Sunday, December 26, 2010

ASIA BIBI "CAN BE KILLED ANYTIME"


Asia Bibi 'can be killed anytime,' says Pakistani priest
The fight against the blasphemy law continues in Pakistan


By Dan Wooding

Spero News is reporting that the "fight over blasphemy continues unabated in Pakistan" as appeals and initiatives on behalf of Asia Bibi, a jailed Christian woman sentenced to death, continue around the world.

This week, just before Christmas, the High Court in Lahore is expected to set the date for her appeal. However, the most extremist Islamic parties and organizations have launched a campaign in favor of Pakistan's blasphemy legislation, announcing street actions and strikes over the coming weeks.

"Maulana Fazl ur Rehman, head of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islma Fazl party, launched the campaign at a press conference," said the Spero News story based on one released by Asia News. "He said that the campaign would unfold in three stages: demonstrations on December 24 after Friday prayers, a general strike on December 31, and a great rally on January 9, 2011 in Karachi."

Maulana Fazl said that religious parties are "united on the issue." He insisted that he would oppose any attempt by the government to change the blasphemy law.

Last week, President Asif Ali Zardari stated that he wanted to modify the controversial law which has been condemned around the world.

At a seminar titled "Protection of the blasphemy law and its importance," Justice Mian Nazeer Akhtar said that Punjab Governor, Salmaan Taseer, was also a blasphemer for protecting those who indulged in blasphemy.

"Section 295C was included in the Criminal Procedure of Pakistan in 1986, and a handful of people cannot be allowed to damage it," he explained.

At the same time, he accused the Federal government of allowing "dubious debates" on the blasphemy topic on various Pakistani television channels.

During Asia Bibi's trial, her attorney called the charges a "fanciful drama" by a Muslim majority "arrayed against a Christian minority."

The case began after Asia Bibi offered her fellow farm workers water which they refused because, as a Christian, she had made it "impure."

Both sides firmly defended their faiths, but Asia Bibi was charged with blasphemy.

The Rev Samson Dilawar, a parish priest who was wounded by gunmen in 1997 and saw his Catholic church burned to the ground in 2005, has claimed that he has been threatened by anonymous callers for assisting Asia Bibi.

He said that Bibi is "not safe in prison."

Dilawar said that the murder last year of a young Christian man accused of blasphemy in nearby Sialkot was a cautionary tale.

"That boy was killed in the jail. She can also be murdered in the jail as well. She can be killed anytime. So anything can happen," the Rev Dilawar said.

Meanwhile, millions of Christians around the world are praying for Asia Bibi in a case that, once again, appears to illustrate the unfairness of Pakistan's blasphemy laws.

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

CHRISTIANS IN PAKISTAN PLAN FOR DANGEROUS CHRISTMAS


I received the message below via email from an anonymous source out of Pakistan. As we in the U.S. celebrate in peace with our family and friends this year, let us take a moment out of the party to ask God to send his Holy Angels to guard and protect these desperately brave Christians who plan to observe this Christmas holy day by witnessing Christ to a hostile nation, a nation that declares in its official religion that "God has no son." Any one who declares Jesus Christ to be the only begotten Son of God, risks his life by doing so. Here follows the message.

A number of Pakistani Christian organizations have decided that they will observe Christmas as a Protest Day. The decision has been made in All Pakistan Christian Parties Conference, the Christians’ will also host black flags on their residences and business houses against the blasphemy laws and enormities toward minorities. According to a report published in the BBC Urdu human rights activists expressed fear of security risk attached with newly formed alliance of radical religious parties and it’s life threatening warning of anarchy if the civilian government attempts to repeal the nation’s strict blasphemy law and pardon Asia Bibi. The leaders of the All Christian Parties Conference have decided to take to the streets on Christmas Day to call on the government to repeal the blasphemy law and the conference also noted that President Zardari, Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, Human rights activist Asma Jehanghir and Punjab Governor Salman Taseer have all concluded that Asia Bibi is innocent, Speakers have also expressed disappointment that they have not received justice from courts.

It potentials to be a dangerous and threatening Christmas for the Christian community in Pakistan. A radical alliance – which includes Pakistan Muslim Leagues, religious political parties allied with banned militant groups – has called a large mass national demonstration entitled Namos-e-risalat, that is, defending the honour of the Prophet Muhammad(PBUH) on 24 December, after Friday prayers, to say “no” to the release of Asia Bibi and any changes to the blasphemy law. Even JuD chief Hafiz Muhammad Saeed attended the meeting. Addressing the gathering, Saeed stressed the need for a well-organised media campaign in favour of the blasphemy law.

The alliance has called on the “ummah” (Islamic community) in all the world, demanding universal support in the defence of the blasphemy law. Moreover, the radical leaders say: “Asia Bibi is a blasphemous woman and should be repudiated by Christians. Anyone who defends her, an ordinary citizen, politician or Minister, is guilty of blasphemy along with her.”

A pretty naked threat from extremist lobby will also put pressure on the PPP led civilian government as well as on Parliament, which in those days could examine the parliamentary motion presented by PPP’s lawmaker Ms Sherry Rehman, who is proposing substantial changes to the blasphemy law.

Tuesday, December 21, 2010

Bi-Partisan Greetings!




To My Democratic Friends:

Please accept with no obligation, implied or explicit, my best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low-stress, non-addictive, gender-neutral celebration of the winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the religious/secular persuasion and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all. I also wish you a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2011 but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make America great. Not to imply that America is necessarily greater than any other country nor the only America in the Western Hemisphere. Also, this wish is made without regard to the race, creed, color, age, physical ability, religious faith or sexual preference of the wishee.


To My Republican Friends:

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Thanks and a tip of the hat to my friend Judy Warner for sending me this.

Friday, December 17, 2010

WORSHIPING WITHOUT A PERMIT


Algerian Christians to Appeal Conviction for Worshiping

By Damaris Kremida

Four Christian men in Algeria will appeal a court decision to hand them suspended prison sentences for worshiping without a permit, saying the verdict could have repercussions for all the country’s churches.

The correctional court of Larbaa Nath Irathen, about 27 kilometers (17 miles) from the capital of Tizi Ouzou Province, gave two-month suspended prison sentences to four Christian leaders of a small Protestant church on Sunday (Dec. 12).

The pastor of the church, Mahmoud Yahou, was also charged with hosting a foreigner without official permission. The court gave him a three-month suspended sentence and a fine of 10,000 Algerian dinars (US$130), reported French TV station France 24 on its Web site. The prosecutor had asked for one-year prison sentences for each defendant.

Although the suspended sentences mean the four Christians will not serve prison time, Yahou said that he and the three other men plan to appeal the verdict because the outcome of their case could affect all Protestant churches of the country, none of which have official permission to operate.
“If they close us, they can close all the gatherings and churches that exist in Algeria,” Yahou said. “They could all be closed.”

In February 2008 the government applied measures to better control non-Muslim groups through Ordinance 06-03, which was established in 2006. Authorities ordered the closure of 26 churches in the Kabylie region, both buildings and house churches, maintaining that they were not registered under the ordinance. No churches have been closed down since then.

Despite efforts to comply with the ordinance, no churches or Christian groups have received governmental approval to operate, and the government has not established administrative means to implement the ordinance, according to the U.S. Department of State’s 2010 Report on International Religious Freedom.

Though none of the churches have closed since 2008, their status continues to remain questionable and only valid through registration with the Protestant Church of Algeria (EPA). The EPA, however, is also trying to gain official recognition.

“Actually, this law of 2006 has come to light: people are condemned as criminals for the simple act of thinking and believing different,” the president of the EPA, Mustapha Krim, said. “If we accept this [verdict], it means we are condemned to close our churches one after the other.”

Krim confirmed that based on Ordinance 06-03, none of the churches have actual authorization to operate, nor can Christians speak about their faith to other Algerians.
“If they condemn our four brothers, they need to condemn the others,” he said.

In a sign of solidarity towards the men and to demand the abolition of Ordinance 06-03, dozens of demonstrators gathered outside the courthouse on the first hearing of the case on Sept. 26. Demonstrators carried banners that read: “Places of worship for everyone,” “Freedom of religion = freedom of conscience,” and “Abolition of the Law of 06-03-2006.”

Attending the re-opening of a Catholic church in Algeria’s capital on Monday (Dec. 13), Religious Affairs Minister Bouabdellah Ghlamallah told reporters, “Religious freedom in Algeria is a reality,” reported Reuters. (ACP editor's note: The Roman Catholic Church has agreed to not proselytize and also to refuse any Muslims who approach the Roman Church seeking to convert.)

The Algerian Constitution gives the right to all citizens to practice their faith, although it declares Islam the state religion and prohibits institutions from behavior incompatible with Islamic morality.

Yahou said the judge did not pass a rightful judgment and thus had no real sense of justice.
“I think he has no conscience,” Yahou said. “We can’t be persecuted for nothing. He didn’t judge on the law and constitution, he judged on Islam. If he had read what is in the constitution, he wouldn’t have made this decision.”

The small church of Larbaa Nath Irathen, consisting only of a few families, had problems as early as 2008, when a group of Islamic radicals launched a petition against the church without success.

Yahou said that he knew very well the people in the village who brought charges against them, saying that they have tried to intimidate the church for the past few months in an effort to close it down.
“These are Islamists, and I know them in this village,” Yahou said.

Tizi Ouzou is part of Kabylie region, an area of Algeria where the country’s Protestant church has grown with relative freedom in recent years.

There are around 64 Protestant churches in the Kabylie region, where most Algerian Christians live, as well as numerous house groups, according to church leaders. The Kabylie region is populated by Berbers, an indigenous people of North Africa.

In October a court in the region acquitted two Christian men of eating during Ramadan in spite of a prosecutor’s demand that they be punished for “insulting Islam.”

In January Muslim neighbors ransacked and set on fire a church in Tizi Ouzou. In September a court in Tizi Ouzou ordered a local church to stop construction on an extension to its building and to tear it down.

Unofficial estimates of the number of Christian and Jewish citizens vary between 12,000 and 50,000, according to the state department’s report.

Thursday, December 16, 2010

WHEN MUSLIMS BECOME THE MAJORITY


Ivory Coast on the brink
- a call to pray for Ivory Coast


By Elizabeth Kendal

Like Sudan and Nigeria, Ivory Coast sits atop a volatile ethnic-religious fault-line. Whilst the less-developed North has long been predominantly Muslim, the South – Ivory Coast’s economic and political engine – has historically been predominantly Christian and African Traditional Religion (ATR). Decades of mass immigration (1960-1993) from the neighbouring Muslim states of Burkina Faso, Mali and Guinea might have been great for the economy, but they have tipped the demographic balance so that Ivory Coast – officially about one-third Muslim – is actually majority Muslim.

The civil war that erupted in September 2002 was portrayed by the international media as a crisis of democracy and human rights caused by Southern xenophobia and Islamophobia. In reality, Ivory Coast’s crisis is the consequence of decades of mass Muslim immigration coupled with political ambition and an internationally-sponsored Islamic agenda. The civil war was fought essentially between those who want all Ivory Coast’s Muslim immigrants naturalized – giving Ivory Coast a Muslim majority overnight – and those who do not.

Though he denies it, former Prime Minister Alassane Ouattara, a Northern Muslim, was doubtless behind the September 2002 failed coup that triggered the war. Ouattara and his party, the Rally of the Republicans (RDR), have been playing the race and religion cards for political gain. Ouattara’s intent has been to have all the Muslim immigrants naturalised (over 4 million: estimated to comprise between 30 and 40 percent of the total population) so that he (their champion) can dragnet the Muslim vote. Ouattara has long had his eye on the presidency.

The civil war left Ivory Coast totally polarised, split between a virtually ethnic-religiously cleansed, rebel-controlled Muslim North and a government-controlled predominantly Christian, non-Muslim South. Since the war the North has been in serious decline with AIDS, poverty and lawlessness increasing exponentially. In November 2004 Ivory Coast’s Christian president, Laurent Gbagbo, launched surprise airstrikes against rebel positions in the North in an attempt to reunify the country. However, former colonial power France (which backs the rebels for economic gain) intervened, razing all IC’s airforce planes, destroying runways and sending tanks against the Presidential Palace, around which loyalists formed a human shield.

The West had insisted that Ivory Coast could be reconciled, reunified and essentially saved by means of democratic elections, such is their faith in ‘democracy’ and the inherent goodness of man. In reality, the divisions are so profound and the stakes are so high that, unless genuine reconciliation occurred first, elections could only trigger conflict. Elections were held on 28 November 2010, with both Gbagbo and Ouattara claiming victory.

The US, European Union and African Union have recognised Ouattara as the winner and called for Gbagbo to respect democracy and step down. Russia meanwhile is blocking a UN statement that would recognise Ouatarra, saying that this is not the UN’s role. Ivory Coast’s non-Muslims are traumatised, fearing that their homeland—once the most prosperous ‘Christian’ nation in West Africa, home to the region’s largest cathedral, home-base to most of West Africa’s regional Christian ministries—is about to come under Muslim political domination.


(COMMENT: Ivory Coast’s crisis – the consequence of decades of Muslim mass immigration – is a foretaste of what several states in democratic Europe may be facing in a generation or two.)


PLEASE PRAY SPECIFICALLY FOR GOD TO:
give Ivory Coast’s Christian leaders – pastors and politicians – great spiritual wisdom and authority.

bring revival to the Church in Ivory Coast so believers will be compelled to go out with the gospel in boldness, empowered by the Holy Spirit, so that Ivory Coast might be spiritually transformed. For only then will the peoples ‘beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks . . .’ (Isaiah 2:4 ESV)

intervene in the tense climate by interposing a spirit of restraint, compelling the people to seek a negotiated solution as a means of averting another destructive civil war—a war that would certainly attract international jihadists.

Tuesday, December 07, 2010

Pakistani Christian Asia Bibi ‘has price on her head’


By Orla Guerin


Ashiq Masih has the look of a hunted man - gaunt, anxious and exhausted. Though he is guilty of nothing, this Pakistani labourer is on the run - with his five children. His wife, Asia Bibi, has been sentenced to death for blaspheming against Islam. That is enough to make the entire family a target. They stay hidden by day, so we met them after dark.

Mr Masih told us they move constantly, trying to stay one step ahead of the anonymous callers who have been menacing them.
“I ask who they are, but they refuse to tell me,” he said.
“They say ‘we’ll deal with you if we get our hands on you’. Now everyone knows about us, so I am hiding my kids here and there. I don’t allow them to go out. Anyone can harm them,” he added.

Ashiq Masih says his daughters still cry for their mother and ask if she will be home in time for Christmas. He insists that Asia Bibi is innocent and will be freed, but he worries about what will happen next.
“When she comes out, how she can live safely?” he asks.
“No one will let her live. The mullahs are saying they will kill her when she comes out.”

‘Noose around neck’
Asia Bibi, an illiterate farm worker from rural Punjab, is the first woman sentenced to hang under Pakistan’s controversial blasphemy law. As well as the death penalty hanging over her, Asia Bibi now has a price on her head. A radical cleric has promised 500,000 Pakistani rupees (£3,700; US$5,800) to anyone prepared to “finish her”. He suggested that the Taliban might be happy to do it.

Asia Bibi’s troubles began in June 2009 in her village, Ittan Wali, a patchwork of lush fields and dusty streets. Hers was the only Christian household. She was picking berries alongside local Muslim women, when a row developed over sharing water.

Days later, the women claimed she had insulted the Prophet Muhammad. Soon, Asia Bibi was being pursued by a mob.
“In the village they tried to put a noose around my neck, so that they could kill me,” she said in a brief appearance outside her jail cell.
Asia Bibi says she was falsely accused to settle an old score. That is often the case with the blasphemy law, critics say.

Anarchy threat
At the village mosque, we found no mercy for her. The imam, Qari Mohammed Salim, told us he cried with joy when sentence was passed on Asia Bibi. He helped to bring the case against her and says she will be made to pay, one way or the other.
“If the law punishes someone for blasphemy, and that person is pardoned, then we will also take the law in our hands,” he said.

Her case has provoked concern abroad, with Pope Benedict XVI joining the calls for her release. In Pakistan, Islamic parties have been out on the streets, threatening anarchy if she is freed, or if there is any attempt to amend the blasphemy law. Under Pakistan’s penal code, anyone who “defiles the sacred name of the Holy Prophet” can be punished by death or life imprisonment. Death sentences have always been overturned on appeal.

Human right groups and Christian organisations want the law abolished.
“It was designed as an instrument of persecution,” says Ali Hasan Dayan, of Human Rights Watch in Pakistan. “It’s discriminatory and abusive.”

While most of those charged under the law are Muslims, campaigners say it is an easy tool for targeting minorities, in this overwhelmingly Muslim state.
“It is a hanging sword on the neck of all minorities, especially Christians,” says Shahzad Kamran, of the Sharing Life Ministry, which ministers to prisoners, including Asia Bibi.
“In our churches, homes and workplaces we feel fear,” he says.
“It’s very easy to make this accusation because of a grudge, or for revenge. Anyone can accuse you. Even our little children are afraid that if they say something wrong at school, they will be charged with blasphemy.”

‘No compromise’
Asia Bibi’s story has sparked a public debate in Pakistan about reforming the law, but it is a touchy - and risky - subject which many politicians would prefer to ignore. Campaigners fear that the talk about reform of the blasphemy laws will amount to no more than that. When Pakistan’s Minister for Minorities, Shahbaz Bhatti, raised the issue six months ago, he was threatened with death.
“I was told I could be beheaded if I proposed any change,” he told us.
“But I am committed to the principle of justice for the people of Pakistan. I am ready to die for this cause, and I will not compromise”.

Mr Bhatti, himself a Christian, hopes that Asia Bibi will win an appeal to the High Court, or be pardoned by Pakistan’s President Asif Ali Zardari. He says she is one of dozens of innocent people who are accused every year.
“I will go to every knock for justice on her behalf and I will take all steps for her protection”.
But even behind bars Asia Bibi may not be safe. Several people accused of blasphemy have been killed in jail.

‘Electric shock’
Thirty-four people connected with blasphemy cases have been killed since the law was hardened in 1986, according to Pakistan’s Justice and Peace Commission, a Catholic campaign group.
In a neglected graveyard by a railway track in the city of Faisalabad, we found two of the latest victims of the blasphemy law. They are brothers, buried side by side, together in death, as they were in life.
Rashid Emmanuel was a pastor. His brother, Sajid, was an MBA student. They were gunned down in July during their trial - inside a courthouse, in handcuffs and in police custody.

Relatives, who asked not to be identified, said the blasphemy charges were brought because of a land dispute. After the killings, the extended family had to leave home and move to another city. They say they will be moving again soon.
“We don’t feel safe,” one relative told us.
“We are shocked, like an electric shock. We are going from one place to another to defend ourselves, and secure our family members.”

Once a month they come to the cemetery to pray at the graves of their lost loved ones.
They are too frightened to visit more often. They bow their heads and mourn for two men who they say were killed for nothing – except being Christian.

Saturday, December 04, 2010

NEWS ON ASIA BEBE


Dear Fr. John
Please find the update of Asia .

December 3, 2010
Pakistan Cleric Offers Reward for Killing Christian Woman

Screen shot 2010-12-03 at 1.40.50 PMBreaking News: Both MSNBC and theAFP are reporting on the Pakistani Cleric by the name of Maulana Yousuf Qureshi (pictured) who is calling for the death of Asia Bibi and offering a $6000.00 bounty for doing so.

Please keep praying for Asia Bibi and her family, and also pray for those who are persecuting her to come to faith in Christ Jesus.
Link to this post | Posted by Stacy L. Harp in Christian Action, Christian News, Christian Persecution
...............................................................................................

Court Prevents Pakistan’s President from Pardoning Asia Bibi

The high court in Pakistan told the president that he can’t pardon Bibi because the court has not yet decided on her appeal.

Washington, D.C. (November 29, 2010)–International Christian Concern (ICC) has learned that today a court in Pakistan told the president of the country that he could not grant pardon to the Christian woman who has been sentenced to death for ‘blasphemy’ against Muhammad.

The Lahore High Court issued the order after lawyers argued that the president can not issue the pardon before Asia Bibi’s appeal to the High Court is decided.

Bibi had appealed to the High Court for the reversal of her death sentence, but the court has yet to set a date for the hearing of her appeal.

In a statement to ICC, Pakistan’s Minister for Minorities, Shahbaz Bhatti said that President Asif Ali Zardari has pledged to intervene if the High Court unnecessarily delayed in deciding Bibi’s case. The president also asked Bhatti to investigate Bibi’s case and Bhatti found her to be innocent.

Bhatti added that the under Article 45 of the country’s constitution, the president of Pakistan has authority to free convicts. The article states that: “the President shall have power to grant pardon, reprieve and respite, and to remit, suspend or commute any sentence passed by any court, tribunal or other authority.”

Meanwhile, fundamentalist Muslims have stepped up their threats against the Pakistani officials, warning that there will be anarchy if Bibi is pardoned.

Pakistan’s blasphemy laws stipulate that defaming the Islamic prophet Muhammad is punishable by death or life imprisonment. Muslim radicals have used the law to repeatedly incite violence against Christians, other religious minorities and even Muslims. In August 2009, a Muslim mob killed 11 Christians following a false allegation of the desecration of the Qur’an in Gorja, Pakistan. According to the State Department’s report on International Religious Freedom, 25 Ahmadis and 17 Muslims were arrested in 2008 alone for allegedly violating the blasphemy laws.

ICC’s Regional Manager for South Asia, Jonathan Racho, said “We are deeply saddened by the plight of Bibi and her family. It’s disturbing that Muslim radicals are using the legal system in Pakistan to delay the release of Bibi. We urge Pakistan to immediately release Bibi and repeal the blasphemy laws that are causing persecution of Christians and other religious minorities in Pakistan.”

Please contact the Pakistani embassy in your countries and politely ask the Pakistani officials to release Asia Bibi.

Pakistani Embassies:

USA: (202) 243-3254 (Phone), (202) 686-1534(Fax)
Canada: (613) 238-7881 (Phone), (613) 238-7298 (Fax)
UK: 0870-005-6967 (Phone)
--
The Archdeacon Fr. Mushtaq Andrew
Diocese of Lahore
Church of Pakistan CIPBC
2 Province of Anglican Catholic Church
www.wix.com/archdeacon/ad


AND ALSO THIS:

No pardon for Asia Bibi, orders Chief Justice LHC
Lahore: November 29, 2010. (PCP) The Chief Justice of Lahore High Court LHC, Khawaja Sharif bared President Asif Ali Zardari to pardon Asia Bibi, a Christian mother sentenced to death on accusation of blasphemy.
The interim orders were issued by Chief Justice LHC Khawaja Mohammad Sharif on a petition pleaded by Allah Bukhsh Advocate praying to stall any may be attempt of pardon to one Christian woman sentenced to death on defiling name of Prophet Mohammad by ADSJ of Nankana Sahib.

The petitioner Shahid Iqbal,s advocate pleaded that accused have filed her appeal in Lahore High Court against her death sentence and decision of appeal is awaited but it seems that President of Pakistan tends to pardon her while President can not pardon when an appeal is pending.

In a report in Pakistan Christian Post, it was feared that Asia Bibi will not be able to avail opportunity of Pardon by President Of Pakistan when family of Asia Bibi on directions of one NGO filed her appeal in LHC in haste.

On one hand, Governor of Punjab was visiting Asia Bibi in Seikhupura District jail and taking her thumb impressions on Affidavit to file her Pardon appeal with President of Pakistan, on other hand some NGO,s based in Lahore were taking her thumb impression to file her appeal against decision of ADSJ verdict. The race among government and NGO,s complicated release of Asia Bibi which benefited forces which consider blasphemy law soul and spirit of Islam.

Asia Bibi recorded her statement in Saddar Police Station, in Additional District and Session Judge Court and before Pakistani media that she never defiled name of Prophet Mohammad or commented against Islam but no one is ready to accept her statement and she is living in fear of life in Prison and her family is fled from her village Ittanwali and taken refuge in undisclosed location in Pakistan.

The Islamic leaders are holding Press Conferences and rallies to maintain sentence of death to Asia Bibi on accusation of blasphemy which can pressure Higher Court.

Pakistani Embassies:

USA: (202) 243-3254 (Phone), (202) 686-1534(Fax)
Canada: (613) 238-7881 (Phone), (613) 238-7298 (Fax)
UK: 0870-005-6967 (Phone)

--
The Archdeacon Fr. Mushtaq Andrew
Diocese of Lahore
Church of Pakistan CIPBC
2 Province of Anglican Catholic Church
www.wix.com/archdeacon/ad

Wednesday, December 01, 2010

CORNERSTONE LAID for NEW CHURCH






I have received the letter below just this morning from Fr. Andrew in Pakistan. Many thanks for your prayers. Please keep praying for our Christian people in Pakistan. Fr. Andrew is seated third from the left, wearing a brown jacket, in the second photo from the top.



His Grace Mark Haverland, His Grace John Augustine,
His Lordship Brian Iverack, dears bishops,
Dear priest brothers

Greetings in our Saviour Jesus Christ

30th November 2010 is the historical and remarkable day for the
Anglican Catholic Church in Pakistan.
This day officially foundation stone laying ceremony took place at
Model Town Gujranwala.
His Excellency Kamran Michael Province Minister for Minorities and
Human Rights was invited to lay the foundation stone.
Due to emergency meeting with Chief Minister of Punjab on Asia Bibi he
could not come to us. But His Excellency sent his representative for
this ceremony.
Our Lord made possible to start our own ACC Church building in Pakistan.
We thank all our Anglican brothers and sisters who made possible to
create his day as historical day for the ACC in Pakistan.

Please have a look on Photographs;
in Christ
Fr. Andrew


--
*The Archdeacon Fr. Mushtaq Andrew
Diocese of Lahore
Church of Pakistan CIPBC
2 Province of Anglican Catholic Church
www.wix.com/archdeacon/ad*