Think Christian persecution is rare?

As I walked through the burned- out shell of a church near Mosul, Iraq, just a few weeks ago, our translator told me that the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria graffiti scrawled on the walls read, “You love life, we love death.”

It’s one thing to destroy a building, but Christians are dying for their faith. And it’s not just in Iraq.

On Palm Sunday, a week before my Iraq visit and nearly 1,000 miles to the west, bloodied pews, sobbing parishioners and crimescene tape wrapped around churches in Egypt where bombs had exploded. What should have been a joyous time of worship as followers of Jesus prepared for Easter turned into a murder scene for families.

If you think this kind of persecution is rare, perpetrated almost exclusively by extremists and terrorists, 215 million Christian victims will tell you nothing could be further from the truth.

For years I have traveled in Sudan, where we rebuilt hundreds of churches destroyed by Muslims. We opened a Bible school there to train new pastors to carry on the work of those who were killed. The persecution of Christians is not just happening in hotbeds of extremist ideology. It may come as a surprise that some of our neighbors and allies are on the list of perpetrators.

For example, did you know that not only is Mexico among the top 50 countries where Christians face the most persecution, but 23 Christians were recently killed by drug cartels there, specifically because of their faith? And just a couple of years ago, lo- cal authorities in Chiapas drove more than 150 Protestants from their community, effectively stealing their land and leaving them without food.

Also consider the Christian refugees across Europe, including 88% of those surveyed in German shelters, who have experienced religiously motivated persecution — 32% of whom have received death threats. In the United Kingdom, some Christian converts from Islam are even under armed police protection, according to Barnabas Aid.

In Egypt, the problem is not the result of terrorists alone. Coptic Christians, the largest Christian community in the Middle East, are subject to government- enacted blasphemy laws, bureaucratic roadblocks to erecting churches, and routine rejection from advancement in careers and even sports.

More than 75% of the world’s population live in areas with severe religious restrictions, and 215 million believers suffer “high, very high or extreme persecution” in the 50 countries where it is most difficult to be a Christian, according to Open Doors USA and the Pew Research Center.

This week, the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, in partnership with Samaritan’s Purse, is bringing more than 600 persecuted Christians and advocates from 130 countries to Washington for our first World Summit in Defense of Persecuted Christians.

Will you raise your voice to help those who are being persecuted because of their faith?