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More than half of Christians in UK experience ‘hostility and ridicule’ for faith: study

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More than half of Christians in the United Kingdom claim to have experienced hostility and ridicule for their faith, according to a study released Thursday.

The report, titled “The Costs of Keeping the Faith,” was compiled by the nonprofit Voice for Justice UK (VfJUK) and found that of the more than 1,500 respondents from different Christian denominations and age groups, 56% reported negative pushback for sharing their beliefs in some capacity.

Of those under 35, that number jumped to 61%.

“Bullying was also reported,” reads an executive summary of the report’s findings. “Christians did not feel free to express their views at work. The younger generation appeared to have had more of these negative experiences than the older generation, suggesting that things were getting worse.”

While acknowledging the theoretical legal safeguards for free speech in the U.K., the study claimed the country has exhibited “some of the highest levels of intolerance and discrimination against Christians in Europe,” which researchers attributed to hate speech laws that have led to a prevalence of “harassment, self-censorship, direct and indirect discrimination.”

The third chapter of the study delves into discrimination, which researchers noted is increasingly reported among younger Christians in the U.K. Some of the difficulties were reported in the workplace and ranged from being forced to work unnecessarily on a Sunday to being effectively forced to keep their Christian beliefs to themselves for fear of retribution.

The fourth chapter dedicates special attention to the National Health Service (NHS), which has seen repeated incidents of Christian employees being punished, such as Mary Onuoha, who sued after being forced to resign from a London hospital for wearing a cross necklace.

The study also goes on to explore some of the anti-Christian sentiment in U.K. education, where Christian parents and teachers say they feel increasingly shut out and discriminated against.

The study suggests the situation in the mainstream churches is no better, with the ninth chapter of the study exploring how many of them are “adopting progressive, secular ideologies, with the result that laity can feel discriminated against and are increasingly leaving them.”

Many of the Christians surveyed who held to a biblical standard did not identify with any particular Christian denomination, the researchers noted.

The study found that much of the cultural hostility toward Christians in the U.K. emerges from LBGT ideology and that most of the younger Christians they interviewed who reported worsening persecution also held to a firm belief in biblical teachings regarding sexuality, gender and marriage.

“Our research showed that when it comes to beliefs about marriage, sex, and gender, while the rest of society was swept along by progressive ideologies, most Christians appear to have remained steadfast to orthodox Christian faith,” the researchers wrote. “Counterintuitively, it was often the younger generation who had more traditional views than the older generation.”

“This set Christians on a collision course with progressives,” they added.

The Observatory on Intolerance and Discrimination Against Christians (OIDAC) in Europe issued a statement noting how the study’s “alarming” findings echo some of the trends the observatory has discovered regarding the rise of anti-Christian sentiment in historically Christian countries.

The OIDAC in Europe, the OIDAC in Latin America and the International Institute for Religious Freedom compiled a report in 2022 titled “Perceptions on Self-Censorship: Confirming and Understanding the ‘Chilling Effect,'” which found that many Christians in such countries are silencing themselves.

To avoid general and vague assessments, the researchers limited themselves to European Christians in France and Germany and Latin American Christians in Mexico and Colombia.

They found that despite the lack of overt, physical persecution, many Christians in those countries were self-censoring their beliefs to avoid more subtle and pervasive persecution, which the study likened to “death by a thousand cuts.”

“A few cuts do not kill you and barely hurt,” researchers said at the time. “But continuous small strikes eventually have an impact. We posit that the accumulation of seemingly insignificant incidents creates an environment in which Christians do not feel comfortable — to some degree — to live their faith freely.”

“Indeed, Western Christians experience a ‘chilling effect’ resulting from perceived pressures in their cultural environment, related to widely mediatized court cases,” they added.

The number of Christians in the U.K. has been declining, according to a 2022 survey of more than 3,000 U.K. adults commissioned by five Christian organizations.

According to data released by the U.K.’s Office for National Statistics that year, less than half of the population identifies as Christian for the first time since the country’s first census in 1801.

The data showed that only 46.2% — or 27.5 million of the country’s more than 67 million people — say they are Christian. In the 2011 census, 59.3% of the population — or 33.3 million people — described themselves as Christian.
Sources:Christian Post

http://theendtimeradio.com

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ENANCHORED ഒരുക്കുന്ന യുവജന മീറ്റിംഗ് UKയിൽ

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ENANCHORED ൻ്റെ ആഭിമുഖ്യത്തിൽ യുകെ Seaham Sunderland യൂത്ത് സെൻ്ററിൽ വെച്ച് യുവജന മീറ്റിംഗ് ഒക്ടോബർ 26 ന് രാവിലെ 9:30 മുതൽ വൈകിട്ട് 4 മണി വരെ നടത്തപ്പെടും. ജെയ്സൺ ജെയിംസ്, ജിബിൻ എബ്രഹാം, ശാലോം ജേക്കബ് എന്നിവർ ശുശ്രൂഷിക്കും. 13 വയസ്സ് മുതൽ 30 വയസു_വരെയുള്ള യൗവനക്കാർക്ക് വേണ്ടിയുള്ള പ്രോഗ്രാം ആണ് നടക്കുന്നത്. മ്യൂസിക്, ഗെയിംസ്, ഡിസ്കഷൻസ്, ബൈബിൾ സ്റ്റഡി, ചോദ്യോത്തര പരിപാടി, ലൗ ഫീസ്റ്റ് എന്നിവയാണ് യൗവനക്കാർക്ക് വേണ്ടി ഒരുക്കിയിരിക്കുന്നത്. ബ്രദർ , എൽവിൻ ഡാനിയേൽ ഈ പ്രോഗ്രാമിന് നേതൃത്വം കൊടുക്കുന്നു.
Sources:gospelmirror

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22 മത് മലയാളി പെന്തക്കോസ്റ്റൽ അസോസിയേഷൻ നാഷണൽ കോൺഫറൻസ് 2025 ഇംഗ്ലണ്ടിലെ ബ്രിസ്റ്റോൾ പട്ടണത്തിൽ.

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യൂറോപ്പിലെ മലയാളി പെന്തകോസ്ത് സമൂഹത്തിന്റെ ഏറ്റവും വലിയ ആത്‌മീയ സംഗമമായ 22 മത്‌ എം പി എ യു കെ യുടെ നാഷണൽ കോൺഫ്രൻസ് ഇംഗ്ലണ്ടിലെ ബ്രിസ്റ്റോൾ പട്ടണത്തിൽ വെlച്ച് 2025 ഏപ്രിൽ 18, 19, 20 തീയതികളിൽ നടത്തപ്പെടുന്നു. മലയാളി പെന്തകോസ്റ്റൽ അസോസിയേഷൻ പ്രസിഡന്റ് റവ ബിനോയ് എബ്രഹാം ഉദ്ഘാടനം ചെയ്യുന്ന കോൺഫ്രൻസിൽ ദൈവവചന ശുശ്രുഷക്കായി പാസ്റ്റർ ബി മോനച്ചൻ മുഖ്യ പ്രസംഗികനായിരിക്കും. എം പി എ ക്വയർ ആരാധനകൾക്ക് നേതൃത്വം നൽകുന്നു. യുവജനങ്ങൾക്കും സഹോദരിമാർക്കും പ്രത്യേക സെക്ഷനും നടത്തപ്പെടും. ഞായറാഴ്ച പൊതു ആരാധനയോടെ അവസാനിക്കും
ഇത്തവണത്തെ കോൺഫ്രൻസിൽ യുവ തലമുറയുടെ കൂടുതൽ പങ്കാളിത്തത്തോടെ കൂടുതൽ മികവാർന്ന നിലയിൽ നടത്തുന്നതിനുള്ള ക്രമീകരണങ്ങൾ നടന്നു വരുന്നു. കോൺഫറൻസിന്റെ വിജയത്തിനായി ജനറൽ കമ്മറ്റിയിൽ പാസ്റ്റർ സാംകുട്ടി പാപ്പച്ചൻ (വൈസ് പ്രസിഡന്റ്), പാസ്റ്റർ ഡിഗോൾ ലൂയിസ് (സെക്രട്ടറി), പാസ്റ്റർ പി സി സേവ്യർ (ജോ: സെക്രട്ടറി), പാസ്റ്റർ ജിനു മാത്യു (ട്രഷറർ) എന്നിവർ പ്രവർത്തനങ്ങൾ വിലയിരുത്തി. കൂടുതൽ ക്രമീകരണങ്ങൾ പിന്നീട് അറിയിക്കുന്നതായിരിക്കും.
Sources:Middleeast Christian Youth Ministries

http://theendtimeradio.com

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How former atheist Ayaan Hirsi Ali found peace in Christ

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When you hear the term New Atheism, you may think of Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins. But you are probably less familiar with Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who stood right by their side in strongly denouncing Christianity. This influential scholar and intellectual was essentially the fifth most prominent new atheist behind Hitchens, Dawkins, Sam Harris and Daniel Dennett.

Hirsi Ali was raised as a Muslim in Somalia. But she eventually began to oppose forced marriage, honor killing, child marriage, and female genital mutilation. Ayaan renounced her Islamic faith and became an atheist. She moved to the Netherlands at the age of 23 and rose to become a top-ranking politician.

Hirsi Ali’s books, Infidel: My Life (2007) and Heretic: Why Islam Needs a Reformation Now (2015) became bestsellers. But rejecting Islam and embracing atheism still left her soul feeling empty, in spite of the fact that “Hirsi Ali was a central figure in New Atheism since its beginnings.”

Last year, Hirsi Ali announced that she had become a Christian, which of course shocked her atheist friends. But it wasn’t intellectual arguments that ultimately convinced Hirsi Ali to embrace Christianity. It was what happened when she humbled herself before the God of the universe. Hirsi Ali prayed fervently and cried out to the Lord for help.

In a friendly discussion & debate with Richard Dawkins a few months ago, Ayaan explained her journey: “I had a personal crisis … I lived for about a decade with intense depression and anxiety, self-loathing. I hit rock bottom. I went to a place where I actually didn’t want to live anymore, but I wasn’t brave enough to take my own life. I was self-medicating. Over a long period of time, I saw psychiatrists and other doctors. I was trying to understand my condition and I was trying to treat it with the help of pure evidence-based science.”

Hirsi Ali continued, “I saw one therapist who said, ‘Perhaps you have something else.’ She described it as ‘spiritual bankruptcy,’ and that resonated with me. And having reached a place where I had absolutely nothing to lose, I prayed, and I prayed desperately. And for me, that was a turning point. And what happened after that is a miracle in its own right.”

Hirsi Ali learned the painful lesson that Islam provides no inner peace, but only brutality and fear, especially for women and young girls. Likewise, she discovered firsthand that atheism also leaves your soul feeling empty. Ayaan was terribly unfulfilled, in spite of her close friendships with Hitchens, Dawkins, Harris and Dennett. Atheism simply did not satisfy the deep longings within her, and even brought her to the brink of suicide.

Dawkins finds it next to impossible to see where Hirsi Ali is coming from today. She has tried to help him understand that there are “different planes of perception.” She compares it to her inability to perceive the significance of Jackson Pollock’s abstract impressionist art. Where one person perceives brilliance, another is left perplexed as to its beauty.

Hirsi Ali said, “When I was an atheist, I was going all over the United States and Europe, mocking Christians, making fun of them, making fun of faith, as you’re doing now dear Richard. I was walking with six to seven men at any given time, protecting me, armed, from things that I said that were offensive to Muslims. Christians were writing me letters saying, ‘We’re going to pray for you. You are misguided.’ And I think that alone defines for me the distinction between mainstream Christianity and mainstream Islam.”

Hirsi Ali is learning that not only does Christ bring peace to your soul when you accept Him as Savior, but Jesus actually turns His followers into peace-loving people who pray for their enemies, rather than taking up arms against them.

Dawkins asked Hirsi Ali, “You don’t believe Jesus rose from the dead, surely?” She said, “I choose to believe that Jesus rose from the dead.” Every follower of Christ believes in the Lord’s death on the cross for our sins, as well as His resurrection from the dead. Hirsi Ali then said, “It has to go back to, ‘Is there something or is there nothing?'” Dawkins obviously believes there is nothing, which is precisely what his ideology provides for those who choose atheism. Hirsi Ali admitted, “For years I agreed with you that there is nothing.”

Dawkins chose to blurt out this sarcastic and blasphemous comment about Christianity: “The idea that God couldn’t think of a better way to forgive the sins of humanity than to have His Son crucified. That is a disgusting idea.”

How can Dawkins remain so blind to the truth? He is hardening his heart and deliberating sinning against the Holy Spirit by continually rejecting God’s plan of salvation. Sadly, Dawkins may have already reached his personal point of no return. Many wondered the same thing about Hitchens, which I addressed in a CP op-ed earlier this year: “Christopher Hitchens Now Realizes God is Great.”

How are we to understand these different planes of perception? The Apostle Paul explained it this way: “The man without the (Holy) Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them” (1 Corinthians 2:14). “The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God” (1 Corinthians 1:18).

Richard Dawkins remains on a much lower plane of perception than Hirsi Ali. The only way to gain what I refer to as “sanctified reason” is to do what Hirsi Ali did when she humbled herself before Almighty God in prayer. It requires humility to “repent and believe the good news” (Mark 1:15). When Dawkins referred to Christ’s crucifixion as a “disgusting idea,” Hirsi Ali gently responded, “God gave us free will.”

By the grace of God, Hirsi Ali was “rescued from the dominion of darkness and brought into the kingdom of the Son, He (the Father) loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins” (Colossians 1:13-14). And there is no greater peace than having a relationship with your Creator and knowing that your sins are forgiven and washed away by the blood of Jesus Christ who “died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God” (1 Peter 3:18).
Sources:Christian Post

http://theendtimeradio.com

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