Latest / Cultural Wars | America Out Loud News / Christianity explodes in Iran: Conversions from Islam to Christianity

Transcript

Christianity explodes in Iran: Conversions from Islam to Christianity · Cultural Wars | America Out Loud News

• 0:09
  You're listening to the Hidden Lightness on America Out Loud Talk Radio.
• 0:13
  I'm your host, Jimmy Hinton.
• 0:15
  Well, there's some interesting things going on.
• 0:19
  Obviously, Iran is on the minds of everybody right now.
• 0:22
  And the war in in Iran, everything that's going on, uh, they just are absolute insane people from the regime, not the residents of Iran.
• 0:35
  The residents of Iran are super cool.
• 0:38
  And uh they deserve all the praise and and peace in the world.
• 0:44
  Uh, just they they have endured so much oppression for so many years.
• 0:50
  And I've uh kept my eyes on Iran for a long time, uh, several years, and mostly because of what I'm going to talk about today, and that is that Christianity is the fastest growing in Iran out of anywhere in the world.
• 1:07
  Let me say that again.
• 1:09
  Christianity is growing the fastest in Iran out of anywhere in the world.
• 1:19
  And you look at the place that is under oppression, uh, it's illegal to be a Christian.
• 1:26
  Islam is the uh, you know, the state religion, so to speak, and it's fallen apart.
• 1:36
  Uh, in fact, I have an article here.
• 1:39
  This is from a couple years ago.
• 1:42
  And a lot of people, I guess, don't know about this.
• 1:44
  They don't know that it's not a Muslim country.
• 1:50
  Uh, in fact, less than 30% of all people in Iran identify as Muslim.
• 1:58
  That's really interesting to me.
• 2:02
  Because it just shows this kind of popularity uh doesn't happen when you're a terroristic nation.
• 2:13
  When the state regime forces you into a certain religion, people run from it.
• 2:22
  And what's interesting is at the same time, people are running and have been running to Christianity for a long time.
• 2:30
  And I think that's really encouraging.
• 2:32
  So this article is it was posted December of 2023.
• 2:39
  And uh it's Iran International.
• 2:44
  And the title of the article is Fall in Mosque Goers in Iran now, quote, highly alarming minister.
• 2:55
  I'll read just a little bit of this.
• 2:57
  The fall in mosque attendance in Iran is now highly alarming, according to a senior government minister.
• 3:04
  This is coming from the state-run government.
• 3:08
  Uh really, really interesting.
• 3:10
  Even they aren't skewing the numbers.
• 3:15
  They're like, oh crap, we've got a problem.
• 3:19
  And I maybe that's part of the reason why they started to spiral in recent years.
• 3:26
  You know, because their oppression wasn't working, and so they just doubled down on it.
• 3:31
  And uh, by the way, Mamdani is getting a lot of criticism from Iranians.
• 3:38
  I mean a lot.
• 3:40
  As he should.
• 3:42
  And they said, don't listen, listen to these westernized Muslims who think that they know what they're talking about.
• 3:52
  And they talked about how the fall of Iran was linked to people like Mimdani.
• 4:01
  Who they promised free everything, free health care, free this, free that.
• 4:05
  Everything's gonna be free.
• 4:08
  If you just be good little boys and girls and be submissive, we're gonna give you all kinds of free stuff.
• 4:17
  And Iran, which once was a wonderful, beautiful, beautiful nation that was a close ally of America, turned into one of the biggest enemies.
• 4:33
  Not because of anything America did, but um because of extremism.
• 4:41
  So at any rate, uh, this article says speaking on Tuesday, Minister of Culture, Muhammad Medi Asmali was commenting on the number of active mosques, which figures earlier this year revealed have gone down by a third.
• 4:58
  He said, today the figures and statistics circulating regarding active mosques are highly alarming.
• 5:05
  Active mosques are not merely places where congregational prayers are held three times a day.
• 5:10
  It seems a significant number of our mosques lack even this minimal function.
• 5:17
  Really interesting, isn't it?
• 5:19
  In February, again, this was 2023.
• 5:23
  It's gotten worse since then.
• 5:26
  In February, a senior Iranian cleric revealed that 50,000 out of 75,000 mosques nationwide had been closed due to a significant decline in attendance.
• 5:44
  Dalabi, uh, that's the senior Iranian cleric.
• 5:50
  The lobby and intermediary between President Rassi's administration and the country's seminaries expressed concern over the fall and its implications for a state funded uh state founded on Islamic principles.
• 6:07
  There you have it, folks.
• 6:10
  It is not a Muslim country.
• 6:16
  Less than 30% identify at all as being Muslim.
• 6:24
  The mosques are empty.
• 6:26
  50,000 out of a total of 75,000 literally closed their doors due to lack of any attendance.
• 6:36
  They can't even do the basic uh basic prayer.
• 6:41
  They're not even meeting the minimum requirements.
• 6:46
  It's really interesting.
• 6:49
  Turns out people don't like oppression.
• 6:53
  They don't like being flogged in the streets.
• 6:57
  They don't like being forced to submit.
• 7:03
  Just doesn't work very well, does it?
• 7:06
  Well, what does work is Christianity?
• 7:12
  I want you to listen to some of these statistics.
• 7:14
  This is uh this is also an older article.
• 7:17
  This is February of 2021.
• 7:21
  And believe me, since then, Christianity has absolutely exploded.
• 7:25
  It's taken off like crazy.
• 7:29
  So this article is in international mission news, and the title of the article is Meet the World's Fastest Growing Evangelical Movement.
• 7:41
  Talking about Christianity.
• 7:59
  Remember Joe Biden?
• 8:00
  What would you do?
• 8:01
  What do what would you bomb Iran?
• 8:03
  No, absolutely not.
• 8:06
  Forget Iran.
• 8:11
  He wanted to play FTSE and try to revive the 2015 nuclear deal.
• 8:17
  Well, you see how that turned out.
• 8:20
  Anyway, the article says in it, Iran promised to restrict its nuclear program to civilian work in exchange for sanctions relief.
• 8:30
  You remember when I said just yesterday that they crossed their fingers, put it behind their back and say, oh, we promise we promise not to not to build nuclear bombs.
• 8:45
  Yeah, we'll do that in exchange for sanctions relief.
• 8:48
  Meanwhile, what were they doing?
• 8:53
  Three years ago, Donald Trump pulled the United States out of the deal, charging that Iran wasn't holding up its end.
• 9:02
  The U.S.
• 9:02
  re-imposed sanctions and Iran ramped up nuclear production.
• 9:09
  Pretty interesting, isn't it?
• 9:13
  Um this is a quote by Paul Crab Crabtree, a Christian source close to that region.
• 9:21
  He said the sanctions have been brutal on the economy and on the people.
• 9:26
  People are mixed about this.
• 9:30
  Um this article says some compare Trump to Adolf Hitler.
• 9:34
  Others argue that if it causes the people to rise up against the Iranian government, it'll be worth it.
• 9:40
  Kind of interesting to see how things have turned out over the last couple of years.
• 9:45
  I mean, really, really interesting stuff here.
• 9:50
  It was this idea like, oh, Trump.
• 9:54
  Trump is like Hitler.
• 9:56
  How could he put sanctions on our country?
• 10:01
  Other people are saying, well, if it causes us to rise up, it'll be worth it.
• 10:06
  Well, the people rose up.
• 10:08
  And President Trump delivered as of this last weekend.
• 10:15
  The article goes on.
• 10:16
  Either way, the situation underlines what the Iranian people have known for a long time.
• 10:21
  Their government, the only Islamic theocracy in the world, is not providing the utopia it promised.
• 10:32
  What do you know?
• 10:34
  Huh.
• 10:37
  You know, you would think that we would learn from history.
• 10:42
  You would think that people in New York City would look to countries like Iran and say, okay, this uh this doesn't work these empty promises, these promises of where we promise you the world, we're gonna give you all this free stuff.
• 10:59
  We're gonna take care of you, wink wink.
• 11:04
  We're gonna treat you like gold.
• 11:06
  Look at Venezuela.
• 11:07
  They did the same thing.
• 11:10
  We're gonna treat you well.
• 11:12
  We're gonna, we're gonna supply your needs, we're gonna give you free health care.
• 11:17
  We'll take care of you.
• 11:19
  The government has your back, wink wink.
• 11:24
  While the article goes on, water is limited, pollution is terrible, structural planning is poor, Crabtree said.
• 11:34
  A lot of people don't trust the government at all.
• 11:37
  You'd think.
• 11:39
  And since the government claims to be an incarnation of Islam, it follows that people have also been growing disillusioned with their faith.
• 11:50
  Yep.
• 11:53
  Uh while official reports still claim that 99.4% of Iranians practice Islam.
• 12:05
  That's fascinating.
• 12:07
  The official state-run reports, even though the state says, hey, 50,000 of our 75,000 mosques are empty.
• 12:18
  They're closed.
• 12:19
  They're literally shut.
• 12:23
  They still claim that 99.4% of all Iranians practice Islam.
• 12:31
  Well, a 2020 survey found just 40% actually identify as Muslim.
• 12:39
  An even larger number, 47% said they were nuns.
• 12:45
  N-O-N-E-S.
• 12:47
  That's a term for atheists or um agnostics that don't identify with any religion.
• 12:59
  Uh pretty interesting.
• 13:01
  8% claim Zoroastra uh uh, I don't know how you say it.
• 13:06
  My tongue is not catching up with my brain today.
• 13:09
  Zoroastraniism, that's an ancient Persian religion.
• 13:16
  And only 1.5% said they were Christians.
• 13:23
  That number has dramatically changed since this article was written.
• 13:30
  About 20 years ago, the number of Christian converts from a Muslim background was between 5,000 and 10,000 people, Crabtree said.
• 13:38
  Today that's between 800,000 to 1 million people.
• 13:42
  That's massive growth.
• 13:45
  According to Operation World, Iran has the fastest growing evangelical movement in the world.
• 13:54
  Uh, none of this is good for a regime that depends on a belief in Islam to stay in power.
• 14:02
  Crackdowns have been increasingly harsh, especially over the past five years, but evangelism hasn't slowed.
• 14:11
  Pretty interesting stuff.
• 14:13
  And you can kind of see the groundwork being laid for what's happening today.
• 14:19
  You know, the protests in Iran, people are getting more and more emboldened.
• 14:24
  And if anybody was paying attention, they'd be asking the question well, how are the people getting so emboldened to actually protest?
• 14:34
  You know, very recent years.
• 14:38
  Yeah, I don't I don't I don't have the exact time frame, but in very recent time, the Iranian government has killed, they've killed roughly 30,000 protesters.
• 14:55
  And you look at that and you say, Well, how is it that the protesters were getting so much confidence?
• 15:03
  I mean, they just they they just kept expanding, getting more and more emboldened.
• 15:09
  How in a country that's that's so terrorized, how do people get so emboldened?
• 15:18
  And it reminds me in the book of Acts.
• 15:20
  You know, when Peter and John were arrested, or Peter and James were arrested.
• 15:26
  The prayer among the Christians was not for safety.
• 15:32
  Yeah, I'm I'm telling my brain's not working today.
• 15:35
  Peter and John.
• 15:36
  Uh so Peter and John, they had led about 5,000 people to Christ, and uh they were retaliated against.
• 15:45
  They went before the Jewish council, they get arrested, and eventually they're released, but with a very harsh warning.
• 15:54
  Don't you dare, don't you let us catch you ever preaching the name Jesus or saying the name Jesus again.
• 16:02
  What's interesting is in in uh Acts chapter 4, it says this.
• 16:08
  Um, when they were released, they went to their friends and reported what the chief priests and the elders had said to them.
• 16:15
  And when they heard it, they lifted their voices together to God and said, Sovereign Lord who made heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them, who through the mouth of the Father David, your servant, said by the Holy Spirit, why did the Gentiles rage and the people's plot in vain?
• 16:33
  The kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord against the anointed.
• 16:40
  For truly in this city, they were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the people of Israel, to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place.
• 16:56
  All right, and so they pray for boldness.
• 17:02
  We're coming up on a break here.
• 17:04
  Uh, be sure in the meantime to check out the America Out Loud store where you'll find incredible deals.
• 17:08
  Use the code out loud for 20% off, and visit America Outloud.news, help us share the outloud truth.
• 17:14
  We'll be right back.
• 17:15
  Well, get ready, my fellow Americans, July 2nd, 3rd, and 4th.
• 17:19
  America Outloud.news in partnership with Clear and the Wellness Company invites you to Nashville, Tennessee for a red, white, and blue celebration.
• 17:30
  You'll never forget.
• 17:31
  We're saluting 250 years of America and 10 incredible years of America Outloud News.
• 17:38
  Standing strong for truth, justice, and the nation we all love.
• 17:42
  Three days of high impact speakers, powerhouse voices, delivering dynamic, unforgettable insights that will fire up your patriot spirit.
• 17:52
  And on July 4th, well brace yourself because you'll experience America's most explosive fireworks show, lighten up downtown Nashville in pure patriotic glory.
• 18:02
  You can reserve your spot with early bird fleisching right now at America Outlaw.
• 18:08
  News forward slash Nashville.
• 18:10
  It's America Outloud News 25010 Nashville D there.
• 18:15
  In just two minutes per day, you can reclaim your health and cut your grocery bill in half with one simple convenient product.
• 18:22
  Our doctor formulated Green 85 juice formula's powerful dose of ultra-concentrated essential nutrients, stops hunger in its tracks, and supplies your cells with what's missing in the grocery store food.
• 18:34
  Go to Chemicalfree Body.com forward slash out loud today.
• 18:38
  Get nature's super multivitamin Green 85, empower your immune system, cut down on your grocery bill, and save 20% on your first order.
• 18:47
  Are you struggling with thinning hair?
• 18:48
  Try roots from the wellness company.
• 18:50
  This doctor formulated non-oily hydrogel uses seven powerful peptides and key nutrients to nourish your scalp and support visibly thicker, healthier hair.
• 18:59
  Visit TWC.
• 19:10
  You wouldn't go a day without brushing your teeth or washing your hands.
• 19:14
  What about washing your nose?
• 19:16
  I mean, your nose does filter the air you breathe, air loaded with bacteria, viruses, and irritants.
• 19:21
  Make nasal hygiene part of your routine with clear.
• 19:24
  No messy bottles to fill, no drowning sensation.
• 19:28
  Clear is a natural drug-free saline with the added benefit of xylitol, which blocks bacterial and viral adhesion.
• 19:35
  Available in stores and online at clear.com.
• 19:37
  That is XLEAR.com.
• 19:46
  Christianity in Iran has been growing for quite a while.
• 19:50
  And it's to the point where 50,000 of the 75,000 mosques have been completely closed.
• 19:58
  And even the
• 20:00
  State uh government the the state media, they reported on this several years ago, and they basically said we're in big trouble because uh now they didn't attribute that to Christianity, they just said that uh people aren't frequenting the mosques, and they saw that as a as a big red flag, and uh it's really fascinating because what was happening is the underground church in Iran has been growing like crazy.
• 20:37
  Christianity is the world's fastest growing religion in Iran.
• 20:46
  Uh, it's really, really incredible.
• 20:48
  We always heard things about Africa, that Africa was uh they were really spreading Christianity, and I remember when I was in seminary 20 some years ago, my professors were talking about um uh pretty much right now, they predicted that uh Christianity was gonna decline so much in the United States, and it was gonna grow so quickly at the same time in Africa that they were gonna be sending African missionaries to the United States.
• 21:21
  Now, I don't think we're we're we're there.
• 21:25
  I don't know that we ever will be there, but Christianity, they were right about one thing.
• 21:31
  Christianity in Africa grew by leaps and bounds.
• 21:35
  And a lot of that was driven by persecution of Christians.
• 21:40
  And every time that you have persecution of Christians, Christianity spreads.
• 21:46
  And that's been since Christianity began.
• 21:51
  Uh, when there's persecution, people tend to turn to God.
• 21:57
  And interestingly, people don't like to be told what to do and what not to do, especially when it comes from the government.
• 22:08
  And uh I I have to stay pretty positive.
• 22:13
  And even though I don't like war, I don't like anything about war.
• 22:17
  I think that war is terrible.
• 22:20
  A lot of Iranians are saying, you know, President Trump didn't start a war in Iran.
• 22:26
  The people who are saying that are completely misled, they're wrong.
• 22:31
  War has been going on in Iran for many, many years.
• 22:36
  They said what President Trump did he is ushering in peace.
• 22:42
  He's at least giving us a chance to end the war in Iran.
• 22:48
  And President Trump just announced again, in fact, multiple times.
• 22:53
  He just made new announcements saying we're ahead of schedule, and this war will come to an end very, very quickly.
• 23:03
  And I don't think he's just uh making niceties.
• 23:08
  I think he legitimately has intel.
• 23:10
  I think he legitimately has a plan.
• 23:15
  And I don't know of any president who would just go in and start bombing a country and and not have any kind of a game plan, but that's the narrative coming from the left.
• 23:26
  The narrative is well, he's he's um trying to divert attention away from the Epstein files.
• 23:36
  That's certifiably insane.
• 23:39
  That's literally one of the most insane things that I've ever heard.
• 23:44
  That he's that desperate to divert attention away from the Epstein files, that he literally sent massive amounts of our military to the Middle East and started a war to get the attention of the American people off the Epstein files.
• 24:01
  Like what fantasy world do these people live in.
• 24:06
  It's just like crazy doesn't even I feel like that's an offensive term because it's offensive to people who are actually crazy.
• 24:16
  Like this is beyond nuts.
• 24:21
  I've never seen anything like it.
• 24:24
  The radical lazy radicalization of the left here in America is it's astounding.
• 24:32
  And just the amount of senseless things that are coming out of the mouths of people.
• 24:39
  I I can't.
• 24:41
  I just can't with it that President Trump, and it's not just a handful of people saying this.
• 24:47
  There are quite a few people saying President Trump started this war to deflect from the Epstein files.
• 24:57
  That's nuts.
• 25:01
  But at any rate, uh, I I just think it's crazy talk to say that he started this war just to divert attention away from the Epstein files.
• 25:12
  That's insanity.
• 25:15
  Uh this is a very strategic war.
• 25:18
  Uh, very clearly the strikes are incredibly strategic.
• 25:23
  Uh the strikes have taken out uh tons of weapon weaponry from Iran.
• 25:31
  Uh we killed the Supreme Leader and his wife.
• 25:36
  We killed dozens of other leaders, uh terrorist leaders, and I think Iran is really in trouble right now.
• 25:49
  Um there's nothing accidental about this.
• 25:54
  It's it's not, oh, we're just gonna drop a couple bombs to uh to get attention off the Epstein files.
• 26:00
  It's just crazy.
• 26:03
  But anyway, I digress.
• 26:06
  The heart of the issue is that Christianity is growing and it's been growing like crazy in Iran, and I think that's fantastic.
• 26:15
  I think it's great news, and finally these people have hope.
• 26:20
  And I don't know what the outcome of the war is gonna be.
• 26:23
  Uh, none of us do.
• 26:26
  We really don't know, but at least it looks like the people have hope.
• 26:32
  At least for the first time in 47 years, somebody stood up to a horrific dictator who's killed many, many, many, many innocent people.
• 26:44
  He's been an absolute absolute tyrant and a nuisance to the rest of the world.
• 26:50
  Iran, by the way, bombed how many different nations, and uh it's just it's so wild to me that they literally started bombing every single country that surrounds them.
• 27:09
  Like what are these people thinking?
• 27:12
  What do they think is gonna happen to them?
• 27:16
  Yeah, they're really not uh as mighty as they think they are, and they just poked a whole lot of bears.
• 27:25
  Which I think in the end is good news for the Christians in Iran.
• 27:31
  Yeah, because now it's not just the U.S.
• 27:33
  and Israel.
• 27:34
  Now everybody's like, hey, no, you uh you can't just bomb us.
• 27:40
  Greece scrambled a couple jets, sent them to Cyprus.
• 27:45
  Apparently, Iran had uh sent a missile over to Cyprus.
• 27:50
  It's like they're literally just hitting all kinds of targets, just like wild men.
• 27:57
  So the United States and and Israel right now.
• 28:01
  We got a whole lot of allies, and I think everybody's gonna shut Iran down very, very quickly.
• 28:09
  I think I think President Trump knew this going into it too.
• 28:12
  He's not a stupid guy.
• 28:15
  He he does some wildly crazy things.
• 28:20
  Some of the posts that he puts and the the AI, you've heard me gripe about them.
• 28:24
  Uh, he does some really bizarre, bizarre things that just make me wonder.
• 28:31
  But he's not a dumb man.
• 28:35
  And he knew that when he goes in there and starts dropping bombs, he knew that Iran would retaliate.
• 28:42
  He knew that Iran they would lose our ever-loving minds when their dear supreme leader was taken out, and they just started firing missiles all over the place, and they're like, literally, whatever targets we're gonna hit, we're gonna hit.
• 28:56
  Well, Trump knew that they were gonna poke the bear.
• 28:59
  Trump knew that we weren't gonna be alone with just the U.S.
• 29:03
  and Israel.
• 29:04
  He knew that going into it.
• 29:08
  So it's really fascinating to see, you know, when you understand the mind of a dictator, and you understand the mind of these people that uh they're they're absolute terrorists and tyrants.
• 29:21
  It helps you play chess a little bit better.
• 29:24
  I mean, look at what Trump did in North Korea.
• 29:27
  Kept insulting uh little rocket man, calling him little rocket man, and then a couple weeks later, boom, he has a meeting with them.
• 29:38
  Literally an in-person meeting.
• 29:42
  It's it's wild when you understand how people think, and I think President Trump does.
• 29:49
  You know how to play people, and you know how to get results.
• 29:56
  So again, you don't have to like him as a person or even as a president.
• 30:00
  President to say there's some some good things that are coming out of this presidency.
• 30:08
  And there are literally millions of Iranians who are celebrating the United States and President Trump.
• 30:18
  And we can't look beyond that.
• 30:19
  We can't look away and pretend like it doesn't exist.
• 30:25
  That's really important.
• 30:26
  It's important for the United States.
• 30:28
  It's important that he has that kind of respect.
• 30:31
  And I've heard some pretty high-profile Iranians talking on the news, and they were saying, look, do not listen to the United States media.
• 30:42
  Don't listen to the West media.
• 30:45
  Listen to what the Iranians are saying.
• 30:48
  We absolutely love, admire, and respect this president.
• 30:55
  We celebrate that this president has finally wiped out evil.
• 31:03
  And we can breathe again.
• 31:04
  We can we can walk out in the streets.
• 31:09
  And this is this is happening all over the world.
• 31:13
  People are celebrating President Trump and the United States of America.
• 31:17
  They absolutely love us.
• 31:21
  But you know, you hear you hear on the the media, the mainstream media.
• 31:25
  Well, it's America.
• 31:27
  America sucks.
• 31:29
  We're so oppressive.
• 31:30
  We're terrible.
• 31:31
  We're awful.
• 31:32
  We need to apologize to the rest of the world.
• 31:37
  You know, for what?
• 31:42
  So definitely very fascinating.
• 31:43
  But I want to read a little bit about some of the people who are linked to Christianity in Iran.
• 31:52
  Uh there's a guy by the name of Nima Alazed, who had an online Bible study.
• 32:02
  Over the past few years, the attendance from that Bible study has grown from 40 people to more than 600.
• 32:11
  Allazed said, I teach four days a week.
• 32:16
  He helped re-launch TGC's Farsi site in May.
• 32:25
  He teaches classes ranging from basic discipleship for new believers to deep theology for people who are hungry for more.
• 32:37
  He said the fanatic Shia Muslims in Iran prove to people that Islam is not the way.
• 32:44
  It gives us the opportunity to show people an alternative.
• 32:49
  And what an alternative it is.
• 32:55
  They're drawn to Christianity.
• 32:58
  Because Christianity is about love and compassion and mercy and salvation through Jesus.
• 33:12
  Second chances.
• 33:14
  The ability to be able to repent and to turn your life around.
• 33:20
  You know, you can read through the New Testament why it was so appealing.
• 33:25
  I looked at the city of Ephesus, and what did they do?
• 33:28
  These people brought their magic scrolls worth millions of dollars in today's dollars.
• 33:34
  They publicly burned their magic scrolls.
• 33:39
  You know, as a show of repentance.
• 33:44
  To get rid of any temptation to go back to that again.
• 33:48
  They publicly burned them, and they renounce them in the name of Christ.
• 33:55
  I mean, what other religion gives you second chances like that?
• 34:02
  The ability to, in the words of Paul, the Apostle Paul, be slaves of righteousness.
• 34:11
  You know, he says you're no longer slaves to sin, but you become slaves to righteousness.
• 34:21
  To do the right thing to treat other people with dignity and respect and honor.
• 34:32
  Ever since 1979, really before, but um the 1979 revolution just absolutely destroyed such a beautiful place.
• 34:46
  And it really is a paradise.
• 34:50
  And that's what the Iranians are saying.
• 34:51
  They're saying we long for the day when we can go back to our nation, but just as important, we want Americans to be able to visit.
• 35:02
  We want Americans to be able to come and enjoy our culture and to see how beautiful of a place Iran is.
• 35:14
  It's really promising.
• 35:18
  So this article goes on to say the Persian Christians had been in trouble before 1979.
• 35:26
  Yeah, their population had been shrinking under cultural pressure and outright persecution ever since the Islamic Arabs took over around 700 AD.
• 35:39
  You know, this is one of the complaints here in America.
• 35:43
  And people are like, oh, you're racist.
• 35:47
  It has nothing to do with racism.
• 35:52
  People just don't want Islam to take over the nation.
• 35:58
  You know, and there's nothing wrong with absolutely not zero wrong with being a Muslim.
• 36:06
  Yeah, there are I've done stories on the show about Muslims who saved the lives of other people.
• 36:12
  You know, the the shooter in Australia.
• 36:17
  It was a Muslim who stood up and took action.
• 36:21
  That's incredible.
• 36:22
  And he deserves full praise.
• 36:28
  But what people don't want to see happen is any form of extremism.
• 36:36
  That's what that's what people are hesitant about.
• 36:42
  They don't want extremism to take over.
• 36:45
  And when we when you hear extremist views, no matter where it comes from, I mean, Christianity is is it's susceptible to when you hear these kinds of things.
• 36:59
  Uh I think we need to take caution.
• 37:05
  So at any rate, uh, the article says under Islamic law, Christianity struggled.
• 37:12
  There were very few conversions, according to Crabtree.
• 37:18
  Um it was very slow.
• 37:21
  Um Christianity looked like it it was dead, but he says it wasn't.
• 37:27
  Allah Zaida said, I was I was born in Tehran.
• 37:30
  I grew up in a nominal Muslim family trying to practice Islamic ways of worship because at school and in society, you're forced to follow Islam.
• 37:40
  But I knew it was not working.
• 37:43
  Well, we're coming up on another break here.
• 37:45
  All of our shows do go to podcasts the next day after the broadcast heard on talk radio.
• 37:50
  You can find them on your favorite podcast app.
• 37:52
  Be sure to subscribe, rate the show, share it, and when we come back, we'll share more good news coming out of Iran.
• 37:59
  Visit America Outloud.news, use the code out loud for 20% off at the store, and we'll be right back.
• 38:06
  Have you been looking for a healthy snack for on the go?
• 38:10
  Well, not all energy bars are soft and sugary.
• 38:14
  Bear bars are a crunchy savory bar made from just six simple natural ingredients.
• 38:21
  Bear bars are plant-based, organic gluten-free, contain six grams of protein and are low temperature dried for unique crunch.
• 38:30
  Most energy bars are based on chocolate or fruit and are held together with syrups or sweeteners.
• 38:37
  To learn more, just visit barebar.com slash out loud.
• 38:42
  In a world of rising prices, you can still grow abundance.
• 38:46
  I'm Doug Evans, author of the national bestseller, the Sprout Book.
• 38:50
  Sprouts grow in three to five days without soil, sunshine, or fertilizer on your kitchen countertop for under a dollar serving.
• 38:59
  Take control of your food and your future.
• 39:01
  Visit the sprouting company.com slash out loud and use the code out loud for an exclusive offer.
• 39:09
  Grow food, not fear.
• 39:12
  And I quote you and I have a rendezvous with destiny.
• 39:16
  We will preserve for our children this the last best hope of man on earth.
• 39:21
  Or we will sentence them to take the first step into a thousand years of darkness.
• 39:27
  Those are the words of number 40.
• 39:29
  Ronald Drake shine bright as America approaches 250 years.
• 39:38
  America out loud news is that place to awaken your heart, soul, and mind.
• 39:45
  To the all up.
• 39:54
  Christianity has grown faster in Iran than anywhere else in the world.
• 39:59
  And
• 40:01
  I found an interesting article, and this was written really recently.
• 40:06
  In fact, it was written February 23rd.
• 40:11
  So this is very recent.
• 40:13
  Obviously, before the war, before the war started, before Americans and Israel launched their strikes on Iran.
• 40:23
  But the title of this article is Iran's Crackdown on Christians undermines Trump's emphasis on religious freedom.
• 40:31
  It's an excellent, excellent article.
• 40:33
  I'll link to it in the show notes.
• 40:35
  But the authors talk about how every time we uh we kind of sl put give a slap in the face to Tehran, um, they just cracked down on Christianity big time.
• 40:52
  In fact, there was a recent report by Christian advocacy groups uh in 2025, just last year, and it found that the the arrests on religion-related charges nearly doubled in 2025 compared to 2024.
• 41:10
  But more than twice as many Christians served prison, exile, or forced labor sentences.
• 41:17
  Uh courts were imposing harsher pen harsher penalties overall.
• 41:23
  And they attribute this to Trump's crackdown globally.
• 41:30
  He's cracking down on terrorism.
• 41:33
  And they said that whenever that happens, what the reports are showing is that the terrorist organizations tend to create scapegoats, and they point to the Christians because they already hate the Christians, and so they just impose stricter laws.
• 41:50
  They arrest more Christians.
• 41:53
  And I think we can certainly see this.
• 41:56
  Uh, we we saw it in Nigeria.
• 41:59
  Um, we're seeing it around the world.
• 42:02
  I think this is a fair assessment.
• 42:05
  And so the stakes are incredibly high.
• 42:09
  And this is what I don't understand.
• 42:12
  Uh it's what I don't understand about the left, I guess.
• 42:16
  It just really honestly legitimately confuses me.
• 42:21
  I'm trying to understand, but I just don't, I don't get it.
• 42:24
  Because I'm seeing so many posts, I'm seeing the media flat out lie.
• 42:30
  And they're they're painting Donald Trump as a complete monster, a deranged idiot who's out of control.
• 42:38
  And yet you look at the map of the places that he's liberating, and they really are being liberated.
• 42:46
  You know, he's not just flexing the U.S.'s muscles.
• 42:49
  Look at Venezuela.
• 42:52
  Uh listen to Venezuelas still.
• 42:55
  Funny how the media is silent on this right now.
• 42:58
  But I'm seeing post after post of tens, if not hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans who are still thanking America.
• 43:09
  They're thanking President Trump directly.
• 43:12
  They're praising America.
• 43:15
  And uh look at look at Nigeria.
• 43:19
  They are praising President Trump.
• 43:22
  They've been begging him to produce some kind of humanitarian aid because of the persecution of Christians, the slaughtering of thousands.
• 43:35
  And yet, what do we have from the left?
• 43:37
  They protest, they take to the streets, and they they no new wars.
• 43:44
  You know, they they they take to the streets, they protest, they talk about how horrible of a man President Trump is.
• 43:50
  I just saw a video from this deranged lady, and she was saying she wants every single person who voted for Donald Trump to die.
• 44:02
  And she claimed that her husband is a serviceman or was a serviceman.
• 44:07
  I think he was killed in battle.
• 44:10
  And uh not during this war.
• 44:13
  Uh and she just she's so angry.
• 44:19
  And she said, anybody who voted for this man, you deserve to die.
• 44:25
  Folks, that's half of America.
• 44:28
  She wants half of the population, millions and millions and millions of people.
• 44:36
  She wants dead.
• 44:38
  Now you tell me how that's better than President Trump liberating the tens, if not hundreds of thousands of Christians.
• 44:49
  It's not not just Christians, it's not just the Christians, though they've been specifically targeted, but he's freed hundreds of thousands of people, prevented hundreds of thousands more people from dying.
• 45:05
  Brutal deaths.
• 45:08
  Have you heard any of the Iranians talk about the trauma of growing up living in a war-tattered nation where you're always living in fear, you're always looking over your shoulder, you're you're watching women be stripped and beaten in the streets, raped, children raped.
• 45:26
  These people are not good people.
• 45:29
  And I I just I don't get it.
• 45:31
  It's it's they're the left is protesting and defending the terrorists.
• 45:37
  Literally.
• 45:38
  I just don't get it.
• 45:41
  I they they claim they like freedoms and you know, no kings, no kings.
• 45:48
  And yet, literally every single dictator that President Trump has taken down.
• 45:54
  What are what are the people on the left do?
• 45:57
  They protest.
• 45:58
  Release Maduro.
• 46:01
  Yeah, they talk about what a great guy Maduro was, what a humanitarian, you know, wonderful man he was.
• 46:08
  I uh these people are nuts.
• 46:11
  They are certifiably insane.
• 46:15
  I've never seen anything like it.
• 46:17
  And I just saw uh it was a couple of different Iranians, and they were out in California, and they said we will never ever vote for a Democrat ever again after their response to President Trump launching strikes against Iran.
• 46:40
  Um we will never ever vote for another Democrat again.
• 46:46
  They lost our vote, they lost our respect.
• 46:50
  They're defending a man who is an absolute tyrant, evil, one of the most evil men to ever walk the face of the planet.
• 47:04
  And with the order of his voice, President Trump took him out.
• 47:12
  He eliminated him.
• 47:15
  And it's really interesting.
• 47:17
  Uh, you know, it's not just the Iranians, because that's the other thing.
• 47:21
  They're like, well, this isn't our war to fight.
• 47:24
  It is.
• 47:25
  It absolutely is.
• 47:27
  And again, I'm not saying I like war.
• 47:29
  I don't like anything about war.
• 47:31
  I really don't.
• 47:33
  I don't think President Trump likes war.
• 47:35
  He said it before.
• 47:37
  In fact, he's talked about it very consistently.
• 47:40
  He's talked about it with the Ukrainian war, Ukraine and Russia.
• 47:45
  He said, I want people to stop dying.
• 47:50
  He does not like war.
• 47:54
  But you know what else he doesn't like?
• 47:57
  He doesn't like sitting on his hands when he has information that Iran is planning attacks on American soil.
• 48:06
  You know, it's funny you don't hear that from the left.
• 48:09
  It's all about, oh, well, uh, we have we have uh several servicemen who died.
• 48:18
  And the president caused that.
• 48:21
  Well, as I mentioned, under President Obama, over 2500 servicemen and women were killed in battle.
• 48:32
  Over 2500.
• 48:34
  This year, I think the numbers just jumped up.
• 48:37
  I think it's uh like um something like five confirmed deaths, which is horrible.
• 48:44
  It's absolutely tragic.
• 48:46
  My heart 100% goes out to the families of those servicemen who were killed in battle.
• 48:53
  It's heartbreaking, devastating.
• 48:57
  But what the left did, what the dishonest left did they took this narrative that the U.S.
• 49:04
  is bombing a school.
• 49:07
  We bombed this girl's school and killed all these little girls.
• 49:12
  One thousand percent not true, and they know it.
• 49:19
  They know it's not true.
• 49:21
  That was not us who bombed that school.
• 49:27
  And yet, nobody to my knowledge, no media outlet has retracted that story.
• 49:32
  They haven't corrected it.
• 49:35
  And so these deranged lunatic lefties are reposting these stories, and they're spreading this false narrative that President Trump is bombing little girls' schools, that he's intentionally targeting, that's the implication anyway, that he's intentionally targeting little girls' schools because see, this just proves he's a Nazi.
• 49:57
  I mean, help me make this make sense.
• 50:01
  It's just insane that people actually believe these conspiracies and they spread them around as if they're gospel fact.
• 50:09
  And what it does is it builds this hatred that's already been there for a long time, but it just festers and it continues to grow that hatred towards our president.
• 50:21
  And it becomes so blinding for people.
• 50:25
  And that hatred is not just aimed at our president.
• 50:30
  Like I said, that insane lady who's wishing death, and she meant it.
• 50:37
  She meant it.
• 50:39
  I mean, I wish I could pull up that video.
• 50:42
  I didn't save it.
• 50:45
  But she was angry.
• 50:47
  She was crying.
• 50:49
  She was shaking.
• 50:49
  She was so angry.
• 50:52
  Dropping the F bomb.
• 50:53
  I wish every effing person who died for Trump or who voted for Trump would die.
• 51:01
  They deserve to die.
• 51:06
  Lady, you need locked up in an insane asylum.
• 51:10
  That's not normal.
• 51:11
  That's not normal behavior.
• 51:12
  It's not normal rhetoric.
• 51:14
  It's not normal to think those things.
• 51:16
  It's not normal to feel those things.
• 51:19
  It's okay to be angry.
• 51:21
  It's okay to disagree.
• 51:24
  100%.
• 51:26
  You know, war is very, very complicated.
• 51:31
  And there's a lot at stake, always.
• 51:36
  And when you're the spouse of a service member who lost their life, it's going to bring up all kinds of emotions.
• 51:43
  I get it.
• 51:44
  I understand it.
• 51:46
  But to wish death on half of America because they voted for a president.
• 51:54
  Who literally is not only stopping terrorism within a country, but it's stopping terroristic attacks against our country.
• 52:03
  Look at what happened in Mexico.
• 52:07
  Look what the cartels just did.
• 52:11
  Look at what they did.
• 52:15
  Those are the people we were allowing across the border, completely unvetted.
• 52:22
  They're sophisticated.
• 52:24
  You know, these cartels aren't stupid.
• 52:27
  They have weaponry that people are kind of scratching their heads.
• 52:31
  Like they were outgunning the Mexican military.
• 52:37
  I mean, absolutely crazy and very sophisticated attacks.
• 52:43
  That's what we're up against when we're fighting evil.
• 52:46
  And our president knows it.
• 52:48
  We happen to have a president who knows it.
• 52:50
  He gets it, he understands it, and he's not putting up with it.
• 52:54
  He's not going to tolerate it.
• 52:57
  And so this article here that was just written a few days ago.
• 53:02
  They were talking about how there's been a surge in arrest of Iranian religious minorities since the 2000 June 2025 war.
• 53:12
  You know, there's the 12-day, the 12-day war, and they said that was a big slap in the face to the Supreme Leader of Iran.
• 53:22
  That's when he really started to escalate.
• 53:24
  And that's another thing that people don't understand.
• 53:26
  See, we were neutralizing.
• 53:30
  Our president was neutralizing the nuclear threat.
• 53:37
  I mean, this this wasn't guesswork.
• 53:40
  Like we knew they had an enrichment facility.
• 53:44
  And if you don't believe in our intel, look at the strikes.
• 53:47
  Look at the precision of the strikes that have been taking place over the past few days.
• 53:52
  Our intel is good.
• 53:56
  They were enriching uranium.
• 54:00
  They've been talking about building an atomic bomb for how many years?
• 54:05
  Can you imagine that nutcase?
• 54:08
  Getting access to a nuclear bomb.
• 54:10
  And so Trump said no, it's not going to happen.
• 54:13
  We went in, did some precision bombing, took out their bunkers, and uh that just that Supreme Leader off on an absolute mission to take out our president.
• 54:29
  And Trump is right.
• 54:32
  He said he wanted to kill me, so I killed him first.
• 54:37
  And what Trump was saying is he would have done it.
• 54:41
  You know, he wasn't a stupid man.
• 54:45
  And he has an underground network like you wouldn't believe of terrorists.
• 54:49
  I mean, these terrorist cells are very powerful.
• 54:54
  So it's a strike before you're struck.
• 55:01
  And anybody who understands, like what are the Democrats, what do they want the president to do?
• 55:08
  Just sit and wait.
• 55:11
  You know, don't shoot unless you're you're you're uh fired upon.
• 55:18
  Well, when they have cells, terrorist cells that they were activating inside the United States.
• 55:26
  That was their promise.
• 55:27
  That was their plan.
• 55:30
  What do we do?
• 55:31
  Wait until half our cities are overtaken, bombed, destroyed.
• 55:37
  What did they want our president to do?
• 55:41
  So it's crazy, man.
• 55:43
  It's getting wild out there, but uh just pretty interesting.
• 55:47
  But this article says uh, you know, of course, this was before the strikes on Iran.
• 55:55
  But the the authors were saying the the U.S.
• 55:58
  Treasury should designate the IIDO and Judge Ramish under existing human rights authorities for their roles in the Islamic Republic's crackdown on religious minorities.
• 56:12
  And they're talking about the power of um sanctions.
• 56:16
  By the way, the IIDO is the Islamic ideology dissemination organization.
• 56:22
  That's the terroristic organization in Iran that's forcing people to be Muslim.
• 56:29
  You either become Muslim or uh we're gonna torture you, harass you, arrest you, or murder you.
• 56:39
  So I just can't begin to imagine living under those conditions and what that's been like for the poor Iranians.
• 56:46
  Uh, like I said, the stakes are very, very high, and thank God.
• 56:52
  We have a president, and you may not agree with a lot of the stuff he does.
• 56:56
  You may not agree with his strikes on Iran.
• 57:00
  But whatever the case, thank God we have a president who sees these people, and the Iranians are praising him like crazy.
• 57:11
  That, my friends, is the hidden lightness.
• 57:13
  You can find more out about my show and get all the latest podcasts if you go to the menu navigation bar at America Outloud.news under our shows or schedule.
• 57:22
  You'll be in the know.
• 57:23
  There's a hidden lightness that shines inside of all of us.
• 57:25
  When there's so much darkness that envelops the world, remember that it doesn't take much light to expose that darkness and to ultimately inspire other people.
• 57:32
  Join me in being a light.