than other prisoners in terms of small rations of food, long interrogations, sexual abuse and torture. Historical groups such as Armenian and Assyrian churches are tolerated but treated as second-class citizens.

I have touched on only a few countries. The charity Open Borders covers more than 60 countries where Christians are persecuted. They state that worldwide 380million Christians face persecution and discrimination, a staggering number. Of their watchlist of the worst 50 countries, 13 have extreme levels of persecution, and the rest are rated very high. It makes sombre reading.

Part of the reason that we in the UK are largely unaware of this is because we do not experience anything remotely like these other countries. Nevertheless, you may get arrested for silently praying outside an abortion clinic. Silently praying: that is thinking, which becomes thought crime. Now where have we heard of that before?

A street gospel preacher may be arrested for speaking ‘hate crime’ if someone chooses to be offended (God only had one Son, and he made him a gospel preacher; Mark 1:38). There is clearly an undercurrent of latent hostility to Christianity in this country, shown in many subtle ways. Where will it lead?

I am not trying to suggest a league table of atrocities – all are vile. But, world-wide and on a purely numerical basis, the atrocities inflicted on Christians – violence, eviction, abduction, captivity, rape, imprisonment, murder – far exceed crimes committed against any other group because of their religious faith.

I am convinced that, although there may be other factors involved, anti-Semitism and anti-Christian hostility are primarily from the same manger – literally. Christ was a Jew, fully immersed in the historic Jewish scriptures. In spite of the tinsel-clad nativity scenes ‘in the bleak mid-winter’, with shepherds with tea-towels on their heads, and three kings from the orient (they weren’t kings, but astrologers/astronomers, and all we know is that there were more than one), the baby grew into a man who was ‘despised and rejected’.

In the traditional Service of Nine Lessons and Carols, the last lesson is from John 1:10-14. ‘He was in the world, and though the world was made by him, the world did not recognise him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.’

We now live in a world which has rejected Christ, who told his disciples: ‘If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first’ (John 15:18).

I am convinced that this is the real ‘oldest hatred’, as demonstrated throughout the world today, whether it be anti-Semitic or anti-Christian.

END