Are Christians being persecuted in the West?
The short answer is: well yes, but actually no. The long answer follows.
Yes, there are some intrinsically impotent imitations of a persecution. They're not done by the best bureaucracy of its day - the Roman Empire. Even if they were, their petty prince can't take your soul without your consent. This putridly pathetic 'persecution', on the other hand, is being done by HR Karens and DMV troglodytes. All they have is high school drama. And we have God. Is it a coincidence that the greatest labor shortage since the war draft coincides with the threat of being fired over the dead baby demon-juice needles? You can easily get another job. The Lord has already provided, you just need to waltz over to the buffet. You are the horse that's been led to the water, now bottoms up!
Let us assume, simply to humour the blackpilled bedwetters, that Christians will be legitimately, effectively persecuted by someone who has half their act together in the foreseeable future. So what? Nothing grows the church like the blood of martyrs. It's evangelisation on roids and meth, at least historically. You want your descendants to live in a genuinely Christian nation? Being persecuted for the Truth and His Commandments is how you get that.
There is tremendous opportunity in every persecution, even this one. Get kicked out of social media over the basic Truth? Now you get to make real life friends and prove to them by your example that life as an authentic Christian is not only possible, it is also a good time. As St. Francis of Assissi put it, 'preach the Gospel at all times, use words when necessary.'
There is even more opportunity in a legitimate persecution. The fastest way to make Christian friends who are also street smart is to go to jail yourself. The Gospel is not locked in with the criminal underclass, the criminal underclass is locked in with the Gospel. Yes, I had to read that comic in high school. Probably still better than the other stuff people have to read in other public schools. Not that a genuine Christian will be in the slammer for even a fraction of his/her sentence, if the Acts of the Apostles are any indication.
Finally, permit me to address the people who sincerely believe they would buckle under persecution. Some of you are going to be on the physically and socially weaker side, and/or struggle with mental health. I do not want to mock you, because the world probably does enough of that already. Instead, I want to encourage you. You see, our Lord has a weird way of using the weak and downtrodden for his greatest feats. The stone that has been rejected by the builders shall be the cornerstone, et cetera. Heck, the king of kings himself found it prudent to come into this world through a probably-illiterate peasant girl in some shed in some backwater. His crowning moment, as it were, was being executed with two petty thieves. Between those two events, he routinely performed miracles on the lowly and outcast, presumably to emphasize the point that what this world thinks is irrelevant. If you keep the faith, you are more likely to experience a miracle than to succumb. God does not abandon those who stick with him. You will not be forced to succumb. You are more likely than most people to get saved in a really spectacular fashion, if need be.
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