Altan khan chose the Gelug order of Tibetan Buddhism (founded by Tsongkhapa, 1357-1419). In 1577 he invited the leader of this order, Sonam Gyatsho, to come to Mongolia and teach his people.
Sonam Gyatsho proclaimed Altan Khan to be the reincarnation of Khublai Khan, and in return, Altan Khan gave the title Dalai Lama to Sonam Gyatsho. Altan Khan posthumously awarded the title to his two predecessors, making Sonam Gyatsho the 3rd Dalai Lama.
Altan khan then proceeded to convert the Mongols to Buddhism either by choice or force.
“The Mongolian government and Lamaist bodies of that period implemented a variety of measures intended to wipe out Mongolian shamanism. For example, Tumed’s Altan Khan passed a law in 1578 that banned shamanist ideological propaganda and traditional rituals. Shamanist ceremonies, including burial-services that involved the burning of animal meat were forbidden by this law. In contrast, Buddhist annual and monthly fasting was strictly enforced. Laws protected inviolable rights of Lamaist officials as officers of the state according to their rank and positions respectively. The four main ranks of Lama priests became exempt from military and fiscal dues. Lavish gifts were given to incoming Lamas according to special codes. For example, a Lama should receive at least 100 horses or equivalent, if he were a learned priest, an unlearned one no less than 20, and even a servant or coachman should be given at least 10. Moreover, images and appurtenances of ongons were burned down and replaced with idols of Mahagal-Burhan. These were to be worshiped with sacrifices of the three kinds of animal flesh (mutton, beef, and horse), and all kinds of milk products. Households were forbidden to carry out shamanist worship at home. Culprits were to pay a fine in horses related to the number of offenses. These laws on one hand gave Lamaism legal, political and economic privileges, while on the other they persecuted shamans and severely restricted the practice of their customs.
Thanks mainly to the investment, assistance, and support of the Ming Dynasty, many Lamaist monasteries were built and many Buddhist texts were published in Beijing to be sent to Mongolia. It is evident that this zeal on the part of the Ming and Qing dynasties to spread the red and yellow Buddhist sects in Mongolia was primarily in order to undermine the heroic warrior traditions of the Mongols. Encouraging Lamaism or Yellow Buddhism in Mongolia subverted the Mongol traditional values. In this regard the distinguished scholar Roy Chapman Andrews wrote “There were several contributory causes of the decay of the Mongol race, but the primal factor was the introduction of Lamaism. Before this they were shamanists, worshipping the spirits of nature...in rocks, trees and mountains.”
Until the 1940’s there were a total of approximately 941 Buddhist monasteries, about 70% of which were not established until the 19th century.
The Manchurian Emperors [Qing Dynasty] instigated a number of aggressive and brutal measures against shamanism during the 17th century, including the humiliation of Oirad’s official Neij (1557-1653) and Zayar Bandid Namhayjamts (1575-1662). The teachings of Maydar Hutagt, sent to Mongolia for the intensification of Lamaism, spread in Mongolia. Shamans were killed, murdered, burnt with dog droppings, and subjected to many fines paid in livestock. Between the 1860’s and 1904, there were three mass burnings at campfires around Horchin, at which it was said, “The ones who have real powers will emerge unscathed, but the remainders shall die.”
Another such burning occurred in the 19th century in Besud Yost Zasagt Hoshuu.
Excerpt from Mongolian Shamanism by Purev Otgony
Besides the killing of shamans, the campaign to wipe out shamanism had many strategies.
First, Lamaist ideology spread by targeting shamans, their family, and their children by telling them they were reincarnations of great Lamas. They would then be encouraged to go to the monastery or send their children there, where they would be “reeducated” in Lamaist dogma. If the shaman was considered powerful or important, Lamaists would target their entire family.
Second, shaman prayers were rewritten with Lamaist influences and dogma. People were forced to recite the new prayers.
Third, Shaman ancestor spirits were “reincarnated” as Lamas or “converted” to Lamaism.
Fourth, Lamaists labeled all shamans “Black shamans”, no matter what their tradition. From the 17th to the 19th century, this label was used to create confusion, spread mistrust, and break down the different shaman traditions. (See “Types of Shamans”).
Fifth, Mongolian protector spirits were “converted” into Lamaism and were incorporated into what is called the Tsam dance.
Sixth, sacred shamanic sites were taken over and monasteries and stupas built over them.
In 1644 the Qing dynasty in China came to power. Unlike previous dynasties, the Qing dynasty was very involved with Mongolia, Tibet, and Central Asia. Through both military and diplomatic means, the Qing first overtook the Chahar Mongols and the territory of Inner Mongolia.
The Khalkha Mongols of outer Mongolia needed to unite. Tusheet Khan wanted to unite the Khalkhas. He believed that Lamaism could help unify the Mongols if they had their own Living Buddha. With a Living Buddha- a Bogdo Gegen- of Mongolian descent, he could unite the Mongols, and get out from under the over-lordship of the Dalai Lamas in Tibet. He nominated his son, Zanabazar (1635-1723) to be this living Buddha and sent him to Tibet to be recognized and schooled.
The political unity that Tusheet Khan sought was not successful. However, the tradition of a Bogdo Gegen of Mongolia had been born. Zanabazar returned from Tibet and was the first of many Bogdo Gegens.
In 1691, Mongolia was submitted to Qing ruler ship. The Qing government wanted to encourage Mongols to become pacifist-Lamaists and allowed the continuation of the Bogdo Gegen line. They did place many limitations on the Living Buddhas, however. A decree was made that reincarnations of Mongolia’s Living Buddha had to be found in Tibet and may not be related to any Mongolian nobility. These incarnations were also educated in Tibet before their “reign” in Mongolia. These puppet rulers of Mongolia could only engage in Lamaist religious pursuits and could not even travel without permission from the Qing government.
The series of Bogdo Gegens solidified Lamaism’s role through the region. More and more monasteries were built and people were expected to support them. Lamaist monasteries drained the wealth of the people and changed Mongolian society. My the mid 1800’s, 45% of Mongol males had taken monastic vows.
Many people were forced to serve as bondsmen to the monasteries. Bogdo Gegen had 22,000 monks and 28,000 bondsmen. There were many complaints of children being abused by monks. The monks themselves spread syphilis all over the countryside. The people began to feel unrest. In 1921, requests for assistance to the Soviet Communist government were made. In 1924, when the last Bogdo Gegen died with syphilis, the Mongolian People’s Republic was born.
The Faith Factor in Foreign Policy: Allen D. Hertzke, University of Oklahoma One of the surprises of the past decade is how Congress increasingly seized the foreign policy initiative in crafting American responses to human rights violations around the world. Propelling this development was a new faith-based movement that coalesced out of concern for the denial of religious freedom abroad. That movement succeeded in gaining landmark legislation aimed at the pandemic of global persecution, but it then capitalized on that momentum to attack other human rights abuses. The key lesson from this story is not the obvious verity that Congress responds to constituent pressure, because Congress itself spurred the very forces that gave rise to initial constituent interest. Rather, the legislative campaign for the persecuted served as the catalyst that ignited nascent forces into a more durable movement. Explaining how and why the congressional system produced this outcome helps us to understand the nexus of global religious trends, movement politics, and American foreign policy. The Religious Context Brutal suppression of religion has been a leitmotif of the twentieth century. But until recently the context of the cold war and the press of global crises deflected singular attention to this phenomenon. In the 1990s, however, conditions ripened for a movement to make combating religious persecution a specific aim of American foreign policy. First, in spite of the secularization paradigm that guided modernization literature, there has been a striking resurgence of religion in the post-cold war - what French scholar Gilles Kepel calls "The Revenge of God."1 As Samuel Huntington observed, when religion matters to people, authoritarian governments "will insist on controlling it, suppressing it, regulating it, prohibiting it, and manipulating it to their own advantage."2 Second, Christians are among the most numerous victims of this persecution because of an unheralded demographic revolution - a tectonic shift of the Christian population away from the West toward developing and non-democratic countries. Propelled by dramatic indigenous growth, some 60 percent of the world's Christians live outside of North America and Europe, and that percentage is growing.3 Feared as a force for independent civil society and often perceived as agents of the democratic West, as many as 200 million believers in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia live under the threat of brutal treatment at the hands of authorities.4 Third, believers in the United States are naturally drawn to these besieged Christians, whose plight is highlighted by a growing array of international advocacy groups. Vivid models of courage and fidelity among modern martyrs can also inspire the faithful, a fact not lost on church leaders. At many evangelical events today featured speakers are foreign Christians, treated like celebrities and role models, who share poignant testimony of how God sustained them as they languished in prison or suffered torture. With Protestant Evangelicalism at the cutting edge of church growth in the United States, grass roots concern for the "suffering church" increasingly percolated in the years leading up to congressional action. Finally, the emergence of the United States as the globe's lone superpower offered a unique opportunity to ameliorate this suffering through American foreign policy leadership. As popular writers, activists, and religious leaders spotlighted the problem, they implored Americans to take seriously their responsibility as citizens of the world's indispensable nation. The Legislative Catalyst The above efforts, though notable in preparing the way, remained fragmented and muted until activists made a pivotal strategic decision: to mount a campaign for congressional legislation. This legislative vehicle provided a tangible way for American Christians to exercise their citizenship on behalf of co-religionists. But it also acted as a powerful magnet, drawing into the movement others who saw their concerns advanced by the initiative. The person most responsible for this strategic decision, ironically, was a Jew, Michael Horowitz, a former Reagan administration official and well-connected think tank lawyer. Outraged when an Ethiopian Christian friend (recovering from torture) was threatened with deportation, Horowitz dramatized the scope of religious persecution, which he complained was an "orphan" of the human rights establishment. A blunt polemicist and tough political infighter, Horowitz prodded Christian leaders and fellow Jews into legislative action by characterizing Christians as "the Jews of the 21st Century," and the "victims of choice for thug regimes."5 Most crucially, Horowitz's strategic analysis mirrored that of scholars who argue that social movement success depends on fostering "cognitive liberation" - a freeing of people from the fatalistic view that they cannot move the political system.6 To Horowitz, the legislative campaign was primarily a tool to liberate the Christian community from its sheepishness and transform the way "bigoted" secular elites view devout faith in the twenty-first century. Horowitz also hoped that the drama of legislative battle would catalyze the emerging movement, drawing diverse groups into its vortex. As the campaign waxed, in fact, liberal Jewish groups teamed up with conservative evangelicals, the Catholic Church with Tibetan Buddhists, Anglicans with the Salvation Army. Though the groups did not always agree on remedies, they created a formidable sense that something had to pass. Congressional hearings and impassioned floor debates, in turn, fed back into the movement, heightening visibility and providing new fodder for mobilization. Though the elite press slighted the movement, church publications and mailings featured the "exciting" efforts of advocates in the nation's capital. Charles Colson of Prison Fellowship and James Dobson of Focus on the Family publicized the cause in syndicated radio and newspaper outlets. Stories on the legislation appeared in Christianity Today, and advocacy groups, such as Oklahoma-based Voice of the Martyrs, implored their followers to write Congress. Members of Congress noticed the grass roots buzz. Senator Sam Brownback (R-Kan.), who emerged as a leader in the new movement, said he was struck by how often he heard from constituents at town hall meetings in Kansas about the plight of Christians in Sudan or China.7 Several features of the law-making arena helped Congress play this catalyst role. First, in our representative system law enjoys both statutory power and the powerful symbolic import of legis rex. Because of this, the legislative campaign attracted the attention of international organizations and foreign dissidents alike. Fierce opposition from the business community, in a curious way, only served to heighten the stakes and energize the advocates. Second, the bicameral complexities of the system propelled a quest for consensus, which produced a strongly unified congressional initiative. Indeed, the system operated pretty much as the founders envisioned. Responding to "public passions," the House passed tough initial legislation. Sponsored by Frank Wolf (R-Va.) and Chris Smith (R-N.J.), the House bill employed blunt measures designed to hold the president accountable if he waived automatic sanctions against nations that egregiously persecute religionists. The Clinton administration vigorously opposed the House bill and State Department officials testified against it. In spite of this opposition, House leaders were able to use the rules to get the bill to the floor, where it passed strongly but not unanimously. Though the House bill was unacceptable in the Senate, it sparked efforts by members and staff to craft an alternative. That Senate bill, sponsored by Don Nickles (R-Okla.) and Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.), was more measured, less blunt in its remedies, and more tied into the routines of diplomacy. As it became clear that Nickles-Lieberman was the only vehicle with a chance of passage, efforts were made to accommodate some House interests, even while negotiations took place with a reluctant administration loath to appear unsympathetic. The result was a true consensus, but one that barely beat the clock. Legislation made it to the Senate floor and was passed by vote of 98-0 on the last day of the 105th Congress. With no time for conference, and no one wanting to vote for persecution, the House passed the Senate bill by acclamation, thus ensuring that the legislation enjoyed unanimous backing in both houses. In the aftermath of the victory, religious presses lauded this "providential" outcome, which would place the government's unalloyed imprimatur on the cause of religious freedom around the world. One of the most sweeping human rights statutes on the books, the International Religious Freedom Act (IRFA) creates a new State Department office and an Ambassador-At-Large for International Religious Freedom. It mandates that State produce a comprehensive annual report on the status of religious freedom around the world - which sets into motion presidential action against violating countries. The law also creates an independent commission, with staff and budget, to monitor violations and hold policymakers accountable for their response. Finally, it reaches into the daily routines of foreign policy by providing better training for diplomatic personnel and fostering their ongoing contacts with vulnerable religious communities on the ground. Another reason that the legislative arena was so conducive to the religious freedom movement was that there were past models upon which to draw. A case in point was congressional action during the campaign for soviet Jewry in the 1970s. Spurred by Jewish lobby efforts and public sympathy for refuzniks, Congress passed, over Nixon's objections, the Jackson-Vanik act in 1973, which linked normal trade status to emigration policies by the Soviet Union. Some Christian advocates explicitly saw this as their model. Then, as now, key members of Congress - by virtue of conviction, ties to constituents, and location in the foreign policy system - are inclined to assert a broad view of the national interest, one that transcends narrow calculations of realpolitik. The legislative campaign against religious persecution, consequently, intersected a wider struggle over the direction of American foreign policy. That struggle, which is occurring even within the Bush administration, pits "realists" who view the national interest in narrow economic and security terms against those who would champion American leadership on behalf of democratization and human rights. The campaign for religious rights thus gained strategic allies in the foreign policy commentariat who are similarly inclined to assert a moral underpinning to America's engagement in the world. Congressman Chris Smith, former chair of the Human Rights Subcommittee of the House International Relations Committee, illustrates the way promotion of religious freedom dovetails with a broader critique of foreign policy "realism." He takes issue with "so-called professionals," especially those in his own party, whose mantra is "stability, stability, stability." Time and again, he observed, "stable" authoritarian regimes turned out anything but. "Dictatorships and lawless governments are unreliable trading partners, dangerous to their neighbors,"and less stable than nations that respect human rights. Promoting human rights, if done smartly, is indeed in the national interest. "If you get that right," he argues, everything else follows.8 While Smith has been making these arguments for years, the legislative campaign enhanced his prominence and the new law provided additional levers for him to employ. Religion on Capitol Hill A final reason Congress played such a pivotal role in the movement for the persecuted is that many members themselves, and their staffs, are enmeshed in religious life and thus predisposed to sympathy for the cause. Cynics might be skeptical, but serious empirical analysis suggests that religious commitments and worldviews do shape the work of many members.9 Moreover, my own investigation confirms a thriving religious life on the Hill, including weekly faith sharing sessions among congressional members across party and denominational lines. Given the exceptional vibrancy of religious life in the United States, it should not surprise us that the people's representatives generally reflect that cultural context, or that some consciously link their faith and human rights advocacy. But equally significant, key members of Congress actually emerged as leaders of the movement itself. Three friends and prayer partners, Tony Hall (D-Ohio), Frank Wolf, and Chris Smith, have traveled the world to meet with Jewish refusniks, Chinese dissidents, imprisoned pastors, Sudanese refugees, tortured believers, war refugees, and victimized women. Hall, an evangelical Democrat from working class Dayton, linked his leadership against world hunger with work against dictatorships that destroy their own people. Wolf, a devout Presbyterian, was profiled by the Washington Post as the capitol's first "bleeding heart conservative."10 Pastors in Eastern Europe were said to carry dog-eared letters from Wolf to use when harassed by authorities. The evangelical legislator is respected by colleagues across the aisle (liberal San Francisco Democrat Nancy Pelosi referred to him as "my leader" on religious freedom issues). Chris Smith, a Catholic, describes himself as a Matthew 25 Christian ("whatsoever you do to the least of these, you do to me"). Inspired by the book, Tortured for Christ by a Romania pastor, Smith used his chairmanship to build a massive documentary record of the denial of religious freedom, which was picked up and publicized by advocacy groups. In the Senate, too, the convictions of members played a crucial role. Notable in the effort were retiring evangelical Dan Coats (R-Ind.), who viewed the legislation as his swan song and insisted that it pass before adjournment, Catholic Don Nickles (R-Okla.), whose prior work on the issue made him a logical principal sponsor, and Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.), whose orthodox Jewish faith (and its link to political convictions) became legendary in the presidential campaign. Lieberman continues to list the passage of IRFA as one of his major legislative achievements. The impact of religious commitments extends to staff. A number of crucial Hill staff members have close ties to international church groups and are respected in the religious community. Some bring experience in foreign missions, others in human rights advocacy abroad, still others serve as fellows sponsored by religious groups. Two such staff fellows, John Hanford in the office of Senator Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) and Laura Bryant Hanford in the office of Congressman Bob Clement (D-Tenn.), worked for months helping to hammer out what ultimately became the Nickles-Lieberman bill. The Legacy: A Movement Buoyed The legislative campaign to make promotion of religious freedom a "basic aim" of American foreign policy propelled the faith-based movement into the vanguard of human rights advocacy. First, the campaign enhanced the social movement infrastructure. New leaders emerged, trust relationships were forged, and advocacy groups experienced dramatic membership growth and heightened visibility. Activists operating on shoestring budgets won more stable foundation funding as their efforts gained stature. Established institutions, such as Freedom House, expanded their focus on religious freedom. Think thanks and academic institutes sponsored conferences, books appeared, and news stories sprouted. Religious non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are being drawn into foreign policy counsels for information and advice. Second, the movement established new government institutions and process that ensure ongoing attention. The State Department now has internal advocates whose clout is enhanced by legal mandates and outside pressure. The independent Commission on International Religious Freedom, designed to hold officials' feet to fire as they implement the law, conducts its own fact finding trips, sponsors hearings, and shares policy recommendations with top officials at the White House and Congress. Obscure but besieged religious minorities - Hoa Hao Buddhists in Vietnam, Muslim Uyghurs in China, Ahmadis in Pakastin, and Baha'is in Iran - have found their causes highlighted. Leaders in foreign capitals have noticed the increased American attention to abuses. The government of Uzbekistan, apparently fearing that it would be named to the list of worst persecuting nations in 1999, freed its known Christian prisoners before the State Department report was released.11 Third, the movement plucked the tragedy in Sudan from the backwaters of human rights concern. Africans in southern Sudan, most of them Christians or tribal religionists, have been subjected to forced starvation, genocidal massacres, and abduction into slavery by agents of the militant Islamist regime in Khartoum.12 That record is no longer ignored because the congressional-church network has intensified pressure on the regime. Not only have bipartisan congressional members traveled to Sudan, but one of them, Senator Bill Frist (R-Tenn.), even "performed surgery in a bush hospital bombed by planes from Khartoum."13 Because of religious humanitarian efforts, moreover, clinics and schools hit by the regime are often run by Catholic, Anglican, or evangelical churches with international linkages and strategic access to policymakers. One relief organization, for example, is Samaritan's Purse, founded and led by Franklin Graham, who offered prayer at the inauguration of George W. Bush. A Movement That Travels The coalition for international religious freedom has also proven mobile. Buoyed by their victory in 1998, religious leaders led another successful legislative effort in 2000, this time joining with feminists to attack the brutal global trafficking of up to two million vulnerable women and children annually into forced prostitution.14 Laura Lederer, director of the Protection Project at the Nitze School at Johns Hopkins University, led a huge project to document the inadequacy of laws dealing with the global crime syndicates that perpetuate this human rights catastrophe. Her efforts, however, did not gain policy traction until the issue was engaged by the religious community. Many of the leaders who forged partnerships in the religious rights campaign were central in building the groundswell for major sex trafficking legislation. These included David Saperstein, the veteran liberal leader for Reform Judaism, who lobbied with Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention, John Busby of the Salvation Army, Charles Colson, and William Bennett. Even given the capacity of social movements to create strange bedfellows, the coalition was a sight to behold, as feminist groups joined hands with their evangelical foes on abortion policy. Chris Smith, the principal architect of the legislation, recounted how some feminist leaders planned strategy in the same room with evangelical representatives, some of whom might be depicted as "Christian Right." As Richard Cizik, director of the Washington office of the National Association of Evangelicals noted, "human rights is now no longer the only prerogative of the left."15 A final and fascinating case of religious foreign policy engagement concerned the effort to relieve debts burdening impoverished nations. Long a cause of international development organizations, major debt relief legislation passed the 106th Congress with pivotal backing from the religious community. This time the initiative came from the liberal church groups, led by Tom Hart, former Democratic staffer and director of the national Episcopal office in Washington. In part because of relationships forged in the religious freedom campaign, he was able to reach across the cultural divide to enlist ecumenical support, not the least of which came from Pat Robertson, who asked members of his 700 Club to write Phil Graham (R-Texas) when the senator threatened to put a hold on the legislation.16 Summary There is "power in movement."17 Social movements take people out of their routines. They excite, buoy confidence, forge new relationships, and strengthen organizations. But movements need vehicles to focus disparate leaders and energize constituencies. Congress, as "the keystone of the Washington establishment," provided the vehicle for the new religious coalition on foreign policy. Just as laser technology focuses and intensifies diffuse light, the congressional arena absorbed nascent movement energies against religious persecution and sent them out in magnified form. Notes 1. Gilles Kepel, The Revenge of God: The Resurgence of Islam, Christianity, and Judaism in the Modern World (University Park: PA: Pennsylvania State University Press,1994). 2. Samuel Huntington, "Religious Persecution at the Close of the Twentieth Century: Its Nature and Causes, and Implications for the International System," in The Faith Factor, Elliott Abrams, ed. (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, forthcoming 2001). 3. The World Almanac and Book of Facts (Mahwah, NJ: World Almanac Books, 2000); and the Britannica Book of the Year, 2000. 4. This is the estimate of Canadian human rights scholar Paul Marshall, Their Blood Cries Out (Dallas: Word Publishing, 1997). Specific documentation can be found in "Persecution of Christians Worldwide," hearing before the Subcommittee on International Operations and Human Rights of the Committee on International Relations, House of Representatives, 15 February 1996; and in Annual Report on International Religious Freedom, Department of State, November 2000. 5. See Paul Blustein, "A Jew Battles Persecution of Christians," The Washington Post, 9 October 1997; and Michael Cromartie, "The Jew Who is Saving Christians," Christianity Today, 1 March 1999. 6. Doug McAdam, Political Process and the Development of Black Insurgency, 1930-1970 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985). 7. Interview. 8. Interview. 9. Peter Benson and Dorothy Williams, Religion on Capitol Hill (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986). 10. Lori Montgomery, "Party Lines Blur for Area Lawmakers, The Washington Post, 24 May 2000. 11. Religious Freedom in the World, Paul Marshall, ed. (Washington D.C.: Freedom House, 2000), 321; confirmed by State Department sources. 12. The Sudanese regime is the world's worst perpetrator of religious persecution, according to the Report of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom, 1 May 2000 (www.uscirf.gov). 13. Mary McGory, "Suddenly Sudan," The Washington Post, 11 March 2001. 14. Alexandra Marks, "Activists Unleash Campaign to Shut Down Sex Tours," Christian Science Monitor, 16 January 1999. 15. Laurie Goodstein, "A Move to Fight the 'Persecution' Facing Christians," The New York Times, 9 November 1998. 16. "Religious Leaders Cheer Debt Relief," Christian Century, November 2000. 17. Sidney Tarrow, Power in Movement (Cambridge University Press, 1994). Dateline the World Azerbaijan "Sixty Christians arrested at worship service" 1999 China "Police destroy 15,000 religious sites in Zhejiang province" 1998 Chechyna "Baptist leader reported beheaded" 1999 Columbia "Christian leaders marked for assassination" 2000 Cuba "Bibles reported burned" 1999 Egypt "Coptic monk murdered" 1999 India "Hindu extremists 'justify' rape of Catholic nuns" 1998 Indonesia "Clergy slain in East Timor" 1999 Laos "Christians forced to recant their faith" 2000 Nigeria Christian women targeted in Sokoto State" 2001 Pakistan "Christian ordered hung for blasphemy" 1998 Russia "Further Christian kidnappings in North Caucasus" 1999 Saudi Arabia "Riyadh police break up Christian worship service" 2000 Sudan "Forced starvation, enslavement of African Christians and animists" 2000 Vietnam "Protestants and Catholics imprisoned without charge, heavily fined" 2000 These headlines, taken from newsletters of international Christian advocacy groups, news stories, and official reports, dramatize the plight of the "suffering Christian church" abroad and create pressure for an American foreign policy response. Allen D. Hertzke, professor of political science at the University of Oklahoma, is currently writing for Rowman & Littlefield publishers a book entitled To Untie the Yoke: Global Religious Persecution, Human Rights, and American Foreign Policy. His email address is ahertzke@ou.edu. =======================================================
Religious Constituencies and Congressional
Initiative on Human Rights
How and Whyto SupportReligion OverseasScott M. Thomas | November 6, 2007 Editor: John Feffer | ||
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