Father Christopher Zugger

After a lot of pressure from human rights groups and some Christian Churches, our government finally  agreed that the jihadists of Islamic State are committing genocide against the Christian population of Syria and Iraq. Before civil war broke out five years ago in Syria, thanks to the failure of the great powers and the UN who would not step in and help the peaceful demonstrators and let Assad begin his campaign of butchering people, Syria was one of the few refuges for believers in Christ. Those persecuted in Iraq usually fled to Syria or Jordan. Those two countries and  Israel were the only ones where Christians could lead fairly normal lives, although Syria was a dictatorship with very little freedom of speech or press. The Christians accounted for 10% of pre-war Syria’s population, with a rich diversity of Eastern Churches – Armenian, Assyro- Chaldean, Greek,Maronite, Melkite,  and Syriac – which covers Eastern Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, and the Church of the East. In addition, there were Latin Catholics and Protestants. All of these people have suffered massacres, gang rapes of women, beheading, kidnapping, torture, slavery for continuing to believe that Jesus is the Son of God. So our generous country opened its doors to those who were driven from their homes by war and persecution, and have allowed forty-seven Syrian Christians to emigrate to our shores. Apparently the previous posting of 83 was wrong – we didn’t let in even that many after all! 

Forty-seven. I have more immediate relatives than that!

How do our president, secretary of state, and those who have arranged the immigration of over 9,400 Sunni Muslims (Sunnis are 75% of Syria’s population) sleep at night? They merrily consign the Christians and Yazidi to the ongoing hell of the civil war. Islamic State does indeed persecute Sunni Muslims who do not go along with their extremist brand of Islam, but let’s face it – there are lots of Arabic Muslim countries to which they can go, but few places that will take a Christian.

The excuse is that Christians don’t register at the UN camps. They don’t because the Sunni refugees routinely berate, mock, beat, and terrorize Christians. When crossing the Mediterranean, Sunni Muslims have thrown Christians overboard and forsaken them. In refugee centers in Germany, Christians beg to be separated from their Muslim fellows because of what happens when the social workers go home. When they get to America and well-meaning social service agencies say “Let’s put all the Arab refugees together so they can be with people of the same language and culture” they are again exposed to extortion, beatings, and even rapes. So no, Christians don’t go to UN camps. But they do register for asylum, they do ask to be taken to safety. And we have bravely taken in forty-seven.

God must weep over us.

Write to your Congress people about this travesty. Maybe write Mr. Kerry and Mr. Obama. But I doubt they will hear us if they refuse to hear the cries of those dying or being enslaved on a regular basis. 

PS HALF OF ALL REFUGEES ADMITTED TO THE USA ARE MUSLIMS. CHRISTIANS ARE ALSO ADMITTED, 46% OF ALL REFUGEES FROM A MIX OF COUNTRIES, BUT FROM SYRIA: NO. 99% ARE MUSLIMS.  cf. http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/08/16/nearly-half-of-refugees-entering-the-u-s-this-year-are-muslim/