Christians face death, persecution, displacement across Africa in 2025

JOHANNESBURG: Millions of Christians in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), who spend Christmas under threat of persecution, kidnapping, sexual violence and, in some cases, death at the hands of Islamist militants, saw Friday’s U.S. strikes against Islamic State militants in Nigeria as a real sign that President Trump is serious about his efforts to end the slaughter of Africa’s Christians.

It is estimated that more than 16 million Christians have been displaced and uprooted from their homes in the region. The alleged release of 130 kidnapped schoolchildren in Nigeria this week has done little to allay fears, as many on the continent attempt to worship at Christmas.

But this year, Fox News Digital has repeatedly highlighted the disaster coming from Africa. The situation has led high-ranking members of Congress, including Sen. Ted Cruz, Republican of Texas, Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J. and, finally, President Donald Trump, who threatened to send American troops to the worst-affected country, Nigeria, with all his might, to stop the killing of Christians, highlighted the violence.

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In Africa, at Christmas, there are so far few signs of improvement. “The Islamist militant assault across SSA is a catastrophe of global proportions unfolding before us,” Henrietta Blyth, CEO of Open Doors UK & Ireland, told Fox News Digital this week.

Open Doors is a global Christian charity supporting Christians persecuted for their faith.

Blyth continued: “Last year we saw a relentless stream of reports from sub-Saharan Africa. (including) reports of militant Islamist groups brutally attacking, among others, defenseless Christian communities. »

“At Open Doors, we sounded the alarm through our Arise Africa campaign. We prayed repeatedly that the terror campaign would come to public consciousness.”

Referring to Nigeria and the thousands of Christians reportedly killed there each year, as well as the speeches, articles and messages against violence, Open Doors’ Blyth says: “There is no sign that this will have abated in 2025.”

Members of St. Leo Catholic Church take out a procession to mark Palm Sunday in Ikeja, Lagos, Nigeria on April 13, 2025. (Adekunle Ajayi/Getty Images)

“The lack of global outrage and action on this issue is a moral shame,” South Africa’s Chief Rabbi, Dr. Warren Goldstein, told Fox News Digital. He added: “It seems that black lives don’t matter if they are murdered by Islamists in Africa. The persecution of Christians in Africa must be seen in its global context. It is part of a multicontinental jihadist war against “infidels” – Jews and Christians – and against Western values.

He continued: “This is a global war, with Israel at the epicenter of the fire from the jihadist forces of Iran, Hamas, Hezbollah and others. The Islamist war against Christians in Africa is another front in this global war stretching from Sudan in the north to Mozambique in the south.”

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Fox News Digital highlighted the regions where persecution hit hardest in Africa in 2025:

NIGERIA

According to Open Doors, the continent’s most populous country experienced Africa’s worst persecution in 2025, with “relentless stories of deadly attacks and kidnappings” across Nigeria’s north and central belt – a litany of villages burned, citizens raped, kidnapped, shot and beheaded.

Pope Leo

Christians hold placards as they march through the streets of Abuja during a prayer and penance for peace and security in Nigeria, in Abuja, March 1, 2020. – Nigeria’s Catholic bishops gathered faithful along with other Christians and others to pray for security and denounce the barbaric killings of Christians by Boko Haram insurgents and the continuing cases of kidnappings against ransom in Nigeria. (Photo by KOLA SULAIMON/AFP via Getty Images)

The diocese of Makurdi, led by Bishop Wilfred Anagbe, in north-central Nigeria, is almost exclusively Christian. But constant and escalating attacks from Fulani Islamist militants led him to testify at a congressional hearing in Washington in March. Back in Nigeria, he was threatened and around twenty of his parishioners were killed.

THE DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO (DRC)

A screenshot shows villagers inspecting the damage caused by jihadist terrorists who killed 49 Christians in the Democratic Republic of Congo in late July. (Open doors)

The war-torn country is 95% Christian, his followers are nevertheless the target of jihadists. In February, Islamic State-linked terrorists belonging to the so-called ADF group, who want the eastern part of the country to become a Muslim caliphate, arrested 70 Christians and reportedly beheaded them – in a church. In September, at least 89 Christians were reportedly massacred by jihadists during a funeral and in surrounding fields.

SUDAN

Sudan’s 2 million Christians represent approximately 4% of the country’s population,

Like the rest of the Sudanese population, they face chronic food shortages and the horror of a years-long war. But Christians are also said to be victims of discrimination and persecution by both parties to the conflict.

Omdurman Evangelical Church after being bombed while not in a combat zone or in use by warring forces. (Open doors)

A senior Sudanese church official told Fox News Digital that in the town of El Fasher, Darfur, “now Christians eat animal food and grass. Neither wheat nor rice, nothing can enter there.”

CAMEROON

Civil conflict and poor governance have allowed armed militants to step into the law and order vacuum, Open Doors reported. In the far north, Boko Haram and Islamic State’s West Africa Province regularly invade villages in nighttime raids, killing, kidnapping and destroying. Thousands of people have fled their homes to take refuge in displacement camps.

Ali, a villager, said: “It never ends. I want it to end, but it doesn’t. We have to sleep in the mountains for safety.”

MOZAMBIQUE

Located in the southwest of the continent, Mozambique has a Christian population of 55%. The Islamic State of Mozambique is wreaking havoc in the far north, targeting Christian communities, burning their churches and destroying their homes. Murders have increased this year, and thousands more are fleeing their homes and joining more 1.3 million which have already been moved.

Christian villages targeted in Mozambique (Middle East Media Research Institute)

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In a massive attack on the village of Napala in October, Portes Ouvertes reported that militants killed 20 Christians and displaced some 2,000 people. A local pastor described how four elderly sisters were tied up and burned alive in a house.

Regarding the airstrikes in Nigeria, Open Doors’ Henrietta Blyth told Fox News Digital: “A military operation like this will not provide any sort of silver bullet to decades of violence. The Nigerian government must seek lasting solutions that ensure peace, protection of civilians and religious freedom for all. »

Chief Rabbi Goldstein concluded: “The West can only win this war if it can find the moral clarity to call it what it is and see all theaters of war as part of the same fight. »