{"id":4293,"date":"2014-02-05T06:02:28","date_gmt":"2014-02-05T14:02:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/?p=4293"},"modified":"2014-02-04T20:17:34","modified_gmt":"2014-02-05T04:17:34","slug":"central-african-republic-church-protects-700-fleeing-muslims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/?p=4293","title":{"rendered":"CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC: Church Protects 700 Fleeing Muslims"},"content":{"rendered":"

Source: Christian Post<\/a>, January 21, 2014<\/p>\n

A Central African Republic priest has opened his church as a shelter to Muslims fleeing the Christian militias terrorizing his community.<\/p>\n

“I am not going to let anyone hurt the people inside my church; it doesn’t matter whether they are Christians or Muslims,” Xavier Fagba, who leads a church in Boali, a city northwest of the capital Bangui, told\u00a0FRANCE 24.<\/p>\n

At the service on Sunday, Fagba told his congregation to make their Muslim counterparts feel comfortable and greet one another with a “kiss of peace.”<\/p>\n

“We just stop causing people pain,” he said.<\/p>\n

Jean-Claude, a Christian, encouraged Ahmad – his Muslim neighbor for years – with a hug at the end of the service.<\/p>\n

“You need to be strong. Stay positive,” Jean-Claud told his neighbor, who recently had his house destroyed in the violence.<\/p>\n

Ahmad said that although he felt that there were individuals trying to protect him, he felt that he would not be fully safe unless he made it to the capital.<\/p>\n

“There are people here who are good to us,” Ahmad told\u00a0The Daily Nation. “But we can’t stay here any longer. We have to leave. I want to go to Bangui. At least there is still some safety there.”<\/p>\n

Currently about 70 French troops are guarding Fagba’s church, where 700 Muslims, mostly women and children, are staying. The volume of people has put a strain on the church’s resources, especially its sanitary conditions, however, without a method to evacuate the people safely, they are planning to remain sheltered there.<\/p>\n

\u00bb Full story with picture<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u00bb Some readers might be interested in a related story, Victimized Christians Take Revenge in Central African Republic; Man Eats Muslim After Christian Mob Attack<\/a> (Warning: video contains violent and disturbing images).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Source: Christian Post, January 21, 2014 A Central African Republic priest has opened his church as a shelter to Muslims fleeing the Christian militias terrorizing his community. “I am not going to let anyone hurt the people inside my church; it doesn’t matter whether they are Christians or Muslims,” Xavier Fagba, who leads a church … Continue reading CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC: Church Protects 700 Fleeing Muslims<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4293","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-briefs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4293","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4293"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4293\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4294,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4293\/revisions\/4294"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4293"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4293"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4293"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}