The widow of a murdered church leader in Laos has been telling Release International she forgives her husband's killers who tried try to destroy the church.
'Abigail' (whose real name cannot be disclosed for security reasons) says Christianity is spreading in Laos - despite persecution - and Christians are growing strong in the faith. She tells her story in the latest edition of Release's award-winning webcast World Update on the Persecuted Church.
The Lao authorities have arrested or detained at least 90 Christians in recent weeks following raids on three provinces.
In one incident, villagers are believed to have killed a Christian by pouring rice wine down his throat until he drowned. When family members buried him and put a wooden cross on his grave, village officials accused them of 'practising the rituals of the enemy of the state'.
And instead of tracking down the killers, they allegedly rounded up 17 Christian families and locked them up without food for three days to try to force them to renounce their faith.
The authorities have long regarded evangelical Christianity as part of a foreign-backed plot to undermine the communist revolution.
During a recent fact-finding visit to Laos, Release met Abigail whose husband was murdered for his faith.
Abigail is continuing her husband's work, looking after churches he set up.
He was away for longer than expected on church business when news came that his body had been found. He had been brutally murdered.
Before he left, Abigail sensed a dread that something like this could happen. She told Release: "I always said, please don't come home late because you have enemies who will try to kill you."
"Don't worry," he replied. "But I said, 'How can I not worry, because our children are still young?' If something happened to you, how would I live?"
But what she feared most happened. Her husband had been missing for several days before his body was found.
To begin with Abigail was distraught: "I was crying, crying, crying and asking God why he took my husband away - he was the one that the church and the people needed more than me."
