Millions of African Christians are displaced by violence. Nobody is talking about it.

Pastor Barnabas lives in a displacement camp in Nigeria. They’re all Christians who’ve fled Islamic militant violence. Nobody talks about it.

As Pastor Barnabas walks through the camp where he lives, he points out the makeshift tents in every direction. There are hundreds of them with people huddled inside, seeking refuge from the sun. These are the women, men and children he pastors.

“We are all Christians. We are displaced because of violence.”
Pastor Barnabas

Thousands of people live here: an informal camp for internally displaced people (IDPs) in Benue State, northern Nigeria. “Each and every one you are seeing here, we are all Christians,” says Pastor Barnabas. “We are displaced because of violence.”

You can see the compassion register on his face as he talks, but there is something else, too: an authority that comes from a righteous anger that he and his church family have ended up in a camp like this.

It’s one of many similar IDP camps across sub-Saharan Africa, where 16.2 million Christians have been forcibly displaced by violence and conflict. It’s an astounding number. But most of the world doesn’t even know it’s happening.

“Millions of Christians are displaced, here in Nigeria,” says Pastor Barnabas. “Millions of Christians are displaced in Africa. The news doesn’t care about it, politicians don’t talk about it, governments don’t talk about it, global politics don’t talk about it. Nobody talks about it.”

That’s why Open Doors’ Arise Africa campaign is so desperately needed.

Pastor Barnabas lives with his wife Joy and children in appalling conditions in the IDP camp

“A terrible place to live”

Pastor Barnabas gets to his tent, and stoops down to show it. Even though he, his wife Joy and their family have lived in the camp for almost five years, their home is made of whatever materials were available – mostly palm leaves and mosquito nets. “It’s smaller than a double mattress,” Pastor Barnabas says. It’s far too small for a large family of eight.

“The IDP camp is a terrible place to live,” says Pastor Barnabas bluntly. “We don’t have good hygiene, we don’t have water, we don’t have toilets. Many people are dying. Only last week, as I am talking, we lost eight people in this IDP camp.”

People wouldn’t live in a camp like this if they had any other choice. They only live here because it’s too dangerous outside the camps. Because of the horrendous persecution that has displaced them.

An appalling attack

Last year, and for many years, more Christians were killed for their faith in Nigeria than the rest of the world combined. The same violent persecution is quickly spreading across other parts of sub-Saharan Africa, as Islamic extremist ideology spreads: as well as these murders, huge numbers of believers are injured, abducted, sexually assaulted or forced to flee from their homes. Pastor Barnabas can easily empathize with the people in the camp who have faced this violence. He’s been through exactly the same experience himself.

“I was on the farm with my brother, Everen, and his wife, Friday,” he remembers. “We heard shooting. We saw people running in different directions. We didn’t know what was happening.”

The community was being attacked by Fulani militants, a group of Islamic extremists who are responsible for many of the violent attacks in north central and central Nigeria. Pastor Barnabas and his family tried to run, but Everen and Friday didn’t manage to escape. “My brother was shot by the militants, and my brother’s wife was also shot and then macheted and killed by the militants,” he says. It’s been almost five years, but the pain of loss is still raw.

Lasting injuries

The attack kept going. Pastor Barnabas couldn’t stop to help his brother and sister-in-law, or even to retrieve their bodies. “I kept running,” he remembers. “Then the militants divided themselves and one of them followed me.”

“If not for God’s intervention, I wouldn’t be where I am today.”
Pastor Barnabas

This man tried to attack Pastor Barnabas with a machete, but accidentally dropped it. “He proceeded to remove his stick and hit me on my hand, and my hand was badly broken.”
Years later, he is still affected by these injuries every day. The attack caused long-term damage and, while he managed to gather enough money to pay for initial surgery, he can’t afford to have the metal in his hand removed. Without that second operation, he can’t use his hand properly. It’s a daily reminder of the horror he experienced at the hands of the militants.

Despite the horrendous ordeal, Pastor Barnabas is grateful to God that his life was saved. “If not for God’s intervention, if not for God’s love, I wouldn’t be where I am today,” he says.

Why were they attacked?

The motive of Islamic militant violence like this is clear: to destroy as many Christians and Christian communities as possible. “This attack is because we are Christians,” says Pastor Barnabas. “When they come to attack us, they call us ‘capari’. It means you don’t have any religion.” The militants don’t value their lives, because they are considered infidels.

“In this camp, many people are affected, many are injured, many are killed or their loved ones have been killed,” he says. “This affected not only my family, not only in the particular IDP camp I’m living, but there are millions of Nigerians that are being displaced. And it is not only in Nigeria these things are happening. They are happening in the whole of Africa.”

The effects of this persecution are long-lasting. As well as the terrible loss of life, it removes any means of getting an income, or future opportunities for the children of affected believers. It threatens the future of the church. “Now, I have lost everything that I had. Everything in my home and village was burned,” says Pastor Barnabas. “I cannot take care of my children. I cannot feed them. Most of the men go looking for work to do, in order to get daily food. But yet, it will not be enough for one meal.”

Desperate hunger

“How can you preach to someone who is hungry, and tell them that God will provide when you cannot take a step to help them?”
Pastor Barnabas

“If you are hungry, you will lose your confidence in God,” he says. “If you are sick, if you are not strong, you may lose your confidence in God.” As a pastor in the camp, he sees many believers struggle to remain faithful to God, because they don’t know where their next meal is coming from and have to watch their children suffer. He has even seen some women in the IDP camp turn to prostitution, in order to get money to feed their families.

Pastor Barnabas is desperate to help believers in his camp. “I don’t have anything to give them,” he says. “We can only pray together and share the word of God together. How can you preach to someone who is hungry, and tell them that God will provide, when you cannot take a step to help them? How will they be encouraged?”

Persecution remains a real danger. Every day, Pastor Barnabas sees the men in the camp weigh up a terrible choice. “This hunger leads many of them to go in search of food to eat where they are being attacked by the militants,” he says. “They have no option, they have to go back there again – and when they go, they are attacked again.” Even while he was speaking with Open Doors partners, Pastor Barnabas heard the terrible news that Ifa, another of his brothers, had been attacked by Fulani militants while trying to gather food. The militant struck him on the head with a machete, and he suffered horrendous injuries.

It’s a stark reminder of the constant dangers facing Pastor Barnabas and the other Christians in this camp – and millions of other believers like them throughout sub-Saharan Africa.

Arise Africa

The African church is calling for their global church family to stand with them against this persecution. It seems to them that nobody is talking about it – and that’s why the global, four-year Arise Africa campaign is so crucial.

You can join with Christians in sub-Saharan Africa today. With your help, Open Doors local partners can continue providing emergency food and aid to Pastor Barnabas’s IDP camp, and many more like it.

“We have been starving. If not for the help of your ministry, I don’t think it would be easy for us to live.”
Pastor Barnabas

“Brothers and sisters, you have been very supportive in the area of food particularly in this IDP camp,” he says. “We have been starving. If not for the help of your ministry, I don’t think it would be easy for us to live. But you assist us. We are very grateful.”

Arise Africa isn’t just meeting people’s physical needs – it can help believers persevere spiritually too, giving confidence that God hasn’t abandoned them when He uses local Open Doors partners as His hands and feet. Local partners are also planning to provide skills training and trauma care, to support long-term resilience and self-sufficiency. They’ve also helped with Ifa’s urgent medical bills, and are paying for Pastor Barnabas’s operation on his hand.

Pastor Barnabas encourages believers in the IDP camp

Gratitude and pressing need

“Thank you, thank you. God bless you.”
Pastor Barnabas

Pastor Barnabas is keen to send thanks to the Open Doors supporters – people like you – who are starting to make this possible through your prayers and gifts. “We are grateful as a family. I am grateful. As an individual, I am grateful,” he says. “On behalf of the IDP camps, we are grateful. Thank you, thank you. God bless you.”

There is still so much danger and persecution in the region, and the believers Pastor Barnabas cares for long for a time of safety, security and plenty. They want to go home. They want the violence to end. And they want to heal.

“I will not lose my confidence in God,” says Pastor Barnabas. “I will always encourage the Christians here that, no matter what should be the situation, they should still believe God that, one day, we shall come back to our ancestral homes.”

Stop the violence. Start the healing.

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Pastor Barnabas knows how vital the support and prayers of his worldwide church family are. “If there is any way you can contribute yourself, contribute in a way to help us Christians in the IDP camp, please do it and God will bless you,” he says, “and join together with us to pray that God Himself should be our defender and sustain us and keep us.”

You’ve heard a snapshot of one man’s story in one IDP camp – and there are 16.2 million Christians across sub-Saharan Africa who could share their own painful stories. This violent displacement is an escalating crisis that needs an equally urgent response. The African church is urgently calling for your support, your prayers and your voice – to make sure people are talking about it. Today, will you help Pastor Barnabas stop the violence and start the healing?