Christians in Iraq

Writing in an opinion column in the London Times in late May, outgoing British Prime Minister Tony Blair expressed his bemusement that Muslims in Iraq (and in Afghanistan) should be angry about the invasion he spearheaded with US President George W Bush, and its bungled aftermath.

The removal of Iraqi tyrant Saddam Hussein left a predictable power vacuum which has created an irresolvable crisis in a country where the toll of random death by violence now effortlessly exceeds that of the prolifically murderous Saddam regime.

Mr Blair is mistaken when he believes that Iraq’s Muslims are insufficiently grateful for the removal of Saddam. Ordinary Iraqi Muslims have little to be thankful for. Paradoxically only Iran and the Islamic terrorists who hate Messrs Blair and Bush the most will be gladdened by the grievous situation created by the invasion and the occupation.

Nor can Mr Blair expect gratitude from Iraq’s Christian minority, a large number of them Catholics of the Chaldean rite.

As noted in this week’s issue, that community suffered no persecution under Saddam on religious grounds; indeed, their religious freedom enjoyed greater protection in Iraq than anywhere else in the Middle East.

Today, Muslim extremists and criminals target Christian Iraqis specifically because of their religion. Catholic priests are being kidnapped for ransom, and in one particularly chilling murder of a Christian, the victim was crucified, a cruel symbolism surely intended to intimidate the Christian community.

It must be emphasised that such acts are contrary to and unrepresentative of Islam, and surely are condemned by all Muslims of good will.

It is a bitter irony that the safety of Iraq’s Christians was seriously compromised by two leaders who profess to be resolute Christians.

For every case of a murdered, brutalised, persecuted and exiled Iraqi Christian, Messrs Blair and Bush must take a large share of responsibility.

The US and Britain are now beginning to acknowledge that they cannot get the insurrectionist genie of chaos, which they so recklessly released, back into the bottle. If there is a formula to establish peace in Iraq, it will more than likely be implemented by Iran—a less than auspicious prospect.

None of this will be of comfort to Iraq’s vulnerable Christians, who are increasingly becoming strangers in their own land.

Christians living under oppressive conditions anywhere need our collective solidarity. We need to support and pray for our fellow Christians in Iraq and in other countries where the followers of Christ are being persecuted by the state or by religious fanatics—in Iraq, in Pakistan, in China, in Saudi Arabia, in Indonesia, in Sudan, even in parts of India.

Those in positions to do so should communicate it very clearly to their influential Muslim friends that the attacks on Christians in Iraq are as intolerable as is persecution of Muslims elsewhere. Muslims should be encouraged to urge their leaders to strongly and loudly condemn attacks on minority faiths, and to call for their protection from state, criminal and extremist attacks.