Hate crimes against Christians in Europe have drastically increased over one year, according to a report from the Observatory on Intolerance and Discrimination against Christians in Europe (OIDAC Europe).
The report identified 2,444 anti-Christian hate crimes documented across 35 European countries. Of the crimes reported, 232 were personal attacks against Christians.
Last year, the organization documented 793 anti-Christian incidents.
The countries with the greatest numbers of reported Christian hate crimes are France, the United Kingdom, and Germany.
Germany alone had a 105% increase in anti-Christian criminal activity between 2022 and 2023.
“OIDAC Europe has been documenting anti-Christian hate crimes for almost 15 years and has seen a steady increase in the number of incidents,” the report says. “While most documented anti-Christian hate crimes are cases of vandalism, threats, physical attacks and even murder also occur.”
“Of the cases documented by OIDAC Europe, where the motives or background of the perpetrators could be established (69), most attacks had a radical Islamist background (21), followed by anti-religious (14), radical left (13) and other political motives (12), some of which were linked to the war in Ukraine,” the group wrote.
Christians are also likely to face discrimination in the workplace, the report explained, citing a study where Christians said they were bullied, received a lower annual assessment, or were dismissed for sharing their beliefs.
The report went on to detail instances of Christians being debunked, hostility toward Christian politicians, discrimination across various job sectors, and legal issues involving Christians.
In Scotland, a “buffer zone” law designed to protect abortion clinics criminalizes displays of pro-life beliefs from one’s private residence, the report notes. The law “could therefore criminalise conversations in private gardens if they are audible from the street, or the display of any sign perceived as ‘pro-life’ in one’s home if it is visible from the outside,” the group wrote.
Other instances of anti-Christian behavior across Europe, as described in the report, include a statue being removed for violating a 1905 French law on secularism and journalists being told to remove cross necklaces.
In its list of recommendations, OIDAC Europe urged governments to “refrain from adopting ‘non-discrimination’ or ‘hate speech’ legislation that lacks clear definitions and thus significantly limits freedom of expression, association, and religion” and to “confront any undue restrictions on the free exercise of faith.”
