At a small Persian church in Chicago\u2019s western suburbs, the pastor bowed his head and offered a special prayer for regime change and freedom of worship in his native Iran, as the five-week U.S.-Israeli war there rages on.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe pray to God to tear down the darkness power from Iran and bring his kingdom and give people peace,\u201d the Rev. James Shahabi said in Persian during a Palm Sunday service at Kheimeh Molaghat church in Addison, Ill. \u201cAnd let his name be glorified in Iran freely.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAmen,\u201d the predominantly Iranian American congregation responded in unison.<\/p>\n
As the church prepares Sunday to celebrate Christ\u2019s resurrection on Easter, its members call for renewal and liberation of their homeland as the fate of its governance hangs in the balance.<\/p>\n
Although Roman Catholic leaders \u2014 most prominently Pope Leo XIV \u2014 have resolutely criticized the U.S.-Israeli war in Iran, the congregants at Kheimeh Molaghat staunchly champion it, longing for the fall of the theocratic leadership of the Islamic Republic, where Christians and other religious minorities are heavily persecuted.<\/p>\n
They say they yearn for a day when Iranians of all religions will be allowed to worship freely in their homeland. <\/p>\n
And they applaud President Trump\u2019s vow to \u201cMake Iran Great Again.\u201d Early in the war, Trump called for the overthrow of the Iranian government and its military\u2019s unconditional surrender, though he has issued vague and contradictory statements since. <\/p>\n
On Wednesday, during Trump\u2019s first national address since the U.S.-Israeli attacks started the war Feb. 28, he said that U.S. forces would \u201cfinish the job\u201d soon, following weeks of often conflicting messages on the military operation.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf Iran gets great, I think the world will get great,\u201d said Narjes Delacai, 66, who left the northern Iranian city of Mashhad decades ago.<\/p>\n
Aria Bahraman, 44, who says he fled religious oppression in Iran about 15 years ago, believes a change of government in Tehran would weaken the many Iranian-backed militant groups scattered across the Middle East, such as Hamas and Hezbollah, making the world safer and more peaceful.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you destroy the head of the snake, the whole snake is gone,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Catholic leaders decry the war<\/p>\n
Their words of support for the war are in stark contrast to those of many Christian leaders who have opposed the military operation in Iran and how the Trump administration has conducted it. <\/p>\n
Chicago-born Pope Leo has repeatedly called for a ceasefire, and on Tuesday he urged Trump to look for an \u201coff-ramp\u201d to end the war.<\/p>\n
During his inaugural Palm Sunday address, the pontiff denounced those who use God to justify war and urged prayers for peace, particularly for those suffering in the Middle East.<\/p>\n
\u201cBrothers and sisters, this is our God: Jesus, King of Peace, who rejects war, whom no one can use to justify war,\u201d he said. \u201cHe does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war, but rejects them.\u201d<\/p>\n
Cardinal Blase Cupich last month decried a video the White House posted online that spliced images of action scenes in movies with real videos of U.S. bombing in Iran.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur government is treating the suffering of the Iranian people as a backdrop for our own entertainment, as if it\u2019s just another piece of content to be swiped through while we\u2019re waiting in line at the grocery store,\u201d the archbishop of Chicago said in a statement. \u201cBut, in the end, we lose our humanity when we are thrilled by the destructive power of our military.\u201d<\/p>\n
The National Council of Churches has also opposed what it calls the \u201cunauthorized military aggression in Iran,\u201d lamenting \u201cthe loss of life from these aggressive acts and gratuitous violence by the U.S. and Israel against the Iranian people, which has only served to further destabilize the region, cripple infrastructure and harm the most vulnerable.\u201d<\/p>\n
The war has proved broadly unpopular among Americans, with roughly 61% disapproving of Trump\u2019s management of the conflict and 59% believing the U.S. decision to use military force was wrong, according to a Pew Research Center poll released March 25.<\/p>\n
As for the pastor at Kheimeh Molaghat, Shahabi said he\u2019s confident the Trump administration will persevere in toppling the Iranian government and restoring governance to the people, as the president promised in the war\u2019s first hours.<\/p>\n
The clergyman warned, however, that failure to do so would jeopardize the future of Iran and the stability of the entire Middle East, unleashing an even more volatile and repressive Tehran government in the war\u2019s wake.<\/p>\n
\u201cTrump has to finish it. He has no other option \u2026 because if he doesn\u2019t finish, the Islamic Republic will destroy the whole safety of the Middle East,\u201d Shahabi said. \u201cThey are going to get worse and worse. The U.S. has to finish it and make sure that there is a very stable, new government.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2018Save us from this brutal regime\u2019<\/p>\n
During the Palm Sunday service, the in-person audience at the nondenominational church was much smaller than on a typical Sunday, with only about half a dozen members dotting the rows of blue chairs in front of the stage.<\/p>\n
The pastor said many congregants were absent because they had traveled to Washington, D.C., to attend a March 29 rally of Iranian diaspora in support of the war.<\/p>\n
Among them was church member Mahdi Rahbar, who said he had joined a crowd of thousands at the demonstration on the National Mall, a day after nationwide \u201cNo Kings\u201d rallies protested the war and other Trump policies.<\/p>\n
In front of the U.S. Capitol, the 30-year-old from suburban Chicago waved an American flag and the tricolor lion-and-sun flag \u2014 the flag of Iran prior to the 1979 Islamic Revolution that has become a symbol of opposition to the government in Tehran.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s important for everyone in the world to know this ongoing war is for rescuing the Iranian people from this regime,\u201d said Rahbar, who left Iran five years ago. \u201cSave us from this brutal regime.\u201d<\/p>\n
Back then, there was no freedom of speech, human rights abuses were rampant and the rights of women in particular were severely restricted, he recalled.<\/p>\n
His family and friends in Iran say the oppression has only escalated in the years since \u2014 just three months ago, the government brutally crushed nationwide protests, killing thousands of citizens and arresting thousands more. Rahbar lives in constant fear for the safety of his loved ones back home.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think most people don\u2019t understand what it means to live under a dictatorship and such a government,\u201d he said. \u201cI never thought I would want my country to be bombed. But it\u2019s not actually my country. \u2026 It\u2019s certain places that are occupied by the [Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps] and the regime that actually kills Iranians.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rahbar was raised in a Muslim family, but said he was agnostic when he left Iran.<\/p>\n
Shortly after arriving in the United States, he met American Christians at the university he attended and asked to join them at a Bible study.<\/p>\n
This kind of inquiry is prohibited in Iran, where it is illegal for a Muslim to convert to Christianity.<\/p>\n
Religious persecution<\/p>\n
Amnesty International has repeatedly condemned religious persecution in Iran, noting in its 2024 report that minority faiths \u2014 including Bahais, Christians, Jews and Sunni Muslims \u2014 have suffered discrimination in various aspects of life, including education access, employment and government positions.<\/p>\n
Open worship can also be dangerous.<\/p>\n
\u201cAuthorities subjected members of religious minorities to arbitrary detention, unjust prosecution and torture and other ill-treatment for professing, or practicing their faith,\u201d the report said.<\/p>\n
Conversion to a minority religion is particularly perilous in Iran, the global human rights advocacy organization found.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople born to parents classified as Muslim by the authorities risked arbitrary detention, torture and other ill-treatment and the death penalty for \u2018apostasy\u2019 if they adopted other religions or atheism,\u201d the report said. \u201cAuthorities raided house churches and arbitrarily detained Christian converts.\u201d<\/p>\n
Iran is ranked the 10th-most dangerous nation for Christians, according to Open Doors International, a Christian advocacy nonprofit.<\/p>\n
Armenian and Assyrian Christian communities in Iran are treated as \u201csecond-class citizens,\u201d according to Open Doors.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey are also banned from using the Persian language in religious activities and for religious materials, and are not allowed to engage with Persian-speaking people in church services,\u201d the nonprofit reported.<\/p>\n
Converts, though, face the greatest risk, according to Open Doors.<\/p>\n
After the service at Kheimeh Molaghat, over coffee and sweets in the church fellowship hall, Bahraman recounted how armed Iranian forces raided the home of his parents about 15 years ago because their family had converted to Christianity. His mother and father were detained for about a month, he said.<\/p>\n
His mom served as the pastor for their church, which met in secret in their home along with 17 or 18 fellow converts for daily services.<\/p>\n
At the time, Bahraman had 5,000 Persian Bibles, which are illegal in Iran, stored in his own apartment. Church members would pass them out surreptitiously for evangelism to prospective Iranian converts.<\/p>\n
When he learned of the raid on his parents, Bahraman rushed to throw out all of the Bibles in public dumpsters.<\/p>\n
\u201cBelieve me, it is not easy to get rid of 5,000 books,\u201d he recalled. \u201cI remember going around and just watching my shadow, because you never know who is behind you.\u201d<\/p>\n
Discarding all of those sacred texts \u201cwas heartbreaking,\u201d he recalled.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was painful to throw it away,\u201d he said. \u201cBut what other choice have you got?\u201d<\/p>\n
Shortly after that incident, he abruptly fled Iran.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat I love most about America is if I wake up in the morning and I want to go to a church, I can go to a church,\u201d Bahraman said. \u201cThere is nobody stopping me.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf I want to read a book, I can read a book,\u201d he added. \u201cNo one is stopping me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Praying at Easter<\/p>\n
The church members plan to gather for a service at Kheimeh Molaghat on Easter Sunday, where they intend to once again pray together for the future of Iran and their loved ones back home.<\/p>\n
They believe that democracy will come to their homeland one day.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have a long path to a democratic system,\u201d Rahbar said. \u201cWe fought for 47 years.\u201d<\/p>\n
With democracy comes freedom of worship, he added.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t want to make everybody Christian. But I want them to have the chance to hear what Christianity [is] like. Because it made me free,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s how it should be. A democratic country has to go that way. To let people choose what to believe in.\u201d<\/p>\n
Leventis Lourgos writes for the Chicago Tribune. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"At a small Persian church in Chicago\u2019s western suburbs, the pastor bowed his head and offered a special…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":252328,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[112051,6577,42746,1073,92450,66770,112052,48,52,51,47,50,49,9066,112050,18256,3020,43610,2664,99627,72],"class_list":{"0":"post-252327","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-aria-bahraman","9":"tag-authority","10":"tag-christians","11":"tag-home","12":"tag-iranian-government","13":"tag-iranian-people","14":"tag-kheimeh-molaghat-church","15":"tag-la","16":"tag-la-headlines","17":"tag-la-news","18":"tag-los-angeles","19":"tag-los-angeles-headlines","20":"tag-los-angeles-news","21":"tag-middle-east","22":"tag-native-iran","23":"tag-pastor","24":"tag-president-trump","25":"tag-u-s-force","26":"tag-war","27":"tag-worship","28":"tag-year"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252327","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252327"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252327\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/252328"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252327"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252327"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252327"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}