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Tuesday, June 17, 2014

Priest Faces Extreme Roles

Punjab, Pakistan - focus on Okara City in red
Intro Shamim Masih – ‘Priest Faces Extreme Roles’
Edited by John R. Houk
Posted June 17, 2014

Shamim reports on how Muslim robbers burgled an Anglican Priest in a Christian community within Okara City of Punjab Province Pakistan. Here is supplemental info that Shame did not include:

… [T]he Priest and his whole family for four hours. The robbers robbed the priest and forcibly snatched all [his] valuables household things including some gold jewelry.

In the meanwhile, the watchman heard the crying and noise of Children and his wife. The watchman [awoke] the whole Christian village and surrounded the priest's house. The other three unknown robber accomplices ran away seeing the villagers coming towards them.

The robbers opened fired at the villagers and also shot at the Priest and his family but they all [were] miraculously saved. The Christian villagers competed bravely with the robbers and rescued the hostage family of the priest.

… They told that the relatives of the robbers were making threats to burn the whole Christian village as [Muslims did] recently burning Joseph Colony [in] Lahore, if they would not agree to compromise with [the relatives] and [force the] release of the robbers from jail by giving a favorable statement [pertaining to] the robbers.

“My family is not safe now in that village and I have requested the Rt. Rev. Irfan Jamil Bishop of Lahore to transfer me to some other Church congregation", told Rev. Hanook David.

"I have also requested the police for security and also to Bishop of Lahore to give me some security for our safety because now the relatives of the robbers are openly making threats to me to face dire consequences if I would not compromise with them. We have seen death very near to us because the robbers opened firing at us but Our Lord Jesus saved us," he added further.

… (Priest's life miraculously saved on the intervention of watchman; By LEAD Family; LEAD Family (Pakistan) blog; 6/5/14 6:01 AM [Blog Editor: I felt compelled to edit for better comprehension by American readers])

JRH 6/17/14
********************************
Priest Faces Extreme Roles

By Shamim Masih
Sent: 6/15/2014 12:53 PM

ISLAMABAD: The spike in attacks against the Christians’ community makes Pakistan one of the most world’s dangerous counties for religious minorities. Pastor Hanook David and his family were assaulted by some extremists in the midnight [hour].

According to the details, a Christian priest, David and his family were sleeping in the courtyard of his house in the village Bethlehem chuck No. 2, Okara city in Province Punjab. During midnight; five men; reportedly jumped into his house with weapons. The attackers tormented the family members, snatched the valuable material and locked them in washroom.

Bethlehem is a Christian village in district Okara, with more than eighty Christian families [who] work as laborers or peasants. The young villagers guard the houses during the night, luckily on this same day, the guard force watched a few unknown people in the streets and heard the sob and rushed towards the pastor’s house. They gathered around the house and asked them to surrender. In the meanwhile; the villagers also woke up and called the police officials. After a few hours [of apprehending] exercise, the villagers were able to hand them to the police. The priest told by telephone that although the police arrested them [for a short time], [then] they set them free after a while. It would not be the first time the local police in Pakistan concocted a story to aid a Muslim attacker.

The case was registered FIR 138/14 in Chochak police station, but the Investigation Officer (IO) Mohammad Murtaza and SHO Haji Saif al Rehman reportedly demanded a bribe to precede the case.

Sohail Johnson, chairman Sharing Life Ministries Pakistan (SLMP) went there with his team and looked into the matter [and] said I am not surprised to hear [about the bribery demand] as it is another manifestation of the extreme anti-Christian bigotry that pervades Pakistani society and culture as a whole. [Pakistan is in] a state of extreme moral bankruptcy.

Recently a Christian MPA in Baluchistan was shot dead by his own security guard and Shahbaz Bhatti former Federal Minister for Minorities was assassinated in the capital of Pakistan but police concocted the story to aid the attackers, he added. 

Be Blessed,
Shamim Masih
________________________________
Edited by John R. Houk
Brackets indicate additions by the Editor. Links within Shamim’s report are by the Editor.

© Shamim Masih
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