ICC Note: 

Reports of persecution against Mexico’s Evangelical community continue to rigorously grow despite ICC’s effort to expose this trend in 2015. In a recent interview, ICC’s Advocacy Manager, Nate Lance,explains how the dire situation of Christians in Mexico is due to the impunity of Catholic and government perpetrators, who continue to dismiss any accusations of persecution reported by Evangelicals. Will Mexico’s Evangelical Christians ever truly experience the religious liberty guaranteed to them by the constitution? 

4/20/2016 Mexico (Christian Post) – Evangelical Christians in Mexico are being targeted by local groups that represent a blend of Catholicism and other faith traditions, say advocates, who are calling on officials to protect the country’s religious minority.

International Christian Concern’s Advocacy Manager, Nate Lance, told Fox News that evangelicals, who are a minority group in Mexico, continue to be targeted for their beliefs and for refusing to convert to Roman Catholicism.

“They will try to force them to convert, and if they refuse, they are banned from their villages, unable to live with or see their families,” Lance said. “When they refuse to recant their faith, they are expelled from the community.”

Fox News reports that although the majority of Mexicans, or over 82 percent, identify as Catholics, significant portions of them practice a “blend of mythologies, faiths and traditions,” which incorporates a “baffling stew of spiritual beliefs.”

The article noted that there are several belief systems around the world that tie in Christianity with other traditions, such as Rastafarianism, Unitarian-Universalism, and faith practices based on Eastern philosophy.

ICC reported throughout 2015 of several cases of direct persecution against Mexico’s Protestant community as local government authorities attempted to kick out dozens of evangelicals from their homes.

Evangelicals have faced starvation and threats of expulsion at the hands of village authorities, with the aim of forcing them to convert to Catholicism.

“Thousands have been displaced and left homeless, simply because they belonged to a religious minority and refused to make financial contributions to religious festivals they did not believe in,” ICC Advocacy Director Isaac Six said back in November 2015.

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