The Christian aid organization Open Doors published its annual World Watch List – a ranking of the most dangerous places in the world to practice the Christian faith – on Wednesday, which found that 380 million Christians around the world face severe persecution.
Christian persecution – which Open Doors defines as “any hostile action toward a person or community motivated by their identification with the person of Jesus Christ” – is particularly prevalent in countries with widespread Islamist terrorism or run by communist regimes. Of the top ten countries on the World Watch List, Islamic radicalism is the driver of persecution in eight of them, while the other two, North Korea and Eritrea, are under the yoke of communist regimes.
Of the 380 million Christians facing persecution, in many cases including deadly attacks, 310 million of them are in the top ten nations on the list. Half of these countries are in Africa and three are in the Middle East. Afghanistan is in South Asia; North Korea is an outlier in the Far East region, though bordering the number 15 country on the list, its longtime patron China.
The number of Christians facing violence, displacement, arrest, sexual violence, or other persecution around the world has steadily increased throughout the 2020s. This year’s tally is 20 million more Christians than the total Open Doors identified in the 2022 edition of its study. In 2020, Open Doors estimated that 260 million Christians faced “high levels of persecution.”
The 2025 edition of the World Watch List covers the events of 2024 – which included a rapid increase in radical Islamic terrorism in the African Sahel region, the spread of Chinese influence in several top repressor countries, and the seizure of power in Syria by the al-Qaeda affiliate Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS).
“The Fez itself is an example of this double meaning behind most of Freemasonry’s facade. Worn and even carried to the grave with pompous dignity, the history of the Fez is barbaric and anti-Christian. In the early 8th century, Muslim hordes overran the Moroccan city of Fez, shouting, “There is no god but Allah and Mohammed is his prophet.” There, they butchered approximately 50,000 Christians. These men, women and children were slain because of their faith in Christ, all in the name of Allah, the same demon god to whom every Shriner must bow, with hands tied behind his back, in worship, proclaiming him the god of his fathers in the Shrine initiation. Remember that the Allah of Islam is not just another name for God. Allah is the name of another god. In usual occult fashion, the initiate swears that he will be inseparably obligated to this “most powerful and binding oath”, in advance, and that he may NEVER retract or depart from it. During the butchering of the people of Fez, the streets literally ran red with the blood of the martyred Christians. The Muslim zealots dipped their caps in the blood of their victims as a testimony to Allah. These blood stained caps eventually were called Fezzes and became a badge of honor for those who killed a Christian. The Shriners wear that same red Fez today. The greatest tragedy is that the Fez is often worn by men who profess to be Christians themselves. It must cause God to weep.“
The Shriner meets in a “TEMPLE” – most of which have distinctly Arabic names. They are often built to resemble a Mosque. He wears his fez with the Muslim symbols on it. He takes his oaths and says his prayers in the name of ALLAH. Many of his secret passwords and code phrases are in Arabic, which he is required to memorize in order to be in the “order”.
Candidates for induction into the Shriners are greeted by a High Priest, who says: “By the existence of Allah and the creed of Mohammed; by the legendary sanctity of our Tabernacle at Mecca, we greet you.”
The inductees then swear on the Bible and the Koran, in the name of Mohammed, and invoke Masonry’s usual gruesome penalties upon themselves: