In July 2007, 42-year-old Li Mei and nine house church leaders were arrested, when they were discovered having a Sunday worship service. They were charged with singing Christian hymns to villagers, showing the JESUS film in a nursing home and praying for healing for a disabled elderly man. The nine were sentenced to re-education through labor for 12 to 18 months. Li Mei served part of her one-year sentence in a hospital with both hands chained to her bed. Repeated beatings and torture caused her to require a hysterectomy. She is currently serving the remainder of her sentence at home under house arrest.

VOM joins TheFaithSpot.com! Click the graphic below to visit our page and become a friend today!

Emmy Award winning television sports director, author, and columnist, David Burchett, discusses Christian persecution in his latest column at Crosswalk.com

ISTANBUL, January 29 (Compass Direct News) – Jordan has increased pressure on foreign Christians living in the kingdom, expelling many long-time residents over the past 13 months in what local churches see as an attack on their legitimacy. Authorities deported or refused residence permits to at least 27 expatriate Christian families and individuals in 2007, a number of them working with local churches or studying at a Christian seminary, Compass has confirmed. In all but one case, officials refused to provide written explanations for the decisions. But many of those expelled told Compass that they had been questioned by intelligence officers regarding evangelism of Muslims. “They said that I am a threat to Jordanian security and I am making the society unstable,” said Hannu Lahtinen, a Finnish pastor deported last month. “They have a thousand ways to say you are preaching the gospel.”

On January 17, eight Bajrang extremists attacked a house church in Madhya Pradesh, kidnapping two believers.

“I admire Communists.” The words seemed strange from a pastor who spent fourteen years in Communist prisons, but Richard Wurmbrand was sincere when he said them.

We really want to connect with you and many more readers so that we can spread the message of God's love through the persecuted church, which is why we have also started a Voice of the Martyrs page on MySpace. Click here to visit Myspace and our page.

Not too long ago I opened an account on the Christian social networking group Shoutlife. And today I am very happy to share with you that we would love it if you joined us on this new exciting networking adventure.