[Today’s Prayer] Iranian Christians Sentenced to Death for Conversion, Local Women Testify to Their Suffering

Marziyeh Amirizadeh is an Iranian-American who immigrated to the United States after being sentenced to death in Iran for converting to Christianity. She endured months of mental and physical torture and intense interrogation, and has since written two books and become a lecturer and columnist. She shares her story in the United States and around the world, raising awareness of the human rights abuses and persecution faced by women and religious minorities in Iran.

According to her, Iranian women have been stripped of many of their rights since the 1979 revolution. The regime systematically and openly oppressed women through misogynistic laws, reducing their rights to half those of men. Girls are forced to wear the hijab from as young as seven, and hundreds of thousands have been arrested on the streets, beaten, and humiliated by the morality police simply for not wearing the hijab properly. A prime example is the 2022 case of Mahsa Amini, who was arrested for exposing her hair and brutally beaten, falling into a coma, and ultimately dying.

In Iran, crimes known as "honor killings" still occur. Since men who kill their female relatives for honor reasons are not subject to the death penalty, perpetrators often go unpunished. Amirizadeh also testified that after her conversion to Christianity became known, her brother was pressured by the imam to "kill her without punishment."

"When I think of International Women's Day, I think of the suffering of countless Iranian women like me," she said. "I recall the horrific memories of being humiliated and physically punished at school and even at home by older brothers who treated me and all other women as inferior, and the intense harassment by men who looked at me like a prostitute."

"I remember living in Iran for 30 years, yet never having the opportunity to travel my beautiful homeland because women weren't allowed to book hotel rooms alone. I also recall the horrific stories of my students enduring sexual advances and threats from judges to divorce their abusive husbands," she said. "In Islam, there are no laws protecting women from abuse or beatings by their husbands."

Yet, despite this oppression, millions of Iranian women refused to give in and risked their lives to fight for their rights. Mothers who lost their children conveyed messages of resistance through dance instead of tears at funerals, transforming their grief into resistance.

Source: Christian Today

Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God (John 1:12)

God, through Sister Amiri Zadeh—who was sentenced to death for converting to Christianity and later moved to the United States to share about Iran's situation—we hear that many women and religious minorities in Iran, especially Christians, are currently suffering human rights abuses and persecution.

Have mercy on the women of Iran who, since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, have been stripped of many rights and are losing their lives to honor killings. Remember those oppressed simply for being women in the Islamic world, abandoned even by their families with nowhere to turn. Hear all their suffering and wipe away their tears with Your own hands.

Also, protect and safeguard the Iranian Christians who, even under decades of powerful Islamic dictatorship, have heard the Gospel, accepted Jesus, and kept their faith. Pour out upon them an unshakable, bold faith.

May all the evil laws of Islam that force the wearing of the hijab, arrest and beat those who refuse, and sentence to death those who have converted from Islam—laws that terrify the souls of Iran and even take their lives—be torn down, and may they be ruled by the laws of God's kingdom.

May the Iranian souls still suffering under Islamic rule receive Jesus as their Savior—He who grants peace and faith to all who believe and seek Him—and confess that Jesus Christ alone is the Son of the living God. May they become those who possess the authority of God's children by confessing the Lord, and may they overcome the world abundantly.

Allow the global church, empowered by prayer, to unite in intercession for the souls of Iran imprisoned and persecuted. Through the prayers of the global church, may the souls of Iran be set free from every bondage and experience the eternal victory of the cross. Moreover, even as persecution intensifies, may the steps of the global church and the Iranian church in witnessing to the gospel never cease, and may the gospel be fully proclaimed throughout all of Iran.

Thus, may Iran become a nation that triumphs through faith in the Lord amidst any persecution, and bears witness to the name of Jesus Christ to all nations!