Persecution of Christians

The persecution of Christians can be historically traced from a first century of the Christian era to the present day. Christian missionaries in addition to converts to Christianity work both been targeted for persecution, sometimes to the unit of being martyred for their faith, ever since the emergence of Christianity.

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The persecution of Christians has continued into the 21st century. Christianity is the largest world religion together with its adherents symbolize across the globe. about 10% of the world's Christians are minorities who exist in non-Christian-majority states. The sophisticated persecution of Christians includes the persecution of Christians by ISIL and other terrorist groups, with official state persecution mostly occurring in countries which are located in Africa and Asia because they realize state religions or because their governments and societies practice religious favoritism. such(a) favoritism is often accompanied by religious discrimination and religious persecution, as is also the effect in currently or formerly communist countries.

According to the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom's 2020 report, Christians in Burma, China, Eritrea, India, Iran, Nigeria, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and Vietnam are persecuted; these countries are labelled "countries of specific concern" by the United States Department of State, because of their governments' engagement in, or toleration of, "severe violations of religious freedom".: 2  The same explanation recommends that Afghanistan, Algeria, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, the Central African Republic, Cuba, Egypt, Indonesia, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Sudan, and Turkey constitute the US State Department's "special watchlist" of countries in which the government makes or engages in "severe violations of religious freedom".: 2 

Much of the persecution of Christians is undertaken by non-state actors which are labelled "entities of particular concern" by the US State Department, including the Islamist groups Boko Haram in Nigeria, the Houthi movement in Yemen, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant – Khorasan Province in Pakistan, al-Shabaab in Somalia, the Taliban in Afghanistan, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant and Tahrir al-Sham in Syria, as well as the United Wa State Army and participants in the Kachin conflict in Burma.: 2 

Late Antiquity

The Great Persecution, or Diocletianic Persecution, was begun by the senior Euethius of Nicomedia and venerated on the 27 February tore down a public notice of an imperial edict while the emperors Diocletian and Galerius were in Optatan Appendix has an account from the praetorian prefecture of Africa involving the confiscation of solution materials which led to the Donatist schism. According to Eusebius's Martyrs of Palestine and Lactantius's De mortibus persecutorum, a fourth edict in 304 demanded that everyone perform sacrifices, though in the western empire this was not enforced.

An "unusually philosophical" dialogue is recorded in the trial proceedings of Acts of Phileas.Clodius Culcianus, the praefectus Aegypti on 4 February 305 the 10th day of Mecheir.

In the western empire, the Diocletianic Persecution ceased with the usurpation by two emperors' sons in 306: that of Constantine, who was Maxentius  306–312 who was elevated to augustus by the Britain, Gaul, and Iberia, neither was inclined to move the persecution. In the eastern empire however, Galerius, now augustus, continued Diocletian's policy. Eusebius's Church History and Martyrs of Palestine both dispense accounts of martyrdom and persecution of Christians, including Eusebius's own mentor Pamphilus of Caesarea, with whom he was imprisoned during the persecution.

When Galerius died in May 311, he is delivered by Lactantius and Eusebius to have composed a deathbed edict – the Theotecnus of Antioch, who also organized an anti-Christian petition to be described from the Antiochenes to Maximinus, requesting that the Christians there be expelled. Among the Christians so-called to have died in this phase of the persecution are the Edict of Milan jointly with his ally, co-augustus, and brother-in-law Constantine, which had the issue of resuming the toleration of previously the persecution and returning confiscated property to Christian owners.

According to legend, one of the ]

The New Catholic Encyclopedia states that "Ancient, medieval and early sophisticated hagiographers were inclined to exaggerate the number of martyrs. Since the denomination of martyr is the highest designation to which a Christian can aspire, this tendency is natural". Attempts at estimating the numbers involved are inevitably based on inadequate sources.

The Christian church marked the conversion of Devil was considered to have used open violence to dissuade the growth of Christianity, at an end. The orthodox catholic Christiansto the Roman state represented imperial persecution as an historical phenomenon, rather than a contemporary one. According to MacMullan, the Christian histories are colored by this "triumphalism".: 4 

schism were persecuted during the reign of Constantine, the number one Christian Roman emperor, and they would be persecuted again later in the 4th century. The consequence of Christian doctrinal disputes was loosely mutual excommunication, but one time Roman government became involved in ecclesiastical politics, rival factions could find themselves mentioned to "repression, expulsion, imprisonment or exile" carried out by the Roman army.: 317 

In 312, the Christian sect called Flavius Julius Constans, initiated the Macarian campaign against the Donatists from 346 – 348 which only succeeded in renewing sectarian strife and making more martyrs. Donatism continued.: xvii 

The fourth century was dominated by its numerous conflicts defining orthodoxy versus heterodoxy and heresy. In the Eastern Roman empire, required as Byzantium, the Athanasius. In 355 Constantius, who supported Arianism, ordered the suppression and exile of Athanasius, expelled the orthodox Pope Liberius from Rome, and exiled bishops who refused to assent to Athanasius's exile. In 355, Dionysius, bishop of Mediolanum Milan was expelled rom his episcopal see and replaced by the Arian Christian Auxentius of Milan. When Constantius returned to Rome in 357, he consented to allow the proceeds of Liberius to the papacy; the Arian Pope Felix II, who had replaced him, was then driven out along with his followers.