In August, Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito warned that hostility and violence against religion was on the rise. He was right. In the last four years, attacks against churches have intensified. According to a report by the Christian non-profit organization Family Research Council (FRC) prepared this month, between January 2018 and September 2022, 420 assaults encompassing vandalism, bomb threats, arson and gun violence were recorded against 397 different Christian houses of worship in the United States.
The deputy director of the FRC's Center for Religious Freedom, Arielle Del Turco, noted that the number of attacks occurring in 2022 is nearly triple the number documented in 2018. "The first nine months of 2022 saw more than double the number of reported acts of hostility against churches that occurred in the entirety of 2018," she wrote in the report. Due to this increase, Del Turco has condemned these violent attacks and asks for respect to exercise freedom of worship, one of the simple fundamental rights of human beings:
In the face of such blatant violence and disrespect against churches (and religion in general), our response must be to condemn these acts and reaffirm the right of all people to worship and live in their faith freely, including the freedom to live without fear of being the next target of such an attack.
The types of attacks included vandalism, arson, gun-related incidents, bomb threats, and more. There also appeared to be an increase in frequency over the course of the reporting period, between January 2018 and September 2022.
Report: https://t.co/CvL5E64T8b pic.twitter.com/AjiSPlkD69
- Family Research Council (@FRCdc) December 19, 2022
Assaults in 33 states and Washington, D.C. in 2022
During the first nine months of 2022, vandals defiled more than 130 churches in Washington, D.C. and 33 other states. In its dossier, the FRC notes that July of this year saw the highest number of monthly attacks - more than 30 - in the last four years and details several of the violent actions against Christian Churches:
The report documents one homicide, numerous arsons, bomb threats (real and fake), and a pervasive desecration of holy items. Vandals regularly smashed crosses, statues, and headstones in cemeteries; vandalized carvings of the Ten Commandments; set fire to a Nativity scene; and smeared feces on a statue of the Virgin Mary. They tore up a Bible and desecrated an American flag in a Primitive Methodist church in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. Denver’s Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary Catholic Church suffered two drive-by shootings this August. Smashed windows and spray-painted doors became ubiquitous. The number of assaults peaked this May through July but has remained elevated compared to historical figures, which usually number in the single digits.
In the period from January 2018 to September 2022, violence occured against Christian, Unitarian-Universalist or Mormon churches in 45 states and the capital.
George Floyd's death and abortion, some of the motives
Following the death of George Floyd in May 2020, violence and vandalism increased in the streets and churches were one of the main targets of attacks, Del Turco describes:
When looking at recorded acts of hostility per month from 2018 to September 2022, it is notable that a spike in church attacks seemed to follow rises in political tension. This happened during the protests and concurrent riots related to George Floyd’s death in May 2020 and following the leak of the Dobbs decision in May 2022. Overall, acts of hostility trended upward during the five-year reporting period.
After the Supreme Court reversed Roe vs. Wade, pro-abortion associations and groups have taken their anger out on churches. In the first nine months of 2022, 57 attacks for this reason were recorded, a "1,140 percent increase over the past four years."
Other reasons, the report notes, are "radical pro-LGBTQ activism, support for COVID-19 church closures, secularism, Satanism, Islamic fundamentalism, and anti-Americanism has also wrought havoc in parishes nationwide."
