70 Christians beheaded in the DRC

Two weeks ago, 70 Christians were found beheaded in a church in the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s North Kivu province. Suspected members of the Allied Defense Forces lured 20 Christians from their homes in the middle of the night on February 13 before kidnapping them from their village. 50 more of Mayba’s Christian residents were abducted shortly afterward when they gathered to figure out how to rescue the captives. 

All 70 believers, including women, children, and the elderly, were taken to a Protestant church in nearby Kasanga, where they were held hostage for several days before the militants beheaded them. Local Christian leaders were reportedly prevented from burying the dead for several days. 

Growing unrest and worsening persecution 

This attack is only the latest example of escalating persecution at the hands of the Allied Defense Forces, an Islamist rebel group with Ugandan roots and one of many terrorist organizations active in the Congo’s civil war. 

Based in western Uganda and eastern Congo, the ADF reemerged in 2014 after over a decade of inactivity and began a new reign of terror in the DRC’s mineral-rich North Kivu province. ISIS claimed the ADF as one of its affiliates in 2018, opening a new and terrifying chapter of Christian persecution in the DRC. 

The unrest in the DRC has ethnic and political components, but it has only exacerbated violence against Christians, bringing the country to 35th place on Open Doors’ World Watch List for persecution. Although most Congolese are Christians, terror groups such as the ADF and M23 frequently target Christian civilians, who have no protection from the Congolese government in rebel-dominated regions. 

According to Open Doors, Islamist militants are “particularly active” in North Kivu, which has been the site of much unrest in recent weeks. Rwanda-backed rebel group M23 captured Goma, the province’s capital, on January 27. Over three thousand people were killed in the initial onslaught, and thousands more were forced to flee. 

Since then, M23 has occupied Bukavu, a second major city in eastern Congo, where deadly explosions killed 13 people at a rally yesterday. As long as the unrest continues, believers will remain vulnerable to persecution and violence, and need our prayers.

“We don’t know what to do or how to pray” 

In response to the massacres, a local elder told Open Doors, “We don’t know what to do or how to pray; we’ve had enough of massacres.” In the face of such evil, it can be hard to know what, if anything, we can do.

Prayer can often feel like an inadequate response to injustice. But Jesus taught his disciples–and teaches us–to always pray and not lose heart, even in the darkest of situations. 

In Luke 18, for example, Jesus tells us about a woman whose persistence convinces an unjust judge to grant her justice. If even an unrighteous judge can be persuaded, “will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night?” (Luke 18:7). 

It is natural to wonder where God is when terrible things happen to those who love him. While we in the West may not face violent persecution, there will be times when we question God’s care for us in the midst of tragedy. In the Gospels, Jesus tells us that not a sparrow falls to the ground without his notice–and we are far more valuable to him than sparrows (Matthew 10:29-30). 

As hard as life may become, he sees us–and he sees our faithful brothers and sisters who endure so much for the sake of his name. “Blessed are those who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness,” Jesus says, “for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 5:10).

Let us pray for our brothers and sisters facing persecution in the DRC, and around the world. May their example of faithfulness encourage and strengthen us, and may we honor them by the way we endure our own trials.  
“May God’s will alone be done,” the Congolese elder said. May his will be done indeed–in our lives, in the DRC, and in the lives of everyone who puts his or her trust in Jesus.