{"id":4705,"date":"2023-11-09T08:07:04","date_gmt":"2023-11-09T08:07:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.persecution.com\/stories\/bombed-church-blamed-for-explosion\/"},"modified":"2023-11-09T08:07:04","modified_gmt":"2023-11-09T08:07:04","slug":"bombed-church-blamed-for-explosion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.persecution.com\/stories\/bombed-church-blamed-for-explosion\/","title":{"rendered":"Bombed Church Blamed for Explosion"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>On Sunday, Jan. 15, 2023, hundreds of Christians gathered at a church in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to end a weeklong series of prayer meetings. The gathering was so large that chairs and tarps were placed outside to provide overflow seating. Those in attendance did not know that radical Islamic group ADF (Allied Democratic Forces) had buried a bomb in the outdoor seating area. Just after a children&rsquo;s choir finished performing, the bomb exploded, killing 15 people and seriously injuring roughly 70 more. &ldquo;Now some people are saying that we planted the bomb!&rdquo; said one assistant pastor, explaining, &ldquo;Those people think we are trying to gain sympathy and funding.&rdquo; The pastor asked that Christians pray for those who are grieving and struggling to recover from their injuries. He also asked for prayers that the church will be vindicated, that Christ will be glorified and that peace will come to the DRC.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.persecution.com\/globalprayerguide\/drc\/\">Click here<\/a> to find out about Christian persecution in Congo, Democratic Republic of the and learn how to pray.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.icommittopray.com\/request\/2586\/christians-in-drc\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Post a prayer for Christians in DRC on iCommitToPray.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On Sunday, Jan. 15, 2023, hundreds of Christians gathered at a church in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to end a weeklong series of prayer meetings. The gathering was so large that chairs and tarps were placed outside to provide overflow seating. Those in attendance did not know that radical Islamic group ADF (Allied Democratic Forces) had buried a bomb in the outdoor seating area. Just after a children&#8217;s choir finished performing, the bomb exploded, killing 15 people and seriously injuring roughly 70 more. &#8220;Now some people are saying that we planted the bomb!&#8221; said one assistant pastor, explaining, &#8220;Those people think we are trying to gain sympathy and funding.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":181,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4705","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-i-commit-to-pray","","tg-column-two"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Bombed Church Blamed for Explosion - Stories<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.persecution.com\/stories\/bombed-church-blamed-for-explosion\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Bombed Church Blamed for Explosion - Stories\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"On Sunday, Jan. 15, 2023, hundreds of Christians gathered at a church in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to end a weeklong series of prayer meetings. The gathering was so large that chairs and tarps were placed outside to provide overflow seating. Those in attendance did not know that radical Islamic group ADF (Allied Democratic Forces) had buried a bomb in the outdoor seating area. Just after a children&#039;s choir finished performing, the bomb exploded, killing 15 people and seriously injuring roughly 70 more. &quot;Now some people are saying that we planted the bomb!&quot; said one assistant pastor, explaining, &quot;Those people think we are trying to gain sympathy and funding.&quot;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.persecution.com\/stories\/bombed-church-blamed-for-explosion\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Stories\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2023-11-09T08:07:04+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"vomtechsupport\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"vomtechsupport\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.persecution.com\/stories\/bombed-church-blamed-for-explosion\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.persecution.com\/stories\/bombed-church-blamed-for-explosion\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"vomtechsupport\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.persecution.com\/stories\/#\/schema\/person\/5ff286fd5505fccd2d5ebfd9d4203216\"},\"headline\":\"Bombed Church Blamed for Explosion\",\"datePublished\":\"2023-11-09T08:07:04+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.persecution.com\/stories\/bombed-church-blamed-for-explosion\/\"},\"wordCount\":191,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.persecution.com\/stories\/bombed-church-blamed-for-explosion\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/assets.persecution.com\/stories\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/VOM-Stories-iCommit-PlaceholderV2.jpg\",\"articleSection\":[\"iCommitToPray\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.persecution.com\/stories\/bombed-church-blamed-for-explosion\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.persecution.com\/stories\/bombed-church-blamed-for-explosion\/\",\"name\":\"Bombed Church Blamed for Explosion - 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