Persecution of Christians in Sudan: many centuries ago, during the time of the Emperor Justinian (AD 527-565), Nubia (modern-day Sudan) was a center of Christianity. Today, most of the small minority of Sudanese who are Christians are Roman Catholic or Protestant, and there is also still a small number of Greek Orthodox Christians there.
The words in this article, “We will kill you because you left Islam and became infidel,” succinctly illustrate the difficulties that converts to Christianity face. May Almighty God bless Sudan nonetheless with a genuine transformation, and turn the hearts of the governing authorities and the people to Christ in repentance.
For previous ChristianPersecution.com coverage of the persecution of Christians in Sudan, see here.
“Former Muslim from Sudan Forced into Hiding,” Morning Star News, March 10, 2020:
JUBA, South Sudan (Morning Star News) – It was more than a year ago that Muslims in the disputed area between Sudan and South Sudan noticed that Ahmed Alnour was no longer reciting his Islamic prayers five times a day.
The tribesman of the ethnic Misseriya Arabs was helping support his wife and seven children in Sudan working as a scrap trader at the Ameth common market in Abyei, a 4,072-square mile special administrative area on the border formed from the peace agreement that ended civil war in Sudan in 2005.
Alnour would soon have to leave that work, forced to flee when area Muslims confirmed that he had become a Christian.
“I saw them and heard them saying, ‘We will kill you because you left Islam and became infidel,’” he said of their attempt to burn down his home the afternoon of April 1, 2019.
Neighbors were able to douse the flames and he escaped unharmed, but on April 8 the assailants returned at 1 a.m. as he slept. He awoke to find his house in flames.
Alnour told Morning Star News that before Christians arrived to rescue him, he heard one of the assailants say in Arabic, “Let us throw him back in the fire, since he has abandoned Islam.”
The Christians took him to a hospital for treatment the following morning. He had lost all his possessions in the fire, including 600,000 South Sudanese pounds equivalent to US$6,000, but he had not lost his faith in Christ, he said….
He was baptized at a church last Christmas. In hiding since the attacks last year, he has obtained a job and temporary quarters from church friends at an undisclosed village in the Abyei area.
Risks are growing as Muslims are looking for him, he said. Fear of Muslims’ reactions in Sudan and lack of economic opportunity keep him from going home to his family, but someday he hopes to be able to return and tell them about Christ, he said.
“I want to tell my family about my new faith in Jesus, and I am sure they will believe with me,” Alnour said.
In light of advances in religious freedom since Omar al-Bashir was ousted as president of Sudan in April 2019, the U.S. State Department announced on Dec. 20 that Sudan had been removed from the list of Countries of Particular Concern (CPC) that engage in or tolerate “systematic, ongoing and egregious violations of religious freedom” and was upgraded to a watch list….
Sudan ranked 7th on Christian support organization Open Doors’ 2020 World Watch List of the countries where it is most difficult to be a Christian….
