Good News Press September/Oct. 2015 September 2015 | Page 2

Good News Press - 2 About Good News Press Sharing the good news of God’s Love through his Son to our local community and world! Partner With Us in Sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ to our Community! Good News Press is a Christian outreach publication in the San Francisco Bay Area. This popular high-quality, newspaper, informs and inspires believers, as well as plant seeds into the hearts of men and women that do not know Jesus Christ. Good News Press covers world, national, and local religious news and events, and features inspiring Christian articles and insights. It is available, both digitally online and in full-color printed format. Christian newspapers reach a targeted audience-specifically a family oriented, audience, with strong loyalties and convictions. share the good news, and bring to them the love of Jesus Christ. We do that by bringing glory to God in this newspaper. • Urgency… We believe that these are Why Support Good News Press the last days and that Jesus Christ is • Fulfill the Great Commission! Help us tell our neighbors about the Good soon to return. News of Jesus Christ and reap eternal • Distribution Good News Press is distributed FREE all over the Bay Area. rewards. Good News Press believes You can find it in area grocery stores that this commission begins in our own backyards. There are more than 7 and businesses. Good News Press is produced by Million people in the Bay Area and a great number need to be reached. We Baron & Connie Woods and Family. want to reach these men and women, To contact us: [email protected]. Christian Refugees fr om Pakistan Cry for Help Christian Freedom International releases a new video documenting the plight of Christian refugees from Pakistan persecuted for their faith. However, the "reality" for Joseph and many other Pakistani Christians seekBANGKOK, Thailand, -ing asylum at the More than half the 14 milUNHCR in Banglion refugees and asylum- kok is far differseekers under the mandate ent than what is of the United Nations refu- "supposed" to gee agency world-wide do happen. not actually live in the camps they are associated After arriving in with. A growing number live Bangkok and illegally in cities and towns immediately around the world. Across making application for asyAsia alone, from India to lum as a persecuted Christhe Pacific islands, there tian, Pastor Joseph reare about half a million ceived his "person of consuch "urban refugees" ac- cern" card from the UNcording to the UN agency. HCR. His "hearing" for asyChristian Freedom Interna- lum is scheduled for years tional has documented the from now. plight of Christian refugees from Pakistan in a newly His tourist visa has long released video. since expired. After receiving numerous death threats and beatings from Muslim militants, Pastor Joseph Aswar, his wife, and two children sold their home and everything they owned in Pakistan to flee the country. Joseph, an educated, capable man, cannot work because he is now in Thailand "illegally." He and his family, and many other Christian asylum seekers from Pakistan pray each day for their next They paid an "agent" a meal. Their children cannot large sum of money in La- go to school and they share hore, and came to Thailand a room in a Bangkok slum as "tourists" to apply for with another Christian famiasylum with the United Na- ly, all living in the one room tions High Commissioner flat, sleeping on the floor. for Refugees (UNHCR) in Bangkok. Joseph and his family receive no help from the UNIn theory and according to HCR and they must survive international law, the UNin the "shadows" while they HCR is supposed to protect await their hearing. He and and provide for the basic many other Christian asyneeds of asylum seekers lum seekers from Pakistan while they wait for a hearlive day to day in fear of ing to decide their fate. arrest and deportation because they have no visas, If granted asylum by the and Thailand never signed UNHCR, Pastor Joseph the 1951 U.N. Refugee and his family will be able Convention that protects to resettle in a free country, refugees' rights. where Christians are not As bad as his current conditions are, Joseph says he is thankful to be in Thailand. He cannot go back to Pakistan as he and his family face certain death. Pastor Joseph misses his home, church, and friends and family in Pakistan, but he knows he must keep looking forward, not backward. An "Uncaring" Bureaucracy Persecuted Christian "urban refugees" scrape by in limbo, even more vulnerable than refugees living in a refugee camp. To make matters worse, the UNHCR in Bangkok is an enormous, uncaring, inefficient bureaucracy that provides little to no help to Christian asylum seekers. According to Christian Freedom International president, Jim Jacobson, "It is a heartbreaking travesty how the UNHCR treats Christian asylum seekers. It is wrong, and this needs to be investigated and corrected before donor nations give another penny to the UN." For more info visit: www.christianfreedom.org.