Security Concerns of Some Countries in Asia
Scripture reading:
Matt. 10:16-17 Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves. Be therefore prudent as serpents and guileless as doves. And beware of men…
Act.20:28 Take heed to yourselves and to all the flock, among whom the Holy Spirit has placed you as overseers to shepherd the church of God…
I. Introduction:
How long will we be able to serve the Lord in our life? We are the young ones who are willing to consecrate ourselves to the Lord for His move on earth. However, in this last age, lawlessness will be gradually multiplied. The environment will become more complicated on our propagation. For this reason, we should not ignore the security concerns. We need to consider all of them in a cautious way. Saints, watch and pray that we may not enter into temptation!
II. Security Concern:
A. Restrictions:
1. Restrictions of countries on Christians and their faith:
Government restrictions in 198 countries are revealed in the following table:
(From：http://www.pewforum.org/files/2015/02/Restrictions2015_GRI.pdf)
2. Cultural restrictions:
a. Food taboos:
Most Asian countries have great attention to their diet:
In Muslims, Pork is forbidden as are foods containing pork products. Other meats, including beef and chicken, are also taboo if they are not slaughtered according to Islamic standards, making them Halal, or permissible for consumption. Foods containing blood, like black pudding, are also not allowed, along with birds of prey and animals that consume meat. The consumption of alcohol is strictly taboo in Islam and is considered a “great sin” in the Quran.
In India, for those that practice Hinduism, eating a cow in prohibited, as it is thought of as God’s useful gift to mankind since it provides dairy products and is the basis for other products.
Therefore, when making the locals a feast, we need to avoid their taboos, even the name of taboos.
b. Clothing taboos:
In Islamic countries，women should wear conservative clothing that covers arms, legs and hair. When in public, women must cover their hair with a scarf.
In Saudi Arabia, avoid wearing any visible gold chains, especially those with a cross. At the very least cover these up. Women should avoid any form-fitting clothing such as trousers or tight dresses. Neither men nor women should wear clothes that reveal their knees.
c. Etiquette taboos:
Indians don’t like white color. In their concept, 1, 3, 7, 13 are unlucky number. You cannot hold a woman’s hand, you just can put your palms together and nodding if you want to say hello. When the guest meets the host, they don’t have handshake and hug, they just put their hands together. If you have a conversation with them, they shake their head when they agree, and they nod when they disagree.
The left hand is considered to be unclean in India, as it’s used to perform matters associated with going to the bathroom. Therefore, you should avoid your left hand coming into contact with food or any objects that you pass to people.
It is stopped for people to sniff or touch the flowers on display in the market.
In the Middle East and the Near East countries，the locals have a habit that when they talk with each other, their hands mustn’t be crossed.
In Islamic countries, the doll cannot be as the gift.
In Pakistan, you cannot take pictures for local women without permission. Men cannot touch local women.
In Jordan, the locals do not drink. So, wine as a gift giving to someone is a taboo. It is prohibited to touch a child’s head.
d. Speech restrictions:
In Jordan, it is taboo to talk about Middle East politics, religion and women rights and other topics.
In India, you should avoid talking about a private matter, poverty, military spending and a lot of foreign aid. In India, even at a friend’s house, you cannot commend children which many Indians believe will cause the wicked attention.
In Iran, it is taboo to talk about baby’s eyes to which Iranians are sensitive.
B. Hostility（Social hostilities to religion）
1. Social restrictions on Christians and their faith:
(From:http://www.pewforum.org/files/2015/02/Restrictions2015_SHI.pdf)
2. People’s attitude towards Chinese in each country:
In Pakistan, because a large number of Chinese have given assistance to Pakistan, most of the Pakistanis from the leadership to the people like the Chinese people.
For Israel, since China had preserved a large number of Jews during World War II, no matter how the Chinese government criticized Israel, Israelis still like Chinese people.
C. Physical world:
Security concerns in the physical world are as follows:
1. Social Security
Social order refers to the way in which a society is organized along with certain rules and standards that are set forth in order to maintain that organization. Within social sciences, social order refers to a set of connected social structures, practices and institutions that maintain and set methods for relating and behaving.
Brief introduction of social security in several countries as follows:
The security situation in Pakistan is very serious, especially in the North West Frontier Province, the tribal areas and Baluchistan which borders Afghanistan, sectarian conflicts and terrorist attacks often have occurred. In recent years, terrorist attacks have occurred against the Chinese people. Chinese people in Pakistan must strengthen security awareness and avoid unsafe regional tourism and business.
In Cambodia, the country’s political situation is generally stable. Social security situation is poor, robbery and theft cases often have happened.
In Indian, half of women did not dare to take the bus. Results of a survey recently released by the Indian government in New Delhi revealed that 80% of women in India felt insecure when shopping in the business district and 70% of women did not dare go out at night.
Foreign women living in Egypt may be the greatest impact on the population affected by sexual harassment. In the respondents of foreign women, 98% of people expressed that they had suffered sexual harassment, more than 52% of people claimed to encounter this case every day.
2. Traffic safety:
Traffic safety refers to driving, walking safely according to traffic regulations and avoiding being killed or seriously injured. However, the traffic rules are different in each country. So, it is crucial important to know the local traffic rules for us to live in a certain country.
For example:
Left-driving countries: Bangladesh, Bhutan, Brunei, India, Indonesia, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, etc.
Right-driving countries: Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Laos, Myanmar, Saudi Arabia, Vietnam, Yemen, etc.
In Pakistan, there is special part for women in the front of the bus.
3. Dangerous sports.
Because our body is the temple of God, we need to keep ourselves away from being damaged, lest we are tempted by the enemy. Therefore, we need to avoid some dangerous sports during our daily life so that our body can be preserved.
Some of the more dangerous sports such as:
Free climbing, bungee jumping, low-altitude parachuting, mountain climbing，Skateboarding. Others items in the amusement parks, such as the pirate ship, roller coaster, Ferris wheel.
All things are lawful to us, but not all things are profitable. Before we do everything, we need to let the peace of Christ arbitrate in our hearts,
4. Concerning the extent of our participation in the activities held by local Chinese:
Generally overseas Chinese societies may hold some activities in corresponding countries, such as gathering the townsmen, celebrating Chinese traditional festivals, etc. As for this kind of activities, whether we can participate or not, or to which extent we can participate, we need much more prayer and let the peace of Christ arbitrate in our hearts.
One point we need to know is that for a person living abroad, the diplomatic representatives of his own country are his genuine friends. When he suffers harm or his interests are adversely affected by host country government or government agencies’ behavior or some personal behavior, the ones he can ask help are just the diplomatic envoys. Therefore, diplomatic representatives have the full authority to ask the government of the recipient country to take adequate measures to protect the lives and property of their citizens in riots and civil unrests.
5. Medical treatment and health condition
Many Asian countries are not so developed, and the medical treatment and public health condition is just so-so. Therefore, we need to know some related information and prepare properly before we go there.
For example: The water condition is dangerous in about 80% Asian countries. More than 60% families in Asia cannot get healthy drinking water from water taps in their home. Especially in South Asia, this problem is very common in over 90% poor stratum. Water condition is so bad in India and Bangladesh which are located in south Asia that most people may suffer from stomach problems after living there for some time. For this, we should prepare properly even bring some necessary medicine.
D. Networks and social media:
1. Definition:
Network and social media is the medium used to spread the information through the Internet, mainly refer to the tools, channels and carriers used by man to transmit and get information.
We cannot avoid using certain social media to keep in touch with other brothers and sisters. Therefore, to make sure the safety of our personal information in this network age is very closely linked with our service.
2. The following websites can help you to know the category of some frequently-used social medias and relevant security coefficient.
http://www.pc6.com/infoview/Article_48333.html
http://www.liusuping.com/it-tech/im-jilu-anquan.html
Some suggestion:
To contact each other between home and abroad: WeChat
To contact each other among the overseas countries: Google and Line.
Within some countries where network is tightly supervised: Speak dialect on Skype.
3. Matters needing attention:
To make sure the safety of the church which we are in and the safety of ourselves, it’s better to use some network language which only we can understand and avoid some spiritual words and sensitive words.
III. “Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves. Be therefore prudent as serpents and guileless as doves. And beware of men…” (Matt. 10:16-17 ).
