Pastor Saeed’s Life in Danger, Wife Urges Congress

on December 18, 2013

– by Christian T. George

A curtain is all that separates U.S. citizen Saeed Abedini from the murderers and rapists in Iran’s deplorable Rajai Shahr prison. Robbed, tortured, and promised release if he denounces his Christian faith, Abedini continues to be deprived of basic human and religious rights.

A former Muslim, Abedini converted to Christianity thirteen years ago and dedicated his life to Christian ministry. Last July, he was arrested for building an orphanage in Iran. Although his trial violated international and Iranian standards of law, Abedini was charged with “undermining the Iranian government,” and incarcerated in the notorious Evin prison where he was routinely beaten by the guards.

In a letter to his supporters, written on February 18, Abedini summarized his worsening condition as wrought with “various (bullying) groups, the psychological warfare, a year of not seeing my family, physical violence, actions committed to humiliate me, insults, being mocked, being confronted with extremists in the prison who create another prison within the prison walls, and the death threats.…”

On November 3, Abedini was transferred from Evin to the even more dangerous Rajai Shahr prison in Karaj – a place where prisoner violence and unexplained deaths are prevalent. Abedini shares space in Ward 3 of Hall 9 with some of Iran’s most violent criminals. He has awoken to a man threatening his life with a knife, the few hygienic possessions he owned have been stolen, and the critical medicine Iranian doctors prescribed for his beatings at Evin are being withheld. For this reason, Abedini’s health continues to deteriorate. He is currently suffering from internal bleeding, kidney pain, urinary tract infections, and lice. In an interview with The IRD, his wife, Naghmeh, shares the most immediate concern. “I am worried that he will be attacked by fellow inmates and would not survive that prison.”

Since his arrest, Naghmeh has worked tirelessly to publicize her husband’s plight through social media (#SaveSaeed, #BeHeard), news broadcasts, and other highly visible avenues. She has joined with the American Center for Law and Justice to marshal a petition for her husband’s release. Thus far, the petition has garnered over half a million signatures. Naghmeh’s message is simple. “As Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. wrote in a letter while in Birmingham prison ‘Injustice any where is a threat to justice everywhere.’ If we do not address what is happening with Saeed and the human rights issues in Iran and the Middle East, we will soon each have to also face such injustices.”

In September, President Obama discussed the freedom of Abedini and two other imprisoned Americans in a phone conversation with Iran’s new president, Hassan Rouhani. Back channel dialogues have proven successful in the past. As a humanitarian gesture, the newly minted Iranian president released 80 political prisoners in September. Abedini’s name, however, was not on that list. Months earlier, Mojtaba Atarodi – a high-ranking Iranian scientist – was released from the U.S. following his arrest in California.

It was hoped that recent U.S. talks with Iran over its cavalier nuclear program would include as a pre-condition for negotiation the release of Pastor Saeed. When Christopher Smith (R-New Jersey) pressed Secretary of State John Kerry as to why the U.S. government did not do more to free the American prisoners, Kerry explained, “They would become pawns to the process and it could prolong it; it could make it more risky or dangerous.”

“I was very disappointed and felt abandoned by my government,” said Naghmeh “… this sends Iran a wrong message that religious freedom and human rights issues are not a top priority to our government.”

In an interview with The Christian Post, Tiffany Barrans, the International Legal Director for the ACLJ, echoed Naghmeh’s concern. “We have a nation that was founded on principles of religious freedom, and if we don’t stand for them and it appears to the entire world that this is [a] priority to the United States, then who will?”

Last Thursday, Naghmeh testified before Congress on behalf of her husband. She expressed gratitude for what President Obama has done thus far, but urged her government to take more seriously the basic human and religious rights of U.S. citizens imprisoned for their faith throughout the world.

“I am standing here before you today because religious persecution is real. And until we stand up as one – as Americans, as political leaders, and government officials, as people who have been endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights – we will not truly embrace the responsibility that comes with that freedom.” She added, “My husband is suffering because he is a Christian. He is suffering because he is an American. Yet, his own government, at least the Executive and diplomatic representatives, has abandoned him. Don’t we owe it to him as a nation to stand up for his human rights, for his freedom?”

Billy Graham wrote a letter to President Rouhani in September urging Abedini’s release: “On September 26, the one-year anniversary of Pastor Abedini’s imprisonment, thousands will attend prayer vigils in more than 70 U.S. cities, calling on your country to release this husband, father and servant of God. I join them by respectfully asking you to release Pastor Saeed Abedini from prison. Such an action would, I believe, have a positive impact in our nation, and might well be perceived by our leadership as a significant step in reducing tensions.”

According to Article 18 of the United Nation’s “Declaration of Human Rights” – which Iran has signed – “Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.”

Cloaked as a political prisoner by the Iranian government, Abedini’s imprisonment is the direct result of his Christian faith. Last Christmas, he wrote in a letter that his interrogators told him he “would hang for [his] faith in Jesus.” This Christmas, as Naghmeh and her two children spend it alone without a father and husband, Abedini’s life continues to hang all the more in the balance.

As the U.S. endeavors to loosen sanctions against Iran and provide humanitarian resources for their people, the question of human and religious freedom becomes all the more backlit. If Pastor Saeed is executed for his faith, as he has been promised, can a president who shakes hands with evil dictators also wash them in innocence? What stance should a government take against countries like Iran – or China, for that matter – where atrocities against humanity prevail? A country that does not use every possible opportunity to fight for basic human rights cannot stand guiltless when injustice is committed. As Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who fought against the evils of the Nazi regime, once said, “Silence in the face of evil is itself evil: God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act.”

Although political tensions run thick between Iran and the U.S., President Obama has the unique opportunity – and responsibility – as the leader of the free world to act more urgently in leveraging for Abedini’s release. Or, if diplomacy falls short, to rescue him from captivity, as he has ordered for other U.S. citizens abroad.

Until then, Pastor Saeed stands in a long line of Christians who have endured torture and persecution for their faith in Jesus Christ. “Yesterday when I was singing worship songs,” he wrote in a letter to his wife, “the head of my cell room attacked me in order to stop me from praising but in response I hugged him and showed him love. He was shocked.”

(Christian T. George, PhD, is Assistant Professor of Biblical and Theological Studies and
Jewell and Joe Huitt Professor of Religious Education at Oklahoma Baptist University
.)

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