We don’t always have time to vet every fishy smelling news report that comes down the pike but if there’s one about a Christian genocide somewhere, dump it in your waste basket. There are authentic cases of violence against Christians like that against Coptic Christians in Egypt. But during the Egyptian Arab Spring uprising, Muslims surrounded a Coptic church in Cairo that was being attacked to defend it. There were other instances in Egypt of violence against Coptic Christians. Without carefully investigating it, one cannot jump to the conclusion that there is generalized persecution of Christians in Egypt. But if there is, we can be sure it is fomented by the military government to exacerbate social tensions between Egyptians–just like racism is whipped up in other countries to divide & conquer.
There are also reports about a crackdown on Christian churches in China. Whatever its scale, human rights advocates of course oppose it. But the Chinese government is not locking up Christians in concentration camps or persecuting them on the same scale as it does Uyghur Muslims. That doesn’t mean abridgment of rights for Christians should not be taken seriously & protested before it escalates. But it should not be exaggerated to shout down the genocide being perpetrated against Uyghur Muslims.
Assadists, in an attempt to cover the Islamophobia & anti-Semitism of their ideology, often write about the Christian genocide in Syria. They drag out the Assadist nun Sister Agnes Mariam de la Croix to prove their point, neglecting to mention that the Catholic Church in Syria is fully supportive of the Assad dictatorship. They might better drag out the Syrian Cardinal who supports the Assad regime just as enthusiastically & ignominiously.
There is no persecution of Christians anywhere in the world that comes close to the scale of violence against Muslims & the increasing attacks on Jews. Reports about worldwide Christian genocide come from rightwing nationalist white media, much of it Christian media, that wants to vilify Muslims & legitimize the Muslim-hating ‘war on terror’. In truth, most of the genocide is by Christians, not against them.
Snopes is not the Bible but this article is a useful source to begin the process of vetting news reports about the latest inflammatory reports of a Christian genocide in Nigeria. Maybe Snopes got it right; maybe they didn’t. But it’s a fishy story & requires a thorough investigation.