Please pray for your brothers and sisters’ safety and security in Afghanistan.
Believers in Afghanistan cannot openly live and is impossible to disclose their faith to the Muslims, because leaving Islam is regarded a sin, and Christian converts face horrible consequence if their faith to Jesus Christ is discovered by the Muslims. They have two choices; either they have to flee the country or they will killed.
If a Christian’s family discovers they have converted, their family, relatives, clan or tribe has to save their honor by disowning the believer, or even killing them. Christians from a Muslim background can also be sectioned in psychiatric hospital, because leaving Islam is considered a sign of insanity.
Afghanistan is considered the second oppressive country against Christians after North Korea, so persecution of a believer is as easy as drinking a sip of water. Afghans as fanatic Muslims, culturally oppose the Gospel, the just accept the teaching of Muhammad. Significant security issues make great challenges for all believers throughout the country. No one can live in peace due to widespread presence of terrorist organizations that do not tolerate the ideas except their own.
99.8 percent of Afghans are Muslims, with 80 percent Sunni and 20 percent Shiite. Their split happened after Muhammad death and both sects are against the growth of Christianity in Afghanistan.
National and subnational governments are highly antagonistic toward Christians. Extremist groups, including the Taliban and the self-proclaimed Islamic State (ISIS), are active, and believers are also persecuted by their families, friends and communities.
Afghan Christians cannot worship openly. They must worship in homes or other small venues, and evangelism is forbidden. Christians and seekers are highly secretive about their faith or interest in Christianity, especially following a surge of arrests in the past decade. Beatings, torture and kidnappings are routine for Christians in Afghanistan. Although waves of Christians have moved to neighboring countries to worship openly. A small number of Christians are martyred every year in Afghanistan, but their deaths generally occur without public knowledge. A few are also in prison, but imprisonment is not common. Christian converts from Islam are often killed by family members or other radicalized Muslims before any legal proceedings can begin.
Since there are no churches or Christian bookstores in Afghanistan, Bibles are available only through underground ministry networks or in digital formats. There is little access to printed Bibles, and owning one is extremely dangerous. Most believers do not have their own Bible, but online Bibles and other digital formats are available and extremely helpful to believers and seekers. Bible translation efforts are underway for the languages of some people groups who do not have a Bible in their native language.
