As the world celebrates Christmas in the Christian majority countries, we don’t realize how Christian minorities, where they are not a majority, struggle, especially around Christmas.
Bethlehem where Jesus was born, is a city under siege under Isreali occupation of Palestine. Descendants of the first Christians cannot celebrate Christmas openly and Palestinian Christians cannot even visit Jesus’s birth place.
Palestinian Christian activist Hanna Kwas writes “My family, relatives, friends and the whole population of Bethlehem are enduring the most repressive and discriminatory regime the town has ever experienced and that includes the hated Roman (western) occupation of the city 2000 years ago.” He adds “A 25 ft. high concrete wall, in addition to the military check points, are putting the population of the city behind an iron curtain and rendering the city an open prison, similar to what successive Israeli governments have done to the rest of the Palestinian villages, towns and cities.”
A Pakistani Muslim man in a 15 year relationship with a Pakistaini Christian woman, faces discriminaiton from the local Muslim population. He says that “We can legally get married, but after we get married, extremists will start threatening.” Christians face a lot of religious discrimination in Muslim majority countries even though the Quran says to protect the “people of the book” which includes Christians and Jews. Christians have also faced discrimination in the Hindu majority in India and Buddist Majorities in Sri Lanka and Mynmarr(Burma).
Indigenous, black and Christians of colour, also face racial discrimination in Christian majority places including North America, Europe and Austria. However, Chrisitan minorities around the world are very resilient and strong in their faith and have very unique customs and traditions, especially around Christmas.
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