generalspeaking

Christianity's Crucible

Damascus, Syria - Aug 23, 2009: Today  in a divine ceremony held at the St. Peter's & St. Paul's Cathedral in the Monastery of St. Aphrem the Syrian, Ma`rrat Sayyidnaya, Damascus, His Holiness Ignatius Zakka-I Iwas, the Patriarch of Antioch & all the East and the Supreme head of the Universal Syrian Orthodox Church, ordained Very. Rev. Yaq'ub Ramban from India Auxiliary Metropolitan, by name Mor Anthonios Yaqu'b, for the St. Antony's Mission in Honnavar under the Evangelical Association of the East.

The venerable glory that was the Syriac Church in Syria is vanishing. Its faithful have been preyed upon, and their numbers have steadily declined as they seek rescue by abandoning their country in an effort to survive the conflict that is consuming Syria. Where Muslim sectarian violence is claiming the lives of the Christians among them, whose religious legitimacy is scorned and threatened.

"It began as kidnapping for money, but then they started telling me I should worship Allah. I was with five others. We were tied and blindfolded and pushed down on our knees. One of the kidnappers leaned so close to my face I could feel his breath. He hissed, 'Why don't you become a Muslim? Then you can be free."

When the Syrian revolution that was initiated with Syrian Sunnis representing the majority population of a country dominated by a Shia-minority government asking for equal representation and rights, it was assumed that if and when 'sides' would be taken, Syrian Christians, fearing that under a dominant Sunni Muslim administration they would fare less well than under Alawite rule, would support the regime.

They and the country's Kurds for whom human rights and citizenship under President Bashar al Assad represented oppression and misery, were expected to waver between support for either belligerents. When the facts appear otherwise; neither the Kurds nor the Christians have leveraged themselves as a bloc to wage battle on behalf of either the Shia or the Sunni elements.

Life for Christians in Muslim-majority countries has always been tentatively anxious, but by and large in the past attitudes were more relaxed and the sects and the religions got on together, knowing one another as neighbours from antiquity forward. As Islamism has developed and grown, with both Shia and Sunni becoming steadily more fanatical in their observance of "pure" Islam, the plight of the Christians among them has become more acute.

The Middle East has been steadily draining itself of its Christians. Self-preservation has deemed that those who could afford to, would seek haven, migrating elsewhere, to Christian-compassionate countries. Poor farmers living off the land haven't the luxury of emigrating, and their love of the country they have lived in for thousands of years links them inextricably to the dear and the familiar.

Christians represent about ten percent of the entire 21-million population of Syria. A relative number equal to that of Egypt with its 80-million population, where Christians there are also fearful of their future, though perhaps somewhat less so with the removal of the Muslim Brotherhood from power. At least a third of Christians in northeastern Syria where they have traditionally lived, have fled, and few are expected to return.

Desperate economic conditions have descended, along with lawlessness and the persecution brought by rebel groups believing that Christian support of the regime marks them out as a target for revenge. To Syria's Christians it seemed the lesser of all evils for their self-preservation that they remain neutral rather than "choosing sides" in the conflict. Having done so hasn't given them any relief from the rebels' belief in their betrayals by clinging to the regime.

"The only unprotected group are the Christians. The Arabs had arms coming from Saudi and Qatar, the Kurds had help from Kurdistan. We had no weapons at all. We are not with the regime. Many times the Islamists didn't want us to join them in the demonstrations. We tried to participate but we were not given a role. It felt as though it was a strategy to force Christians out of the revolution."

A Christian member of the Syrian National Coalition who hails from Hasakah, an ancestral area for Syrian Christians, describes how he and his colleagues had attempted to approach Western officials to ask for weapons for Christian groups to be enabled to defend their areas. "The West wants to arm the seculars or "West-friendly" people. Well, we, the Syriac Christians, are those people. We want arms to protect our communities", said Bassam Ishak.

"We spoke to Western diplomats asking for help, and everyone ignored us."

Labels: Christianity, Conflict, Defence, Islamism, Revolution, Syria

posted by Pieface @ Monday, August 05, 2013