Many hope their struggle to endure will get a boost from a historic visit by Pope Francis planned in March. Many Christians who fled the IS advance have either stayed in Iraq’s Kurdistan region or started new lives abroad. “She tells me we should stay, and that God is with us.”The numerical decline and waning clout of Iraqi Christians started before the Islamic State’s persecution of religious minorities like theirs. Christians were among groups targeted by militants amid the breakdown in security after the 2003 US-led invasion that overthrew Saddam Hussein. The Chaldean Catholic Patriarch, Cardinal Louis Raphael Sako, estimated that one million Christians have left Iraq since 2003 and about 500,000 remained.

Source: Egypt Independent February 24, 2021 06:00 UTC