Of all of the under-reported stories of persecution throughout the world, Asia Bibi’s must be among the most heartbreaking. While her husband and young children hide, fearing for their lives, Asia lives day after day in the torturous solitude of prison, wondering whether her fate will be determined by the Islamic Republic of Pakistan or a radical Islamic cleric.

Only two years ago Asia Bibi was an illiterate Pakistani farm worker, a Christian mother of five children, living in a rural community in Pakistan. Today, she resides on death row, in a prison cell so small that her outstretched arm can with one motion touch the four walls that enclose her. Her husband and children are in hiding, and Asia herself is at the center of a firestorm of controversy about Pakistan’s blasphemy law.

It is for the crime of “blasphemy” against the Prophet Mohammed that Asia awaits death by hanging. Her accusers, the Muslim women she worked with on a farm in her hometown of Ittan Wali, say that she made a disparaging remark about the Prophet Mohammed during a dispute over drinking water. This charge Asia denies, but the mere allegation of her Muslim co-workers was enough for a local judge in Sheikhupura to sentence the Christian woman to death. That was one year ago, on November 8, 2010, the day Asia became the first woman to be sentenced to death under Pakistan’s controversial law.

Risks Faced by Minority Faiths
The sentence instantly garnered international attention. Opponents of Pakistan’s blasphemy law have long argued that it is used as a tool by Muslims in Pakistan to settle personal disputes against Christians, as any accusation of blasphemy is enough to land a powerless non-Muslim in prison – or worse, on the hangman’s noose.

Christians, Hindus, and other minority religions comprise less than 3 percent of Pakistan’s population, in a nation that is 97 percent Muslim, and home to numerous radical Islamist groups. The Muslim cleric of Bibi’s hometown has already assured his followers that if Pakistan fails to execute Asia Bibi, he will take the law into his own hands and kill her himself. Another cleric is offering a $6,000 reward to anyone who murders her. “Pakistan is more dangerous for Christians than ever before,” says Jerry Dykstra, media relations director at Open Doors, a Christian humanitarian agency.

A Day to Remember the Persecuted
It is for victims such as Asia Bibi that the International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church (IDOP) exists. The day of prayer, according to the IDOP website, “is a time set apart for us to remember thousands of our Christian brothers and sisters around the world who suffer persecution.”

Godfrey Yogarajah, executive director of The Religious Liberty Commission of World Evangelical Alliance, says, “The International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church (IDOP) gives us the privilege of joining together with over half a million churches in 150 countries to pray for the suffering church.”

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