David QuinnPersecution of Christians is not a fashionable cause
In mid-February the Nigerian terrorist group Boko Haram, currently making headlines around the world, attacked the Christian village of Izghe in the north of the country killing at least 106 people and specifically targeting male residents.
This attack, one of many on Christians by Boko Haram, attracted almost no international publicity much less celebrities posting pictures of themselves online condemning the attack.
What has finally made Boko Haram almost a household name in the West is their kidnapping of over 200 mainly Christian schoolgirls for the ‘crime’ of receiving a Western education.
Boko Haram is actually the nickname of the organisation. It means ‘Western education is forbidden’. The full Arabic version of their name means ‘People Committed to the Propagation of the Prophet’s Teachings and Jihad’.
They take their inspiration from a text in the Koran which says: “Anyone who is not governed by what Allah has revealed is among the transgressors.”
They were founded in 2002 as an ultra-Islamic group and since 2009 have been attempting to found an Islamic state through violence. Their violence has frequently targeted Christians but also Muslims opposed to them.
‘Western’ influence
They are against anyone, male or female, receiving a ‘Western’ education, or indeed coming under any kind of ‘Western’ influence.
They associate Western education with Christian education and there is a good reason for this because Christian missionaries, mainly Irish Holy Ghost Fathers set up schools all over southern Nigeria for both boys and girls.
A Holy Ghost Father (or ‘Spiritan’ as they’re now called) told me the other day that there was big resistance in the Muslim north of the country to them setting up schools there, even though there is a (rapidly diminishing) Christian population in the north.
Some of the more obtuse critics of religion think religion is all of the same kind, all equally bad and that what is done in the name of one religion is a slur on all religions. But that is like claiming politics is all of the same kind and crimes committed in the name of one form of politics is a stain on all kinds of politics.
It is obvious that we should distinguish between bad and good politics and bad and good religion. Terrible things have been done in the name of Christianity but today Christianity is overwhelmingly peaceful in all parts of the world but much violence is carried out in the name of Islam which is in a militant phase. Violent Muslim groups tend to be called ‘Islamist’ and so Boko Haram is often called ‘Islamist’.
This Islamist group would obviously be violently opposed to everything Irish missionaries have done in Nigeria over the last hundred years and will literally stop at nothing to stop Christian influence spreading to the north of the country. They are killing Christians to force Christians to move to the south of the country and they are succeeding.
The question arises, why hasn’t the world cared about this? Why did it take the kidnapping of those school girls to make us start paying attention? There are two reasons in all probability. One is that the Western world hasn’t shown much concern for what is happening to Christians in other parts of the world for decades.
This is because we are much more secular than we were and all because many of us are now very hostile towards Christianity. It is all because it is very hard for us in the once Christian-dominated West to imagine that Christians can be a persecuted minority anywhere even though Christianity is now the most persecuted religion in the world with thousands if not tens of thousands of Christians being killed each year because of their faith.
This is causing Christians to abandon parts of the world where they have lived since the dawn of Christianity. Christians in much of the Middle East are extremely beleaguered and there is almost no fuss in the West about it. That is a scandal. Not even Western Christians seem to care much and that is an even greater scandal.
A second reason for the sudden interest in the activities of Boko Haram is the fact that they targeted girls on this occasion. Education is obviously one of the best ways to empower any group and an attack on the education of girls is an attack on female empowerment. Therefore the attack on these girls is an attack on the ideals of feminism, although not only feminism seeing as so many schools in Nigeria, as elsewhere in the world, were founded by Christians.
But the fact is that feminism is far more fashionable cause in the West than Christianity and this explains why this latest incident has caused so many headlines compared with the killing and shooting of Christians.
Photograph
It is why Michelle Obama (below) had a photograph posted of herself online calling for the girls to be freed and it why so many celebrities have jumped on the bandwagon.
It also explains why the feminist protest group in Russia, Pussy Riot became a cause célèbre in the West after they were arrested and served time in prison for staging a protest in Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Saviour.
In Russia Christian groups not approved by the state, often American Evangelicals, are attacked, harassed and arrested. This attracts no international attention to speak of much less interviews on top rating shows in the West, much less on RTÉ.
So it is a good thing indeed that Boko Haram is finally attracting the international attention and condemnation it deserves but it should have attracted this attention years ago but didn’t because the persecution of Christians is simply not a fashionable cause