The first question: who counts as a Christian? Mormons consider themselves Christians, but few other Christians consider them so. Are Unitarians Christians? What about Deists? Thomas Jefferson considered himself a Christian, but many modern Christians wouldn't agree. Do denominations that reject the Trinity qualify? What about those that reject Jesus' divinity, but espouse His teachings? What if they accept Jesus' divinity, but say the Holy Spirit is just an emanation, not a Divine Person? What if they reject the Virgin Birth, or the sinlessness of Mary or the Motherhood of Mary? Are anti-Marian positions attacks on the Person most mainline Christians agree is her Son?
We also have to define exactly what counts as martyrdom. Is it the premature death of someone who witnesses to Christ? Do they have to be actually slain by someone else, or can they merely die as a result of a civil war, in which many victims are killed indiscriminately? What if they were killed partly because of their tribe or race, that is, the killer always hated the Tutsi tribe (whether Muslim, Christian or animist), but the killer also always hated Christians, and this one happened to be a Christian Tutsi, which made the killing more delectable?
Or, perhaps, the killer doesn't even know his victim is Christian, the man dies simply because the killer doesn't like the man's stance against multiple wives or homosexuality?
Keep in mind that due to the increase in world population, it is quite possible for the raw number of martyrs to increase, while the actual amount of persecution (percentage or per capita persecution) is decreasing.
Clearly, the number of Christians in the last two-centuries has grown ten-fold. If the amount of persecution has neither increased nor decreased, we would expect the number of martyrs to grow ten-fold as well. By the same reasoning, if the number of martyrs has only quintupled, (grown five-fold), we could say with confidence that, while the raw number of martyrs has increased, the amount of persecution is actually decreasing.
Some say 45% of all of history's Christian martyrs have died in the last two centuries. That may be true (although a lot of that depends on whose numbers you believe and how you count), but it is also quite possible that the number of people alive right now comprises about 45% of all the Christians who ever lived between 33 AD and 2011. After all, according to the tables at this link, roughly 50 billion people have been born, lived and died between 1 AD and 2015. About 18 billion of those lived during the last two centuries.
If the population of Christians was never above 20% of the world population (and it wasn't until the last century), then the entire Christian population for all of history has been around 10 billion people. About 3.6 billion have lived during the last 200 years, 72% of whom are alive right now. So, yeah, we should see that a pretty high percentage of all martyrdoms have occurred in the last century or two, without necessarily seeing any real increase in the percentage of persecution across the Christian experience.
Does this make the persecution any less real or heinous?
Of course not - it is still just as vicious and evil today as it ever was.
Has the raw number of Christian martyrs increased?
Obviously, yes.
But has overall Christian persecution increased?
On that point, it is hard to say that it has.
UPDATE:
This from Global Research
"According to a 2009 report published by the Counter Terrorism Center at the United States Military Academy at West Point, Al-Qaeda kills over seven times more Muslims than non-Muslims.
The UN reported last year that Muslims are the largest victims of ISIS in Iraq."
Also, the BBC reports on how the "100,000 martyrs per year" meme was manufactured. Let's just say it isn't a particularly good number.
We also have to define exactly what counts as martyrdom. Is it the premature death of someone who witnesses to Christ? Do they have to be actually slain by someone else, or can they merely die as a result of a civil war, in which many victims are killed indiscriminately? What if they were killed partly because of their tribe or race, that is, the killer always hated the Tutsi tribe (whether Muslim, Christian or animist), but the killer also always hated Christians, and this one happened to be a Christian Tutsi, which made the killing more delectable?
Or, perhaps, the killer doesn't even know his victim is Christian, the man dies simply because the killer doesn't like the man's stance against multiple wives or homosexuality?
Keep in mind that due to the increase in world population, it is quite possible for the raw number of martyrs to increase, while the actual amount of persecution (percentage or per capita persecution) is decreasing.
Year (AD) World Population (billions) Christian% of World Christian Population (millions) 1000 0.263 17 45 1800 1 27 200 2015 7 32 2600
Clearly, the number of Christians in the last two-centuries has grown ten-fold. If the amount of persecution has neither increased nor decreased, we would expect the number of martyrs to grow ten-fold as well. By the same reasoning, if the number of martyrs has only quintupled, (grown five-fold), we could say with confidence that, while the raw number of martyrs has increased, the amount of persecution is actually decreasing.
These numbers from Christianity.com demonstrate the problem with raw versus per capita calculations. While Long emphasizes that more people have died in the 20th century, he fails to note that the world's population has gone from 1 billion in 1800 to 7 billion at the close of the 20th century:
In a recent article, Justin D. Long emphasized the startling fact that more people have died for their faith in the Twentieth Century than in all of the previous centuries combined. “During this century, we have documented cases in excess of 26 million martyrs. From AD 33 to 1900, we have documented 14 million martyrs.”He did add, however, that thankfully martyrdom has been on the decline for the past decade. "The current rate is 159,000 martyrs per year -- down from 330,000 per year at the height of the cold war. With the demise of the Soviet Union and its sponsored communism, religious freedoms have opened up. Although there are still numerous restrictions and some persecution, martyrdom -- in the form of executions and assassinations -- has been significantly curtailed."
If the population of Christians was never above 20% of the world population (and it wasn't until the last century), then the entire Christian population for all of history has been around 10 billion people. About 3.6 billion have lived during the last 200 years, 72% of whom are alive right now. So, yeah, we should see that a pretty high percentage of all martyrdoms have occurred in the last century or two, without necessarily seeing any real increase in the percentage of persecution across the Christian experience.
Does this make the persecution any less real or heinous?
Of course not - it is still just as vicious and evil today as it ever was.
Has the raw number of Christian martyrs increased?
Obviously, yes.
But has overall Christian persecution increased?
On that point, it is hard to say that it has.
UPDATE:
This from Global Research
"According to a 2009 report published by the Counter Terrorism Center at the United States Military Academy at West Point, Al-Qaeda kills over seven times more Muslims than non-Muslims.
The UN reported last year that Muslims are the largest victims of ISIS in Iraq."
Also, the BBC reports on how the "100,000 martyrs per year" meme was manufactured. Let's just say it isn't a particularly good number.
Update 2020
This from Christianity Today:
The number of Christian martyrs worldwide has fallen by half in a decade, according to the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. Although 800,000 Christians were killed in the 2010s, that was significantly lower than the 1.6 million Christians killed in the 2000s, according to the center’s most recent report.When it comes to tracking global trends in Christianity, the center leads the field. Since it was founded as the World Evangelization Research Center in Kenya in 1965, and then relaunched as the Center for the Study of Global Christianity in 2003, CSGC has monitored a range of global trends, including changes in denominations, populations, conversions, and martyrs.The good news about the decline of martyrs will be met, however, with skepticism. CSGC’s calculations result in a much higher total than those of other groups that track these numbers. Open Doors, for example, reports 4,305 Christians were martyred in 2019. A researcher with the International Society for Human Rights estimated the number is about 10,000 annually.CSGC puts annual deaths at approximately 90,000.
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