Christianity Under Attack: Religious Freedom Protects It. Without it Many Die. May God Bless and Preserve America's Freedoms

IT MAKES SENSE TO ME

by Larry Peterson

Countless articles, essays, blogs and so forth will be in print as we welcome in the New year of 2015. I'm not going to reminisce or wallow in what might have been or what should be. I just want to mention a family to you. Maybe you have heard of them, maybe not. Their names were Magdy Tawfiq, his wife, Sahar Rizk and their daughters, Catherine, 13 and two younger girls aged 10 and aged 9. Unlike Americans, these people did not have the Constitution of the United States of America in force to protect them. No, they were Coptic Christians (which is Catholic too) and they lived in Libya. They were our  Christian brothers and sisters in faith. They loved Jesus Christ and the message of Love and Hope and Salvation that He brought to all mankind. They believed as we do. Unlike us they are dead. They were brutally murdered because of their love and respect for the Son of God, Jesus.

Sahar and Magdy; July 20, 2000

Magdy and Sahar were married on July 20, 2000 and moved to Libya in 2001. Magdy worked at a Diabetes clinic in Sirte for two years and then  he began working with Sahar at the Jarf Health Center. People reported that Doctor Magdy treated all the people there regardless of having money or not and was beloved by everyone. They loved God, each other and tried their best to treat all people equally.

At 4:00 am on Tuesday, December 23, Doctor Magdy woke to knocking on the door of his building. He assumed it was a patient with an emergency needing immediate attention. When he opened the door he was greeted by armed masked men. They attacked him, handcuffed him and placed him in a chair. The family, living in fear after many threats from Ansar Al-Sharia, had become the target of cowardly, masked, gunmen who were taking their orders from the realm of evil.

The hooded demons went to the bedroom and shot Sahar dead. Then they took Doctor Magdy outside  and shot him through the head and chest leaving his crumpled body  handcuffed in a heap. Catherine's 13-year old body was found outside of town. The two youngest girls were forced to watch the murders. They were left alive to tell the story and are now living with relatives. It is all so hard to even imagine what these kind, decent, innocent people have to endure prior to their actual deaths. The fear, the anxiety, the hopelessness must be beyond anything we here in America can ever fathom.

We live in America. They lived in Libya. We share the same faith, the only difference being we are here and they are there. Therefore, based on location, we live and they die. And how much  do we hear about these atrocities and the virtual elimination of Christianity throughout the Middle East and other parts of the world? We hear hardly anything. You and I can get up on a Sunday morning and head off to our  churches and none  of us is concerned about our safety. Not one of us worries about being murdered for believing in Jesus.

Yet, in other parts of the world on the very same day we are going contentedly off to Church, our Christian brothers and sisters, including children and babies, are being brutalized, raped, beheaded, burned, shot and hanged for believing exactly what we believe. Look at the wedding photo of Magdy and Sahar. The picture might have been taken in Milwaukee, or New York or maybe Atlanta or Dallas. If that had been the case then they would still be alive and this story would not have to be written, But the truth is evil is running rampant throughout the world and its primary target is Christianity.

ALL Americans should embrace with all their might the freedoms our Founding Fathers handed down to us, especially Freedom of Religion. Yet there are those who portray this freedom and Christianity as an affront to them. They do not like religion because it stands its ground against the forces of secularism. These Americans want to purge religion from the public square. They will even go to court to have a cross removed from somewhere they have decided should not have it. Those that do this are just selfish and self consumed for not respecting so many of their fellow citizens and for refusing to accept the fact that they are chipping away at the very freedoms that give them the right to  protest in the first place.

They might want to consider that the Islamist radicals want them dead too. If you are an American they hate you whether or not you are a Catholic, a Jew, or an atheist. They  hate anyone who is an American.  I wish they would look at the wedding photo of Magdy and Sahar. They did not have the freedom we have. They have been slaughtered.

As we embark on the journey that is the year, 2015, I would like to remember people such as Father Frans Van der Lugt, murdered by ISIS in March because he was a Catholic priest. He was 76 years old. Pray for Asia  Bibi, a mother of five, in prison in Pakistan for five years and waiting to be hanged. Her crime--"blasphemy". She is Catholic and defended Jesus. Then there is Salem Matti Kourk who was hiding out in Mosul and went to find some food. He was captured by ISIS , beaten, murdered and his body left in front of the Church of the Virgin Mary, which ISIS had also destroyed.  Of course we cannot  forget the thousands of men, women and children kidnapped, murdered and mutilated throughout the year of 2014 by the evil ones who hate Christianity. Genocide against Christians is real.

I end this with a link to the story I wrote about "Little Christy". If ever there was a picture that could show the face of evil in this world this blog has it. Let us celebrate our freedoms as Americans and fight to the bitter end to protect them. The alternative is beyond imagination.

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2015  May God's Blessings be upon you