A voice for the hurting

PAUL BUTLER, HOST: Today is Thursday, September 7th. Thank you for turning to WORLD Radio to help start your day.

Good morning. I’m Paul Butler.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: And I’m Myrna Brown. Coming next on The World and Everything in It: international affairs.

Most people know that the United Nations is the largest intergovernmental organization in the world, with 193 member states. The UN was founded to provide a forum for peaceful international dialogue.

BUTLER: Christians often debate the merits of such an institution, for governments and for Christians. But one man says that it’s not so much what the United Nations can do itself, but the forum it provides for others that can make a difference.

BROWN: WORLD’s Europe reporter Jenny Lind Schmitt attended a recent meeting of the United Nations in Switzerland, and she brings us the story.

AUDIO: I now give the floor for a joint statement from the World Evangelical Alliance.

WISSAM AL-SALIBY: Thank you Mr. Vice President.

JENNY LIND SCHMITT, REPORTER: It’s one of the most intense parts of Wissam al-Saliby’s job. In a vast hall at the United Nations in Geneva, the Human Rights Council is holding one of its annual meetings. Delegates sit attentively in curved rows under a ceiling dripping with multi-colored resin stalactites.

And Wissam al-Saliby has exactly two minutes to state the most pressing concerns of evangelicals worldwide.

AL-SALIBY: The World Evangelical Alliance and the Commission of Churches on International Affairs of the World Council of Churches remain gravely concerned about the ongoing violation of human rights of religious minorities in Algeria and India.

Al-Saliby is director of the World Evangelical Alliance office in Geneva, Switzerland. Today he is in front of several hundred representatives to make the case for freedom of worship for Christians in nations under periodic review by the Human Rights Council.

AL-SALIBY: [Speaking Arabic]

A little while later, in Arabic, he calls for the Algerian government to stop forcibly closing evangelical churches and arresting Christian leaders.

Al-Saliby has a job with no end in sight: Calling powerful governments to account and making their religious discriminations public.

AUDIO: Do you need a minute with your coffee?

No, I'm fine. It’s Nepresso.

Over a cup of coffee in a small rented office nearby, al-Saliby explains how statements to the Human Rights Council can make a difference:

WISSAM AL-SALIBY: States don't want to be criticized by other states.

In many countries where evangelical Christians are a minority, hostile governments have no qualms about discriminating against believers. But when those discriminations are brought to light on the international stage, that can influence governments to treat their citizens more fairly. Al-Saliby wants to use the forum of the United Nations to show that evangelicals are not as isolated as they may seem.

AL-SALIBY: Part of the way to solve that is to say that this local church is connected to the bigger family. Here's the bigger family. And then the Government needs to feel like these people are connected

As Christianity has spread across the globe, so has persecution against Christians. According to the Open Doors World Watch List, 2022 was the worst year on record. Over 360 million Christians suffered high levels of persecution or discrimination for their faith.

AL-SALIBY: So what we do here is to support the national church advocacy to amplify the voice. And to really make the government think twice before doing some things.

Before he became advocacy officer for the World Evangelical Alliance, al-Saliby worked at the Arab Baptist Theological Seminary, outside of Beirut, Lebanon. Al-Saliby’s work at the seminary brought him into contact with hundreds of Muslim-background students from around the Arab world.

He heard story after story of God’s supernatural intervention and call. And he also heard about opposition to the gospel in the countries where students longed to return to preach Christ.

Years before, al-Saliby had worked with humanitarian groups around the Middle East, documenting human rights violations and violence against civilians. The work was difficult and emotionally wearing, but he says that experience was essential for the work he does now.

AL-SALIBY: Human rights work includes very difficult, very thorough documentation methodology. And this is an ongoing fight to make sure we have the resources to get the professional methodology right so that the people on the receiving end would assess the validity of our claims from our methodology and the way we’re working.

Al-Saliby insists that national Christian advocacy groups need to learn this kind of careful documentation so they can be heard in an international setting.

AL-SALIBY: We had an Excel file, date, location, the names of the people. What happened, you know, exactly and everything. So that kind of work is difficult, it’s time demanding, it’s resource demanding, it’s what we should be doing. If you shout genocide or if you shout ethnic cleansing or if you shout Christians are being killed, people will not listen, and they’re not listening.

AUDIO: [Statement on India]

Armed with facts and numbers, al-Saliby can bring documentation of persecution against Christians to the floor of the Human Rights Council. He can also address delegates of member nations directly. It’s essential to document what the national government in question did or didn’t do. Recent attacks on Christians in Nigeria are a case in point.

AL-SALIBY: Likely the government was complicit with the attackers. But we have to find a way to document this correctly and say it.

Al-Saliby insists that local Christians on the ground need to clarify how they want their governments to change. Once they make those appeals for freedom of religion, the World Evangelical Alliance can make sure the United Nations hears them. But always remembering where help really comes from.

AL-SALIBY: We cannot fight here as if the United Nations is our hope. We are fighting here because we have a greater hope. And once we engage with this mentality, once we talk with the people with this mentality, then this place. Maybe God will use it for His glory, for His church.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Jenny Lind Schmitt at the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland.

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