Posted on 12/04/2005 7:44:18 PM PST by Hunden
An Iranian convert to Christianity was kidnapped last week from his home in northeastern Iran and stabbed to death, his bleeding body thrown in front of his home a few hours later. Ghorban Tori, 50, was pastoring an independent house church of convert Christians in Gonbad-e-Kavus, a town just east of the Caspian Sea along the Turkmenistan border.
Within hours of the November 22 murder, local secret police arrived at the martyred pastors home, searching for Bibles and other banned Christian books in the Farsi language. By the end of the following day, the secret police had also raided the houses of all other known Christian believers in the city.
According to one informed Iranian source, during the past eight days representatives of the Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS) have arrested and severely tortured 10 other Christians in several cities, including Tehran. All the detainees have since been released.
One of the arrested Christians was reportedly interrogated about his involvement in relief work after Irans deadly Bam earthquake in December 2003. Another working with a legal organization defending human rights was accused of using it as a cover for church activities.
In addition, MOIS officials have visited known Christian leaders since Toris murder and have instructed them to warn acquaintances in the unofficial, Protestant house fellowships that
the government knows what you are doing, and we will come for you soon.
A former Muslim of Turkmen descent, Tori had converted to Christianity more than 10 years ago, while in Turkmenistan.
After he returned to his native Iran in 1998, Tori began to share his new Christian faith with friends and relatives. Within two years, a small fellowship of 12 believers was meeting in his home.
But not all welcomed his message; at least one relative attacked Tori, scarring his face. In the past year he received several threats from Islamic extremists vowing to kill him if he did not stop sharing his Christian faith.
Tori is survived by his wife and four children, ages 3 to 23.
He is the fifth Protestant pastor assassinated in Iran by unidentified killers in the past 11 years. Three of the five were former Muslims, under Iranian law subject to the death penalty for having committed apostasy.
Toris murder came just days after Irans new hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called an open meeting with the nations 30 provincial governors. During the session, an Iranian source told Compass, Ahmadinejad declared that the government needed to put a stop to the burgeoning movement of house churches across Iran.
I will stop Christianity in this country, Ahmadinejad reportedly vowed.
This was apparently a green light from the president of Iran to go out and start killing Christians,
the source said.
Slurring Non-Muslims
Last week a Zoroastrian representative in the Iranian Parliament protested a slur against non-Muslims on November 20 by a top aide to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, supreme leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
According to the government-run Entekhaab website, in a public speech Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati told youthful Basidjis (members of a volunteer militia formed to enforce strict Islamic codes) preparing to join suicide missions that non-Muslims are sinful animals who roam the earth and engage in corruption. Jannati, who is secretary general of the powerful Guardian Council, is known to be a mentor and close advisor to Ahmadinejad.
Iranian Member of Parliament Kurosh Niknam declared the comment, an unprecedented insult to religious minorities.
Over the past month, Ahmadinejad has conducted a broad shake-up within the government establishment, replacing hundreds of governors, ambassadors and senior ministry officials with young and mostly inexperienced Islamists. Yesterday students at Tehran University protested noisily when a religious cleric without even a high school diploma was appointed rector of the nations oldest university.
In November, the new director of prisons also transferred a number of political prisoners of conscience into criminal wards with convicted murderers and drug dealers. At least one of these political prisoners has been killed by fellow inmates, sparking the fears of Iranian Christians for the security of Hamid Pourmand, serving a three-year sentence at Tehrans Evin Prison for refusing to renounce his conversion to Christianity.
He won't stop Christianity. He can kill some people, and torture others, but one can not stop God's will.
I am waiting for the outrage to come from the UN and the Democrats ...
More evidence of the "real" driving power behind Islam ...
I will stop Christianity in this country, Ahmadinejad reportedly vowed.
The fact that it "needs stopping" a nation with such tight Islamic control of the highest levels of power says something rather significant! I had no idea it was spreading there at all.
In the end it's the Nazis who will be exterminated!!
God bless our Iranian brothers and sisters.
Most Iranis in the UK (and they REFUSE To be called Irani, preferring to be called Persian as the term Irani seems infused with memories of the Ayatollah), hateIslam but don't want to speak up. These incidents are cracks in the wall. I definitely see Iran cracking and breaking away from the moon cult. However, do note that I suspect most will become Zoroastrian (the ancient Persian religion) but many would become Christian too.
I'm sure you know better than to hold your breath waiting. The UN will at most issue some meaningless statement, just as they have in Sudan. The Dems will cheer the Iranians on and blame Christians in Iran for their own deaths.
ACLU Man of the Year!
>I am waiting for the outrage to come from the UN and the Democrats.<
...and from the high priest of religious tolerance and compassion, Prince Charles...
He can try but he will fail.
There was once a man in that particular neck of the woods by the name of Haman.
He made a similiar threat towards God's people...had it all figured out and all set up.
He was a real powerful guy...no way anyone was going to stop him...
Bottom line is that he ended up hung from the gallows he built to kill others.
Anyone who's interested can read the whole story in the OT book of Esther.
God's people are the apple of His eye.
People who stick their finger in God's eye aren't long for this world.
I predict the downfall of the imams is coming soon...and it will be the Lord Himself who will bring them down.
People totally forget the spiritual component to the downfall of the Soviet bloc.
Too often, we in America think we're so darned powerful...but our power is puny compared to God's infinite power.
Jesus Christ is the ruler over the kings of the earth. (Revelation 1:5)
Or a few more earthquakes.
Oh! Really!
Ya mean like cuttin' off peoples heads? Blowing up buildings? That kind of "non sinful" stuff?
Burn in Hell you muslime jerk!
I vote for giving him a "taste" of his own "medicine".
Buh Bye, Schmuck!!!
He won't stop Christianity. He can kill some people, and torture others, but one can not stop God's will
Chilling words!
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