The Voice of the suffering and persecuted​

To provide for their needs, the Archdiocese of Colombo has set up a team of 40 certified trauma therapists. They provide psychological care for grieving, injured and other severely traumatized people.

"When they come to the villages they shoot for hours. Who is supplying them with these resources? If they were not getting this support from outside, they would have to stop. That’s why I’m appealing to the international authorities. Whoever has the power to do so, may they put a stop to all this violence!”

"Let us stand in solidarity and unity in our prayers. We pray for the safety of the bishops and all those wrongfully charged, that they might find strength in these trying times."

IN A COUNTRY where Christians have been subject to targeted bombings, kidnapping, and discrimination, Church leaders are grappling with a new crisis: an attempt to give Islamic clerics voting rights on Iraq’s highest court, the Federal Supreme Court. The move, which is under consideration by the Iraqi Parliament, would bring Iraq a step closer to an Iran-like theocracy, in which non-Muslims are forced to live under Islamic Sharia law. For example, in Iran, Christian women are forced to wear the veil and alcohol is completely banned. The change would include four Islamic jurists among the 13 voting members of ...

“THE PEOPLE HERE are good, but the government is bad.” This is the opinion of a Buddhist taxi driver. It’s a view is one widely held in Sri Lanka today. Ever since it became known that authorities had been warned by India’s secret service about the planned terrorist attacks that struck the country on Easter Sunday, criticism of the government has been intense. Feared revenge attacks did not materialize – not least because Cardinal Malcom Ranjith of Colombo hastened to the scene of the bombings and urged traumatized Catholics to renounce any form of reprisal. Altogether some 300 people ...

PITER ESSA, 17, just graduated from High School in Aleppo, Syria. Piter, who is Syriac-Orthodox, tells Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) about some of his painful experiences during his country’s civil war: “I’ve survived this awful war, and I live my life like I used to. My school didn’t close at all, so I was able to continue with my studies; I graduated from High School this year. “I was separated from many friends who were forced to flee. I personally experienced violence in the forms of mortars and missiles, which did both physical and psychological damage. ...

niON THE FEAST of the Assumption, August 15, Pope Francis, during the Angelus prayer in St Peter’s Square, blessed 6,000 rosaries destined for Syria. They will be given to Christians in Syria who have had relatives or family members abducted or murdered during the civil war. This is part of an ecumenical initiative by Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) in partnership with Catholic and Orthodox Churches in Syria. “The rosaries, made at the initiative of ACN, are a sign of my closeness to our brothers and sisters in Syria,” Pope Francis said as part of his Angelus ...

“On June 8, 2019, he went to work but did not come home. I was very worried, as he was never late. His brother helped me look for him. We went street by street but could not find him. The next morning, someone told us that he’d seen the body of Safdar Masih in the local hospital. He had been murdered."

"We Christians are a people of hope. But facing the end also brings us clarity, and with it the courage to finally speak the truth. Our hope to remain in our ancient homeland now rests on our own ability, and the ability of our oppressors and of the world at large, to acknowledge the truth. Violence and discrimination targeting the innocents must end. Those who teach it must stop."

FATHER DURAID Barber is a priest of the Syriac-Catholic Archdiocese of Mosul, Kirkuk and Kurdistan. Born and raised in Qaraqosh, a Christian town on the Nineveh Plains, he spent three years in exile in Kurdistan after ISIS swept through the region. He returned to Qaraqosh in June 2017, the first priest to do so. He serves at St. Jacob’s Church and is on the staff of St. Paul’s House of Church Services. He recently spoke with Aid to the Church in Need: What motivates you in your pastoral work? My love of service, and the wide range of human ...