Although, more than 100,000 visas have already been granted this year to Muslims not facing persecution

by, Isaiah Narciso | The Gospel Herald | h/t Carrie Dedrick @ Christian Headlines and BCN

(Washington, DC)—The U.S. State Department may have sent a signal to an Anglican bishop in Iraq that despite persecution and harassment from the terror group known as ISIS, Christians in that country will not find any support from the United States government.

According to Faith J.H. McDonnell of Philos Project, the Rt. Rev. Julian M. Dobbs, bishop of the Diocese of CANA East (Convocation of Anglicans in North America), revealed that part of U.S. foreign policy during an interaction with the State Department’s Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration (PRM). Dobbs made his case to the State Department on behalf of a group of Assyrian Christians who are desperate to leave northern Iraq.

“There is no way that Christians will be supported because of their religious affiliation,” the State Department said.

“Donors in the private sector have offered complete funding for the airfare and the resettlement in the United States of these Iraqi Christians… but the State Department—while admitting 4,425 Somalis to the United States in just the first six months of 2015, and possibly even accepting members of ISIS through the Syrian and Iraqi refugee program, all paid for by tax dollars, [said] they ‘would not support a special category to bring Assyrian Christians into the United States.'” –Faith J.H. McDonnell

McDonnell reported that the Assyrian Christians received both the permission and blessing from their own bishop to leave Iraq. Until recently, church leaders in the region have urged Christians to stay in the Middle East; now they have concluded that their chances of survival are much better if they left.

“Christianity in Iraq is going through one of its worst and hardest stages of its long history, which dates back to the first century,” Archbishop Bashar Warda of Erbil said. “Throughout all these long centuries, we have experienced many hardships and persecutions, offering caravans of martyrs. Yet 2014 brought the worst acts of genocide against us in our history.”

Warda added that “Christianity as a religion and as a culture from Mesopotamia [ancient Iraq]” now faced “extinction” due to the ongoing threat posed by ISIS.

McDonnell elaborated on the plight of Christians and other minorities in the region since ISIS took over the Iraqi city of Mosul in June 2014. read on at ...