At least 37 people were killed and scores wounded during an attack by an al-Shabaab suicide bomber and gunmen at a popular beach in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, on August 3.
Al-Shabaab has claimed responsibility for numerous bombings and attacks in Mogadishu as well as other parts of Somalia. Last month, five people were killed in a powerful car bomb blast at a café in the capital. In March, militants killed three people and wounded 27 during an hours-long siege of a Mogadishu hotel.
According to a Morning Star News report, Muslim relatives attacked an ex-Muslim convert to Christianity in Somalia for the second time on July 8. They wounded him in the stomach, broke his wife’s ankle, and beat his children, all because he converted to Christianity.
Somalia is often in the news for violent incidents related to Islamic terrorism; its constitution upholds Sharia law. Islam is the dominant religion of Somalia, practiced by almost the entire population. Nearly all inhabitants speak the Somali language, which remained unwritten until 1973, when the Supreme Revolutionary Council (SRC) proclaimed it the nation’s official language and decreed an orthography using Latin letters.
Islam arrived at the East African coast through many waves occurring at different times. In his 1977 dissertation, scholar Ali Abdirahman Hersi details the history of the colonization and Islamization of Somalis by Arabs and other Muslims. Hersi explains that Islam took root in what is today Somalia mostly through Muslim immigration and proselytization, which began in the 7th century. However, when the ‘converted’ native populations under the Abbasid caliphs revolted, then jihadist armies were sent to East Africa. This included the Islamized city-states of the Somali coast. Hersi notes that today,
Somalis do not only constitute one of the most thoroughly Islamized societies in tropical Africa (the other is Zanzibar), but they also boast one of the highest percentages of adherence to Islam anywhere in the world. Islam as a religion and a system of values so thoroughly permeates all aspects of Somali life that it is difficult to conceive of any meaning in the term Somali itself without at the same time implying Islamic identity.
This level of attachment to Islam brings with it extreme hostility towards other religions. Somalia ranks number two on the World Watch List of the Open Doors organization, which monitors Christian persecution globally.
However, there was a time when parts of Somalia had sizable Christian communities. Somalia’s once-important Christian population has been destroyed by both Islamists and socialists.
The current population of Somalia consists of 18 million Muslims. Open Doors estimates that the number of Christians in Somalia has been reduced to hundreds. The small Christian community is under constant threat of attack, says Open Doors. When identified, Christian men are likely to be attacked, tortured, or brutally murdered. Women and girls also face the threat of death, in addition to sexual violence and forced marriages.
In a more peaceful past, however, the Christian community was much larger. Somalia even prided itself on having the largest Catholic cathedral in the region. Orthodox, Catholic, and Protestant churches all have a long history in the country. As the scholar Paul Bowers writes:
The Christian presence in Africa is almost as old as Christianity itself, that Christianity has been an integral feature of the continent’s life for nearly two thousand years.
Orthodox Christianity originally arrived in regions of modern-day Somalia in the second and third centuries, reports the official website of the Archons of the Ecumenical Patriarchate. Today, Somalia is under the jurisdiction of the Holy Archdiocese of Aksum, the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Alexandria and all of Africa.
Arab sources from the 10th century describe the port of Saylac (Zeila) in present-day northwest Somalia, near the border with Djibouti, as a Christian city.
Jesuits visiting the island of Socotra east of Somalia in the 16th century were amazed to find that the inhabitants were Christian (although illiterate). A letter from St. Francis Xavier to the Jesuit headquarters, dated September, 1542, described a Christian population in Socotra who claimed to be converts of St. Thomas.
Ben Aram, who was in ministry among Somalis for many years, notes that “archeologists have discovered ruins of Somali tombs that are marked with crosses. He makes a solid argument, that on the basis of these written records, archaeological data and Judeo-Christian symbolism still active in traditional Somali culture, ‘both Judaism and Christianity preceded Islam to the lowland Horn of Africa.’”
Somalia’s modern history began in the 19th century, when European powers began to trade and establish themselves in the region. In the late 19th century, the area that would later become Somalia was under the control of Britain in the north and of Italy in the south.
In 1886, a French Roman Catholic mission agency and the Swedish Overseas Lutheran Mission set up bases in the port town of Berbera (in the then British protectorate of Somaliland), in Mogadishu, and in Kismayo. The church grew rapidly.
The Catholic cathedral in Mogadishu was opened in 1928. It was the largest cathedral in Africa. Built in three years and designed in a Norman Gothic style by architect Antonio Vandone di Cortemilia, the church was heavily influenced by the Cefalù Cathedral in Sicily. By 1940, the Bishop of Mogadishu estimated there were 40,000 Catholics in the city and surrounding areas.
During the 1950s, Christian missions multiplied. The Swedish Lutheran Mission, Mennonite Mission, and the Sudan Interior Mission (SIM) in particular left their mark on the region.
In 1960, the British and Italian administrations merged to form the new nation of Somalia. President Mohamed Siad Barre’s military government came to power in 1969. It was the beginning of the end of the Christian presence in the country. Open Doors explains:
Barre introduced ‘Scientific Socialism’ into Somalia. During this process, property owned by Christian missionary organizations and churches, including schools and clinics, were seized. Christians were expelled from the country.
In 1972, the government of Somalia nationalized all of the Roman Catholic Church’s property. By 1976, all foreign missionaries had left the country.
In 1974, a new law was introduced giving women the same inheritance rights as men. Islamic leaders who preached against this new law were imprisoned or executed. It was claimed that the secular and reformist nature of the government undermined the Islamic identity of the Somali people. This resulted in a revival of radical Islamic influence and the growth of Muslim clan-based militant organizations. They aimed to turn Somalia into an Islamic state.
Siad Barre’s regime and Islamic militants shared an enemy—Christians, whose presence had become increasingly visible in prior years. During Barre’s rule, radical Muslims used their influence to encourage the government to ban the printing, importing, distributing, or selling of Christian literature in the country. Moreover, the National Security Services (NSS) threatened, arrested, tortured, and murdered many Somali Christians. Other Christians lost their jobs and businesses.
In 1989, Pietro Salvatore Colombo, the Catholic bishop of the Diocese of Mogadiscio, was gunned down during a church service. Aleteia reports that,
After his burial in Mogadishu, someone dug up his remains and extracted his teeth for their gold fillings. His remains were later relocated to Milan, Italy.
In early 1991, the cathedral was looted and set ablaze. Right around that time, the U.S. embassy in Mogadishu, which had received bazooka fire, was evacuated. One week later, the Italian embassy—the last remaining one in the city—also evacuated. In short order, telephone links were severed, as a once-vibrant capital city separated itself from the outside world and descended into a dark age of self-destruction.
After decades of ruling the country with a mixture of terror and guile, President Siad Barre’s regime finally collapsed in 1991. The country was left without an effective government. As Freedom House notes,
Somalia has struggled to reestablish a functioning state since the collapse of an authoritarian regime in 1991. No direct national elections have been held to date, and political affairs remain dominated by clan divisions. Amid ongoing insecurity, human rights abuses by both state and nonstate actors occur regularly.
After several attempts at mediation by the international community, a federal government was eventually formed in 2012. The government only controls cities and towns; many parts of rural Somalia remain in the hands of the jihadist terrorist group, al-Shabaab.
The Harakat Shabaab al-Mujahidin, commonly known as al-Shabaab, launched a violent insurgency in Somalia in 2006. They have since carried out many terror attacks both inside and outside of Somalia. The 2015 attack against Garissa University College in Kenya, for instance, killed around 150 (mostly Christian) students. According to the National Counterterrorism Center,
Al-Shabaab is responsible for the assassination of Somali peace activists, international aid workers, numerous civil society figures, and journalists, and for blocking the delivery of aid from some Western relief agencies during the 2011 famine that killed tens of thousands of Somalis.
Al-Shabaab vigorously advocates a strict form of Sharia law and is committed to eradicating Christianity from Somalia. When discovered, Christians are at risk of being immediately killed, reports Open Doors.
Church life in Somalia is non-existent. In recent years, the dangers facing Christians appear to have worsened as Islamic militants have intensified their hunt for Christian leaders. No region is safe for Christians in Somalia. However, the most dangerous places are the areas under the control of al-Shabaab.
Despite suffering military setbacks and facing rebellion from some clans, al-Shabaab remains a potent force, controlling large swathes of the country. It has infiltrated federal and local authorities; it even extends its reach to neighboring countries like Kenya.
Today, Somalia is nearly 100% Sunni Muslim, and society expects all Somalis to be Muslim. Imams in mosques and madrassas (as well as the leaders of al-Shabaab) publicly state that there is no room for Christianity, Christians, and churches in Somalia. The country’s Constitution declares that Islam is the state religion. Al-Shabaab targets and kills Somalis who are suspected of being converts to Christianity. Foreign jihadists are also present in the country.
“However, Islamic oppression is not limited to only militants,” adds Open Doors. “Christian converts also face serious violations of religious freedom from family, extended family members and the community at large. To be Christian, especially a convert from Islam, is a huge challenge. It can lead to a brutal death at the hands of Muslims.”
Insecurity in the country due to al-Shabaab and clan militias has led to an 80% rise in sexual violence, primarily against girls, according to a 2021 report in Forbes magazine.
As one Open Doors expert explains:
A Christian school girl was raped inside her own school after her classmate exposed that her mother is a Christian.
The complete Islamization of Somalia appears to have destroyed concepts such as basic human rights and religious liberty. Open Doors notes:
No religious groups other than Sunni Islam have any meaningful rights in Somalia. In areas controlled by al-Shabaab, the situation has become so extreme that even Shia Muslims keep a very low profile. Moderate Sunnis are also targeted. Laws in Somalia prohibit the propagation of any religion other than Islam and prohibit Muslims from converting. The Constitution also states that all laws must comply with the general principles of Sharia.
Non-Muslim nations and religions are extremely vulnerable due to Islamic expansionism across the world. Over 1,400 years throughout the history of Islam prove this reality. Wherever Islam arrived, it took over the land, oppressing and even exterminating non-Muslim locals.
“Turkey used to be called Anatolia or Asia Minor and was a Christian civilization,” writes Dr. Bill Warner. “Today, Turkey is over 95% Muslim. North Africa, Egypt, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon used to be Christian. Afghanistan was Buddhist; Pakistan and Malaysia used to be Hindu. Today, they are more than 95% Muslim. Islam does not reach a balance point with the native civilization; it dominates and annihilates the indigenous culture over time.”
Somalia is one of the most striking examples of this historical phenomenon. In a land once inhabited by non-Muslims, including Christians, today the tiny community of Christians lives in fear for their lives. Europeans should heed the history of how Islam expanded and annihilated non-Muslims in other parts of the world. If they fail to learn from these historical examples, they risk eventually finding themselves in the same irreversible predicament.
