• Embed Doc
  • Copy Link
  • Readcast
  • Collections
  • CommentGo Back
Download
 
Algerians Alienated from IslamAre Turning to Christ
By Rev. Bassam M. Madany
http://www.unashamedofthegospel.org/algeriansalienatedfromisl.cfm
When recounting the history of the early Islamic
Futuhat,
I get tears in my eyes as Ireflect on the disappearance of the Christian Church in North Africa. This tragedy took  place in a part of the world that, prior to the rise of Islam, had made significantcontributions to the historic Christian Faith. One of the greatest North Africans was SaintAugustine of Hippo (354-430). All Christian traditions know what an important role he played in the formation of the seminal Church doctrines that constitute Christianity. Hislegacy contributed in an important way to the rise of the Protestant Reformation.During the 19
th
century, Protestant missionaries went to Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia,and sought to re-plant the Gospel in those countries after many years of Islamichegemony over the land and people. The opposition to their work was great, and the fewconverts who came to experience liberation from Islam endured great persecutions whentheir conversions became public.During my 36 years of radio missions to the Arabic-speaking world (1958-1994), Ideveloped a special interest in the growing number of North African listeners whocorresponded with
 Saatu’l Islah
(Reformation Hour) requesting the Bible-basedliterature we offered. I will never forget those letters from Algeria in the early 1960s,written by members of the
FLN
(the French acronym for Front de la Liberation Nationale.) Those correspondents were involved in the war against France, which hadcolonized their country since the middle of the 19
th
century.Over the years, I mailed thousands of Arabic books and tracts to my North Africanlisteners acquainting them with the claims of the Biblical Messiah. I remember onelistener who, upon receiving my book 
Freedom in Christ,
spent two weeks in prison after  being charged with communicating with a “subversive” organization!
 
So it was with great pleasure that I read about two years ago on
 Elaph,
an Arabic onlinedaily, the text of a lecture delivered at a Conference held at Zurich, Switzerland
,
on
ThePlight of Women and Minorities in the Middle East and North Africa, (
24-26 March,2007.) The title of one lecture was: T
he Christians of the Maghreb under the Rule of Islamists.
http://www.elaph.com/ElaphWeb/ElaphWriter/2007/4/225336.htm
I quote some pertinent parts to illustrate the wonderful news that the Christian Church is being re-established in that important region of Africa.
“The New Christians’ phenomenon throughout the Arab Maghreb
has come to theattention of the media. For example, the weekly journal,
 Jeune Afrique,
devoted threereports on this subject with respect to Tunisia, Morocco, and Algeria. In March 2005, the French daily
 Le Monde
devoted a complete report about this topic. And 
 Al-‘Arabiyya TV 
channel telecast two reports on the subject that had been recorded in the
 Kabyle
district of Algeria.
 
“Jeune Afrique
estimated that the number of people who have embraced Christianity inTunisia was around 500, belonging to three churches. A report on the website of 
“Al- Islam al-Yawm” 
 prepared by
 Lidriss el-Kenbouri,
and dated 23 April 2005, estimated the number of European evangelists in Morocco to be around 800, and that quite often,their evangelistic efforts are successful. The report further added that around 1,000Moroccans had left Islam during 2004. The magazine
“Al-Majalla”,
in its No. 1394issue, claimed that the number of 
 New Christians
in Morocco was around 7,000; perhaps the exact number may be as high as 30,000.
 
“The report that appeared in the French daily
 Le Monde
claimed that during 1992,between 4,000 and 6,000 Algerians embraced Christianity in the Kabyle region of  Algeria. By now, their numbers may be in the tens of thousands. However, the authoritiesare mum about this subject, as an Algerian government official put it; ‘the number of those who embraced Christianity is a
 state secret.’” 
 The paper mentioned several important factors that led people to convert to Christianity:
“When we enquired from those who had come over to the Christian faith to learn about the factors that led to their conversion, they mentioned several factors, among them was
‘The violence of the fundamentalist Islamist movements.’ 
 
 A Christian evangelist working in Algeria reported:
‘These terrible events shocked people greatly. It proved that Islam was capable of unleashing all that terror, and those horrific massacres! Even children were not spared during the uprising of the Islamists! Women wereraped! Many people began to ask: Where is Allah? Some Algerians committed suicide!Others lost their minds; others became atheists, and still others chose the Messiah!’” 
“Quite often, the
‘New Christians’ 
testified to the fact that 
what they discovered in their new faith was love; it formed another factor in their conversion.
These are some of their words: ‘ 
We found out that in Christianity, God is love.’ ‘God loves all people.’ ‘What attracted us to Christianity is its teaching that God is love.’” 
2
 
The testimonies of these new
 Maghrebi 
Christians are heartwarming. The Christianmessage came to them through various means, but it struck them as a word of a lovingGod in search for His lost sheep. They embraced the Messiah who died on the cross, androse again for their justification. Notwithstanding all the difficulties that they were to facein the future, they clung to the Biblical
 Injil 
that had brought them peace with God, andthe gift of eternal life.Almost two years after the Zurich Conference that dealt with the plight of 
 Maghrebi 
Christians, I was overjoyed to read the following report posted on 22 January, 2009, onthe Arabic-language
 Aafaq (Horizons) website.
It detailed the news of young Algerianswho have converted to Christianity as they became ever more alienated from Islam. Hereare excerpts from the report datelined Algiers:“Some
 Amazigh
 
.1
websites have disclosed that many Algerian young people have leftIslam and adopted Christianity. They confessed that they did so due to the ugliness of thecrimes perpetrated by the
 Salafist 
 
‘Da’wa and Combat Movement’ 
against civilians.They were tremendously disappointed and disenchanted with Islam, claiming that it wasresponsible for nurturing these
 Jihadists
who have been terrorizing and murderinginnocent people.“The website noted that the spread of Christianity in Algeria has even reached areas thatwere entirely under the influence of the
 Islamists
, such as in eastern Algeria.Furthermore, the Christian expansion in the country was not due exclusively tomissionary organizations, as certain Islamic groups claim.
The reason is to be found inIslam itself.
It has been associated in the minds of the youth with
 Irhab,
assassinations,and crimes against innocent people. They remember that many of the crimes werecommitted during the 1990s, and occurred in distant villages of Algeria when youngwomen were abducted, taken to the mountains as “captives,” gang-raped, and then killed by having their throats slit. Such horrific scenes took place in Algeria over several yearsand resulted in the very word
“Islamic” 
becoming synonymous with
 Irhab!
 “The report added that in Islam a woman is regarded as an enemy that must be foughtwith all means. She must be punished for the simplest mistake, while men go unpunishedwhen they commit similar misdeeds. Thus, a woman is held responsible for the simplestact, and is liable to be put to death, since she is by nature a
“
 Shaytana
” i.e. a femaleSatan. This seriously misguided and misogynist view of women causes young men toworry about their own sisters, and be anxious about their future daughters as well.“It went on to explain that the
 Irhabis
who committed those awful crimes against womenheld to a view of Islam that took for granted that discrimination between the sexes isnormal. They believe in the notion that the bed is the sole reason for a woman’sexistence. In northern Algeria alone, 5,000 women were raped. This
 Amazigh
sourceregards these radicals as
‘Allah’s guards on earth’ 
who refuse to act as civilized human beings.3
of 00

Leave a Comment

You must be to leave a comment.
Submit
Characters: ...
You must be to leave a comment.
Submit
Characters: ...