Advocacy: Burnt Bible changes government policy

Father Daniel, an Iraqi priest, met with Prime Minister Theresa May in December 2017. His visit, combined with your signatures on Open Doors Hope for the Middle East petition, has left a lasting impact on her, which just goes to show the power of the public in the UK and Ireland to move politicians to act.

A Bible sits in No. 10 Downing Street. Its Arabic writing is obscured by ash. Its pages are burnt. 

This Bible was a gift to Prime Minister Theresa May from Father Daniel, an Iraqi priest. It was saved from the wreckage of a church in Karamles, a small village in the Nineveh Plains in Iraq, which had been burnt by so-called Islamic State (IS). 

Fr. Daniel met with Theresa May in December 2017, as part of the Hope for the Middle East campaign, organised by Open Doors and partner organisation Middle East Concern. They met to discuss the future of Christians in the Middle East. On the day, Fr. Daniel represented the calls of a petition signed by over 800,000 people from 143 countries asking that Christians and other diverse religious communities in Iraq and Syria receive equality, dignity and a role in reconciling their societies. 

Fr. Daniel from Iraq meets with Prime Minister Theresa May, Rt Hon Dame Caroline Spelman MP and former Open Doors CEO Lisa Pearce.

In the following months, Theresa May twice mentioned her meeting with Fr. Daniel during Prime Minister’s Questions (once in February and once in March), expressing her concern for Christians and other religious minorities in the Middle East. She vowed that her government would consider what more they could do to help these groups. 

What did all this lead to? Well, fast forward to June 2018 and the Prime Minister announces the appointment of Lord Ahmad (Foreign Office Minister) to a newly created role: Prime Minister’s Special Envoy on Freedom of Religion or Belief. (See Open Doors’ perspective on this role in an earlier press release).

When speaking about his new role at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO)’s Human Rights and Democracy Report Launch in July 2018, Lord Ahmad shared some of the Prime Minister’s motivations as well as his own reflections. We were very pleasantly surprised to hear Fr Daniel mentioned again… 

“...the story of Father Daniel from the Nineveh Plains in Iraq, who when he met our Prime Minister Theresa May, what did he do, he handed her a Bible, retrieved from a church burnt to the ground by Daesh [IS]. That survival of the Holy Bible symbolised the hope that Christians in Iraq continue to hold in their hearts, that once again they will be allowed to freely practise their faith in safety in their homeland, in their country.”

That brief meeting clearly had a lasting impact. This was confirmation of the importance of the biblical imperative to speak out for the oppressed and to stand up for the persecuted church. Not only that, but it confirms our value to where possible enable our persecuted family to be their own advocates.  

Lord Ahmad then went on to share something else which motivated the Prime Minister to create this role:

“And I assure you, ladies and gentlemen, that the Prime Minister remains committed to not only promoting tolerance, but also the understanding and protecting of freedoms to practise faith and belief at home and indeed overseas. So the letter she received from six-year-old Zeal Saunders from Devon must have particularly resonated with her. For he wrote, and I quote: Dear Prime Minister, I have just learnt about people in prison in other countries simply because they are Christians. They should be as safe as us. Please do everything you can to help them. Thank you.”

We don’t know who this young boy is – but his burden for the persecuted church played an important part in motivating the Prime Minister to create a new role in her government to promote and protect religious freedom. Together with Fr. Daniel’s meeting in December 2017, this child taking the time to write a letter has made a real difference. While writing letters to politicians can sometimes feel a thankless task and people often wonder whether they have any impact, Lord Ahmad’s comments remind us yet again of the power of the public in the UK and Ireland to move politicians to act. 

HUMAN RIGHTS REPORT LAUNCH

Lord Ahmad’s comments were made during the launch of the FCO’s Human Rights and Democracy Report, which outlines the UK’s work on human rights and democracy around the world throughout 2017 focusing on 30 designated priority countries. 

24 out of the 30 priority countries feature on the Open Doors 2018 World Watch List. Conspicuous by their absence are four countries from the top 20: India (#11), Nigeria (#14), Vietnam (#18), and Laos (#20). 

• Afghanistan (number 2 on the 2018 World Watch List)
• Bahrain (number 48)
• People's Republic of Bangladesh (number 41)
• Burma (Myanmar - number 24)
• Burundi (not on the World Watch List this year)
• Central African Republic (number 35)
• China (number 43)
• Colombia (number 49)
• Democratic People's Republic of Korea (number 1)
• Democratic Republic of the Congo (not on the World Watch List this year)
• Egypt (number 17)
• Eritrea (number 6)
• Iran (number 10)
• Iraq (number 8)
• The State of Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories (Palestinian Territories are number 36)
• Libya (number 7)
• Republic of Maldives (number 13)
• Pakistan (number 5)
• Russia (not on the World Watch List this year)
• Saudi Arabia (number 12)
• Somalia (number 3)
• South Sudan (not on the World Watch List this year)
• Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka (number 44)
• Sudan (number 4)
• Syria (number 15)
• Turkmenistan (number 19)
• Uzbekistan (number 16)
• Venezuela (not on the World Watch List this year)
• Yemen (number 9)
• Zimbabwe (not on the World Watch List this year)

The right to freedom of religion or belief received significant attention during the report launch event. We were pleased that Lord Ahmad’s speech affirmed the role of charities in informing government policy and echoed the theme of the 2018 World Watch List Launch in Parliament (non-violent persecution as a tool of suppression) when he outlined 'It’s how that first discrimination then turns to persecution, that persecution turns to violence and worse still.”

Our hope is that throughout 2018-2019 this understanding of the multi-faceted nature of religious persecution is disseminated throughout the FCO and Department for International Development, so that religious persecution can be tackled on all levels and not just when incidents of violence break into the news headlines. Open Doors looks forward to working with the Special Envoy to turn this into a reality.