Lausanne World Pulse – World Pulse Archives – World Pulse Archives

ASIA: Since 1981 fast economic growth in Eastern Asia has pulled almost a half-billion people out of poverty, according to World Bank figures. That growth has lowered the overall proportion of the world’s people living in extreme poverty, defined as less than $1 a day, from 40 to 21 percent of earth’s population.

BHUTAN: Police raided three Protestant house churches in Sarpang district after Easter services, Compass Direct reports. No one was arrested, but police warned church members to stop meeting and told three pastors and an elder to report daily to a police station. Police said the Bhutan-ese government considered their meetings “terrorist activities.” Catholic churches also have been increasingly restricted since 2000 when the government outlawed public non-Buddhist religious services and imprisoned violators.

BOLIVIA: Quechua-speaking villagers have struck an uneasy truce two months after a mob destroyed the sole evangelical church in Chucarasi, Compass Direct reports. On March 9, village officials signed an accord with members of the local Church of God that obliges evangelicals to respect animist customs in return for the right to hold worship services, though they are forbidden to rebuild their demolished chapel. Community pressure led three evangelicals to say they will return to animism. But most of the 36-member congregation remains firm in the faith. “We declared in the meeting that, although we might die for it, we are going to follow Christ,” the planter of the Chucarasi church said.

BRAZIL: Almost half of Brazil’s 178 million population is black, but even in this country where much lip service is given to racial equality, most of the country’s wealth and power is in the hands of light-skinned Brazilians. In the past 10 years, a vocal black movement has demanded quotas for jobs, education, work contracts and even for the media and movies. But Brazil’s new quotas have led to lawsuits from whites claiming discrimination. To counter claims that those taking advantage of quotas actually have money and don’t need preferential treatment, the government is requiring quota recipients to prove they earn no more than $100 a month.

CHINA:The government is losing its battle to keep information from Web surfers. Internet users are finding savvy ways to avoid government blocks to sites the state doesn’t want citizens to access. But some government attempts to deny access proved damaging to China’s economy when it blocked vital e-mail correspondence.

EUROPE: After almost 30 years of mobilizing young Christians for world mission, The European Missionary Association, TEMA, is filing for bankruptcy. Since 1976 the Holland-based group has organized 10 congresses for some 50,000 young Christians in Switzerland, the Netherlands and Germany. TEMA chairman Tore Askildsen said its New Year’s congress in Salzuflen, Germany, left a $300,000 deficit, caused in part by low German turnout…The continent’s largest religious minority is Muslim. The Islamic community has grown from a few hundred thousand 50 years ago, mainly laborers from North Africa and Asia, to some 12 million today. Many suffer marginalization, unemployment and poverty. Some of Europe’s Muslim leaders, feeling the need to distance themselves from militant Islam but not wanting to abandon their faith, are wanting to develop “EuroIslam”—a faith that supports Western democratic values but is less dependent on Middle Eastern doctrines.

INDIA: According to government figures, the church is less than three percent of the nation’s population, but indigenous Indian missionary organizations have grown. The largest of several missionary networks, the India Missions Association, has almost 200 member groups. According to Operation World, in 2000 India had 44,000 indigenous missionaries. Christians in Kerala state were the first to send Christian workers to other parts of India. Still, westerners fund much, if not most, of missionary outreach. Government restriction of foreign funding could greatly affect mission work.

ISLAM: Egypt’s President Hosni Mubarak asked ministers of religious affairs and other officials from 65 Islamic countries taking part in an annual Cairo conference on Islam to work together to refute what they call false allegations against Islam in the West. Many Islamic scholars feel Islam has itself come under attack since 9/11. Tolerance was the theme for this year’s Cairo conference. Mubarak said the leaders should keep an open dialogue with those of other religions to show that Islam promotes peace and brotherhood. Islam’s highest religious authority, the sheikh of al-Azhar Mosque, said that Islam opposes all attacks on civilians and said a clear difference exists between jihad and terrorism.

RUSSIA: A Russian pastor visiting the US reports that interest in evangelical Christianity is growing, especially among young people. One St. Petersburg beauty parlor doubles as a Baptist church on Sundays. While the city has a 4.5 million population, only 8,000 attend any of its 80 Protestant or evangelical churches. Only eight churches have buildings. The rest meet in offices, homes or storefronts. More people in the city are Russian Orthodox, but most are atheist or agnostic, said Pastor Maxim Baranov. His church sponsors a speakers’ club where business people and professionals hear talks on management and ethics. Two-thirds aren’t Christians. Some meet in small-group Bible studies. They like the club environment because it’s an alternative to bars and parties, he said.

SCOTLAND: A Scottish government minister says that the state won’t fund Islamic schools because of a critical report of two Muslim schools. The report said the school, which received state founding, wasn’t educating students in accordance with Scottish standards.

SPAIN: The country’s new Socialist Party prime minister, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, has called for legalizing gay marriage across Spain and for Catholic dogma to be stripped from public schools in a “modern, cultured, tolerant” country. While abortion is illegal, Rodríguez Zapatero’s party platform aims to change the law to allow first-trimester abortion on demand. According to a 2003 Gallup poll, two-thirds of Spaniards favor gay marriage.