Laos

Laos has dropped out of the Top 10 this year, but this does not mean that there is improvement in the country. The Laotian authorities put believers under strict surveillance, sometimes arresting them and putting them under intense pressure to renounce their faith. The government views Christians as unpatriotic agents of Western political ideology. Communities pressurise those who abandon the worship of evil spirits. Building new church structures is restricted, and there is a great need for training and discpleship, but Biblical training is difficult to do because most of the believers live in rural areas. But The Church of around 200,000 believers, mostly from ethnic minorities, continues to grow despite persecution.

Examples of Persecution:

• In late 2010, officials in Katin village ordered six Christian families to renounce their faith or be expelled
• Expelled from their village at gunpoint in 2010, for failing to renounce their faith, 48 Christians were forced to build temporary shelters at the edge of the jungle. Months later, they were suffering from a prolonged lack of adequate food and clean water, one person dies and two were hospitalised.

Please Pray:

• For the Christians – around 150 – who were arrested last year, some of whom are still in jail
• For unity, integrity and godly leadership in the Church
• That church members, mostly in rural areas where poverty and lack of healthcare is common, will know God's strength and provision for their needs.