The King met a priest who survived abduction and death threats in Nigeria, at an Advent gathering of Christian charities in London last week.
Fr Alfred Ebalu, who now serves in the Archdiocese of Southwark, was part of a delegation from Aid to the Church in Need (ACN), who spoke to the King on his visit on 8 December to King’s House, a mission centre run by the evangelical KXC.
Fr Ebalu described the growing persecution of Christian in his country – violence which ACN has said “clearly passes the threshold of genocide”.
The charity’s delegation, led by its UK director Dr Caroline Hull, provided the King with an overview of mounting attacks on Christians in other parts of Africa.
They also introduced the King to the report Persecuted and Forgotten? published last month, which detailed worsening conditions for Christian communities across the world. Covering the period 2020-22, it found that the persecution of Christians increased in three-quarters of the countries surveyed.
The author of the report, John Pontifex, and the charity’s chaplain, Fr Dominic Robinson SJ, also joined the delegation.
Speaking after the event, Dr Hull said: “We are so grateful to the King for giving us the opportunity to introduce him to witnesses of Christian persecution.”
She added that the event was “an important testimony to the vital role faith plays in our world today”.
KXC originated as a “church plant” in King's Cross from St Mary's Bryanston Square, a charismatic Anglican church in Marylebone. After a peripatetic existence using rented spaces for worship, KXC made King's House its permanent base this year.
Other visitors to King’s House last Thursday included the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, and the Bishop of London, Dame Sarah Mullally.
The King has spoken several times since his accession on the importance of “protecting the space for faith itself”. As Prince of Wales, he made numerous public interventions on behalf of persecuted Christians and religious minorities, particularly in the Middle East.
In 2014 he recorded a video message for the launch of an ACN report on religious freedom, describing the situation in the Middle East as “an indescribable tragedy”.
At the time of his accession in September, John Pontifex told The Pillar that the King had “demonstrated a deep and abiding compassion for Christians targeted for their beliefs, an approach which was absolutely aligned to his commitment to religious freedom”.
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