World religious leaders have called on Churches in the West to help Christians in the Holy Land who are threatened by religious intolerance and deepening poverty. Emigration is such a serious problem that if it continues at current levels Christians will all but disappear. According to some senior clergy, Christians now make up more than 20 percent of emigrants. It is an alarming statistic given that Christians number about 160,000. In 2008, the year that the state of Israel celebrated its 60th anniversary, reports showed that in the years the foundation of the state, Christians in Bethlehem declined from 60 percent to10 percent of the population. In Jerusalem, the situation is just as serious. There, Christians have fallen from 45 percent of the population to barely 7,000 in number. Abandoning the Holy Land is for many a very painful decision. They know that the more people leave, the worse it becomes for those left behind. If the holy Land loses all its Christians, it won’t be a holy land anymore. It’s very nice to have all these holy places, but the living stones, these are the Christians there, and these people need to be helped to stay.Aid to the Church in Need Australiahttp://www.aidtochurch.org/Aid to the Church in Need Irlanda:http://www.acnirl.org/Aid to the Church in Need United Stateswww.churchinneed.orgAid to the Church in Need Great Britainwww.acnuk.org/ 

World religious leaders have called on Churches in the West to help Christians in the Holy Land who are threatened by religious intolerance and deepening poverty. Emigration is such a serious...leggi tutto