Political Correctness is deadly when used to provide cover for Islamic murderers. It doesn't help when the press keeps referring to Islam as "a religion of peace." The fact is, as Chuck Colson notes :
Around the world, Christians are suffering and even dying, because they are Christians. They know also that the victimizers more often than not are Islamist militants.
This past April seven Christians were murdered on the southern Philippine island of Jolo.
The seven, who were working road construction, were kidnapped by the group Abu Sayyaf, an al Qaeda affiliate.
The group demanded more than $100,000 in ransom from the Christian community. When it wasn’t immediately paid, the seven, two of whom were teenagers working to help support their impoverished families, were beheaded. Abu Sayyaf then ordered civilians to take two of the severed heads to a military camp and left the other five at yet another camp.
Christians are being attacked right and left around the world primarily by radical Muslims. But political correctness requires "the outright denial of Islam's attitudes and actions towards what it calls 'infidels.'" (See my earlier post).
Eliza Griswold, a Nieman Fellow at Harvard, has investigated Christian martyrdom in Nigeria, Sudan, Indonesia, Malaysia, Yemen, and Iraq. Most recently she has written an article, "The Believers,” which appears in the latest issue of the New Republic. In it, she compares and contrasts the Christian and Islamic use of the word “martyr.” "For Muslims, 'martyr' indicates 'a willingness to kill.' For Christians, it means a 'willingness to die' -- a big difference."
The persecution of Christians (and those who do the persecuting and murdering) remains an underreported story of our time. For accounts of recent tragedies, see the links at the end of Colson's article. A good source for keeping tabs on persecution of Christians worldwide is Compass Direct News.