Always under pressure

Now condemned, the latest incidents of church burning in Pakistan are indicative of a continuing deeper pressure Christian communities face.

Belle Tindall

Belle is the staff writer at Seen & Unseen and co-host of its Re-enchanting podcast.

A crowd of people inspect fire damaged debris outside a burnt-out church.

The aftermath of a mob attack that burnt-out a church in Jaranwala, Pakistan.

Tearfund.

The pressure is once again rising for the four million Christians living in Pakistan.

Earlier this month a crowd of thousands angrily descended upon the city of Jaranwala in North-Eastern Punjab, an area with a notably high population of Christian residents. The mob set fire to (at least) four churches, burned Bibles in the streets, vandalised a cemetery, and looted numerous homes believed to be owned by Christian families. Social media and news outlets are brimming with videos of these attacks taking place in broad daylight; people can be heard cheering and chanting as churches are set alight, while police officers seemingly stand by and watch the chaos unfold.

These attacks were triggered by allegations that two Christians in Jaranwala had set fire to a Qur’an, thus breaking Pakistan’s strict blasphemy laws and insulting Islam. There is little evidence to suggest that this crime was committed by Christians, only that burnt and vandalised pages of the Qur’an were found scattered near this Christian community. Although the allegations therefore remain heavily disputed, the consequences that the Christian community have suffered have been severe.

Despite this being one of the most destructive incidents in the country’s history, there are thankfully no reports of injuries or fatalities, as it is reported that the Christian residents were forewarned and therefore able to evacuate their homes in time. Nevertheless, the damage done to the community in Jaranwala is profound. Both Christians and Muslims alike have widely and vehemently condemned the violence directed at the Christian community in Pakistan, with Muslim leaders refusing to allow such violence to be carried out in the name of Islam.

The depths of distress

The Right Reverend Azad Marshall, Bishop of a neighbouring city, has responded, stating that the Christian community throughout Pakistan are ‘traumatised’, ‘deeply pained’ and ‘distressed’. Bishop Azas has therefore called for ‘justice and action’ and an assurance that ‘our (Christian) lives are valuable in our own homeland’. Bishop Azad’s words imply that, perhaps unsurprisingly, the pain and devastation caused to the Christian community is multifaceted.

The first layer of distress is the most obvious: the practical implications of these attacks continue to face this community and are a source of ongoing distress. Whole families are sleeping on the streets, their homes no longer safe, surrounded by the rubble of their beloved churches and the ash of their burnt Bibles. In response to the mass destruction, over one hundred men who are thought to have been involved in carrying out and/or inciting the riots have been arrested and detained. What’s more, the Pakistani government have handed out $6,800 as compensation to each Christian household affected, this is reported to be over one hundred Christian families in total.

And yet, the words pouring out from Christians in Pakistan, so often echoing the words of Bishop Azad, speak of another level of pain and distress. This pain is pertaining to the lack of safety and value they experience in their own home as a result of their Christian identity. Such damage is not so easily compensated.

Continual and extreme persecution

Pakistan is a majority Muslim country, with the four million Christians making up just 1.9 per cent of the population. According to the charity Open Doors, which monitors such incidents and who have placed Pakistan in eighth place on their World Watch List, the persecution that Christians face as a minority people group in the country is both continual and extreme. As well as the one-off incidents, such as the deadly attack of a church in 2017, which killed at least nine individuals, Christians in the country are subject to ‘a silent epidemic of kidnappings, forced marriages and forced conversion of Christian girls and women’.

The Prime Minister has attempted to quell the deepest fears being vocalised by Pakistani Christians by vowing that his government will work to ensure their safety as a minority group. However, what is being highlighted in Pakistan is how a Christian identity can place on in the epicentre of political tension. We’re reminded once again that religious persecution can, and does, ensure that people feel unsafe and undervalued, unwelcome in their home countries. What is it like to live under the pressure of political extremists stirring up hatred toward you as a result of your beliefs? What must it feel like to feel such a tension in the country you call home? This is a daily reality for not only the 2 million Christians living in Pakistan, but the 360 million Christians who are living in persecution worldwide.

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Character

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17 April 2024

5 min read

Work isn’t working, it’s killing us

We mistake the nature of work and our purpose within it.

Cameron Wiltshire-Plant

Cameron is training to be a vicar in the city of Leicester.

Two people sit beside each other working on laptops, One looks askance to the other who frowns.

Resume Genius on Unsplash.

What is work for? In our individualist society we perhaps might zoom in on the minutiae of the specific role that we fulfil. Work is for the success of the company I work for, work is for building up my CV, work is to earn money enough to live, work is for seeing people I don’t have to live with. But what about work? The burden that humans have always had to gather enough resources to provide for themselves. We are mistaking the nature of work and our purpose within it, and it is beginning to kill us.

Each of the recent generations have had different, and askew, attitudes to their work. Baby boomers- those who got a job and a sensible haircut in the 60s, conceived work as a contract. They worked well at almost anything and the reward was home ownership, resources to provide for a family, and saving for leisure. The purpose of their work is the lifestyle it creates. To some extent, their successors in Gen X had the same perception and the same contract- stick at any industry and the reward will be generous enough to make the graft worth it.

But what happens when that contract is broken? When work no longer leads to those rewards? The Millennial answer is to seek out work that gives purpose, to accept the reward will not be fulfilling and so to find the purpose in the end of the work itself. Even if that means a lifetime of renting and scrimping, because the reward is not to be found in the payment.

A slow generational drift from the true purpose and boundaries of work has left us confused about its point and struggling to engage.

The Gen Z answer to this broken contract is the most fascinating of all; a reluctance to work at all. There is ‘quiet quitting’ whereby you do as little as possible whilst remaining employed, ‘bare minimum Mondays,’ and, of course, ‘lazy girl jobs.’ The purported aim of this generation is to find jobs where they can work from home, do almost nothing, and still receive a generous salary. Others are living the ‘soft life.’ They move in with mum and dad (usually boomers who have run the rat race and received the benefits of the contract) and do something creative part-time, earning little but doing little. It's a bit of the old baby boomer attitude seeking pleasure outside work but without the corresponding work ethic or career mindset.

On top of this is the mental health crisis, which prevents many of Gen Z from working, with one in three non-graduates out of work with mental health conditions. Bosses receive calls from parents of those in their 20s explaining that their children are too unwell to work.

I suggest that these things are linked, and a slow generational drift from the true purpose and boundaries of work has left us confused about its point and struggling to engage. We must look outside ourselves to understand what work was created for. In Genesis, the Christian origin story, God conceives work as a place of dignity and purpose. What Adam and Eve did in the garden mattered- they were the leaders of creation, and God even gave them the responsibility of naming other creatures. Humans were made to have responsibility, made to express this in their work. Even in the drudgery of repeated physical, administrative, or household tasks, we have the freedom to find purpose. We can take pleasure and pride in making things, fixing things, restoring things, even if just to the state they were in when we cleaned last week.

Find the purpose in the making, fixing, restoring, the very task itself.

The ‘quiet quitting’ of Gen Z or the dry contract of the boomers will not cut it. Even in jobs we don’t like, or tasks we find overwhelming, the same reframing is needed, perhaps even more so. Work itself brings purpose, and that is worth giving our whole selves to, otherwise listlessness and sadness will get us. We were made to find purpose and joy in the task of whatever is in front of us, no matter how simple.

Millennials have swung the pendulum too far in the other direction. Yes, this generation have found the importance of purpose in their work. But only in work that has an end outside of itself. Work has been created with an internal, permanent purpose. Suggesting that meaning only comes from employment with obvious altruistic ends means that any other kind of work, domestic or employed, is devoid of this meaning. The same listlessness ensues in any role not found to have such an end.

St Paul elevates work explicitly even beyond this created place of purpose. In his letter to a church in Colossae, he writes, ‘Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters.’ In other words, work is an act of worship, acting as if the task we are completing is for God, and putting the requisite effort in.

Of course, this is a massive challenge. How many of us put as much work in to satisfy our bosses as we would if they were the ultimate director of our eternal destiny? But it does redeem those moments where we wonder what the point of what we’re doing is, who will see it, and if it is really worth doing properly at all. God sees. God knows. And that makes it worth doing properly.

Paul also makes it clear here that work is not just what we get paid for. Work is everything we do that is not rest. Whatever we do - employed, at home, inrelation to our families. And this allows those who cannot work, in an employment sense, to take part in God’s purpose for humanity by working in a way in which they can. Whether it’s caring for a relative, nurturing a tiny veg patch, creating a piece of art, or hoovering the carpet. Find the purpose in the making, fixing, restoring, the very task itself. Do it as if God were watching. And feel yourself become more human.