Hundreds of prominent buildings around the world were illuminated in red on November 20 to mark Red Wednesday, an annual event in support of persecuted Christians.
The red-lit buildings included scores of cathedrals and churches, but also iconic monuments and public buildings such as the Westminster Parliament and the Hungarian Presidential Palace.
The initiative was first launched by the Catholic charity Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) in 2016 to draw attention to the reality of anti-Christian persecution around the world and emphasize the importance of religious freedom as a fundamental human right.
Red, the color of blood, is the traditional color associated with martyrdom.
Vatican News reported that some 300 different events were taking place in more than 20 countries to mark Red Week, including the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada, Australia, France, Spain, Germany, Italy, the Philippines, Mexico, Chile, and Colombia.
This year’s campaign has focused on Christian children and young people displaced by persecution and violent conflict in Africa, the Middle East, and elsewhere.
According to ACN’s recently published biennial report, “Persecuted and Forgotten?”, Christian persecution has significantly worsened between 2022 and 2024.
The epicenter of militant Islamist violence has shifted from the Middle East to Africa, the report notes, and in parts of Burkina Faso, Nigeria, and Mozambique, Christians have been terrorized by targeted violence.
In Burkina Faso, for example, more than two million people – about 10 percent of the country’s population – have been displaced because of the ongoing Islamist insurgency, the report revealed.
Nigeria is ranked eighth in the 2024 Global Terrorism Index and some 5,000 Christians were killed for their faith in Nigeria just last year. Militant Fulani insurgents in the country’s Middle Belt regularly commit massacres and other violent atrocities against Christians and the government has been notoriously inactive in defending Christians from such attacks.
Acts of terrorism by Fulani raiders have been timed to coincide with Christian holidays. For example, militants stormed a number of Christian villages in Plateau State on Christmas Eve 2023, killing hundreds. They similarly struck on Easter Monday 2024, murdering 10 Christians, including a pregnant woman and her unborn baby.
In Eritrea, as well, some 400 Christians are currently imprisoned – without trial – just because of their faith.
There was intensified targeting of Christians as enemies of the state and/or of the local community, as authoritarian regimes, including those in China, Eritrea, India and Iran, ramped up repressive measures.
In India, 720 attacks or other incidents of persecution against Christians were reported in 2023, up from 599 the prior year.
State and non-state actors have increasingly weaponized legislation as a means of oppressing Christians and other minority religious groups, the report found.
This latest period has also witnessed increased threats to Christian children, especially girls, who have suffered abduction, sexual violence, forced marriage and forced conversion.
For the first time in the 18-year history of the report, Nicaragua is featured due to extreme oppressive measures targeting Christians, notably the mass detention and expulsion of clergy under the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega.