North Korean dictators and the power of Christianity

For Christmas I wanted to share part of an article by Melanie Kirkpatrick  entitled "A Christmas Prayer for North Korea's Christians." It will encourage you to realize how Christianity has power to scare the brutal leaders of repressive countries, and it will make you appreciate all the freedoms we have in America.

 Here it is:

 

Spare a thought on Christmas Eve for Christians who live in countries where practicing their faith is an act of courage. Nowhere is that more true than in North Korea, where religion is banned. The only permissible worship is that of the trinity of Kim family dictators—the late Eternal President Kim Il Sung, his son Kim Jong Il (who died last year), and current leader Kim Jong Eun.

How dangerous is it for Christians in North Korea? In a report this year, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom describes "the arrest, torture and possible execution" of Christians, Buddhists and others conducting clandestine religious activity in the North. It cites several widely reported cases of persecution of Christians, including the public execution in 2009 of Ri Hyon Ok for the crime of distributing Bibles. In keeping with the regime's policy of punishing wrongdoers' families, Ri's husband and three children reportedly were dispatched to a political prison.

The commission report also describes how 23 Christians were arrested in 2010 for belonging to an underground Protestant church. Three were executed and the rest were jailed. The commission estimates there are thousands of Christians among the 150,000 to 200,000 North Koreans incarcerated in the regime's infamous political prison camps. 

Yet despite this repression, something is happening that many characterize as nothing short of a miracle: Christianity appears to be growing in North Korea. Open Doors International, which tracks the persecution of Christians world-wide, puts the number of Christians in North Korea at between 200,000 and 400,000. 

North Korean Christians necessarily worship in secret. Many of the congregations are small family units consisting of just a husband and wife and, when they are old enough to keep a secret, their children. Other times a handful of Christians form a kind of congregation in motion. A worker for Open Doors explains how it works: "A Christian goes and sits on a bench in the park. Another Christian comes and sits next to him. Sometimes it is dangerous even to speak to one another, but they know they are both Christians, and at such a time, this is enough." 

. . . It is new believers who are responsible for the recent spread of Christianity in North Korea. Most have been introduced to Christianity by fellow North Koreans who are recent converts. The proselytizers usually escaped across the border to China, became Christians, and then returned home to seek converts. The proselytizers and the churches they establish in North Korea often are supported by South Korean or American missionaries in China.

. . . While the Kim family regime has long punished every North Korean whom China repatriates, it reserves the harshest penalties for those believed to have had contact with Christians in China. It also has sent agents into China to kidnap South Korean pastors working with North Korean refugees including, in 2000, a pastor from Chicago who was a permanent resident of the U.S. Kim Dong-shik is believed to have died in prison in North Korea. 

. . . The regime has stepped up the campaign against Christians in recent years. It trains police and soldiers about the dangers of religion and sends agents posing as refugees into China to infiltrate churches. Sometimes the agents even set up fake prayer meetings to catch worshipers, according to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. 

. . . Why does the regime fear Christianity? Eom Myong-hui, who escaped from North Korea a few years ago, became a pastor in South Korea and is now living in the U.S., says that it is because Christianity points the way to freedom: "In my view, Christianity is about the individual, about accepting responsibility." That is anathema to Pyongyang, which wants to control every aspect of its citizens' lives.

. . .  Being a Christian in North Korea isn't just dangerous. It is also lonely. An American who has made frequent visits to North Korea recalls a secret prayer meeting with a local Christian. Tell the world "that we are part of the body of believers," the North Korean pleaded. "Don't forget us."