Southern Baptists have long recognized the importance of religious liberty for all people. Stretching back generations, Southern Baptists have a rich heritage of affirming the importance of and fighting to maintain protections for religious liberty for people of all faiths. The Baptist Faith & Message states “a free church in a free state is the Christian ideal, and this implies the right of free and unhindered access to God on the part of all men, and the right to form and propagate opinions in the sphere of religion without interference by the civil power.”
Each year, the secretary of state names Countries of Particular Concern who have engaged in or tolerated particularly severe violations of religious freedom. To issue a CPC designation to a nation, the State Department’s Office of International Religious Freedom must find “systematic, ongoing, [and] egregious” violations of religious freedom. These violations may include “torture, prolonged detention without charges, forced disappearance, or other flagrant denial of life, liberty, or security of persons.” These designations carry significant consequences and are an important tool in U.S. foreign policy.
After the still-unexplained removal of Nigeria’s CPC designation in November 2021, both the general level of violence and specific targeting of Christians increased. Terrorist groups like Boko Haram and ISWAP have continued to specifically target Christians for persecution, largely unhindered by Nigerian security forces. Christians are almost eight times more likely to be killed in jihadist-related attacks than Muslims, and more Nigerian Christians were killed in 2021 than in all other countries in the world combined, totalling an estimated 4,650. Additionally, on Christmas Eve 2023, hundreds of Christians in Nigeria were killed or injured by a series of terrorist attacks; just weeks later, the Department of State once more declined to include Nigeria on the revised list of CPCs for 2024.
The ERLC supports H.Res.82, which calls upon the Department of State to designate Nigeria as a CPC, and has repeatedly called on Secretary Blinken to complete this designation even before legislation requires the department to. As we expressed in a letter to Secretary Blinken, the time for the United States to take concrete actions to stop these atrocities has arrived, and we continue to pray for our brothers and sisters impacted by these devastating attacks.
