Afghanistan
·
Please pray God
will bring healing and peace to Sahar Gul who was sold into marriage when she
was 12 years old then allegedly tortured by her in-laws to the point where she
couldn’t walk. Sahar was starved, chained up in a basement bathroom, beaten,
burned with hot metal pipes, and had her fingernails pulled out.
·
Pray for Sahar’s
safety now that her mother-in-law, father-in-law, and sister-in-law have been
released by Afghan judges saying there wasn’t any proof of abuse. Pray for
justice for this young woman who wasn’t notified of the hearing to set aside
the conviction against these three relatives or of their release. http://tinyurl.com/mpqdfjo
·
Pray for the
girls and women of Afghanistan who are forced or sold into marriage, married
off when they are still underage, and/or abused by relatives or in-laws.
·
Please pray the
proposed changes to Afghanistan’s criminal prosecution code—one that would
prevent family members from testifying against each other—will not succeed in
parliament. If it passes, abused girls and women will have no legal protection
against violence since relatives are most often the abusers.
·
Pray for the
protection and safety of Afghanistan’s women and girls. Pray those who make and
uphold the laws of this country will work to protect the girls and women of
Afghanistan instead of further harming them.
Burma
·
Give thanks to
God for the recent release of 42 children and young adults who had been
recruited into the Burma Army as child soldiers. Pray the government of Burma
will continue to honor a United Nations agreement they signed in June to end
the practice of recruiting and using child soldiers. http://tinyurl.com/m6tfmjv
·
Pray all children
will be released from the Burma Army as well as from seven ethnic armed groups
in the north and east of the country. Human rights groups estimate there are
approximately 5,000 children who have been recruited into the Burma Army. No
numbers are available on those recruited into rebel groups.
·
Pray for all
children who are taken away from their families, friends, schools, and
communities and forced to fight in armies or militias.
Colombia
·
Please keep in
prayer the children of Colombia’s rural communities who are at great risk of
being injured or killed by landmines. Colombia has one of the highest landmine
casualty rates in the world because of the 50-year conflict between the
Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) rebel group and the government.
·
Pray for children
who have been wounded by landmines or unexploded ordnance. Of the 10,413
Colombians injured or killed by landmines since 1990, 1,019 were children. http://tinyurl.com/ns2xuja
·
Pray for
ceasefire agreements between the Colombian government and FARC. Pray the two
sides will achieve a lasting peace and work to remove landmines near schools
and communal areas. Because of the vast number of landmines planted by FARC, it
may take more than a decade to clear all of the improvised explosive devices
(IEDs) and landmines in Colombia’s rural areas.
Egypt
·
Please keep close
in prayer the children and people of Egypt during a season of political unrest
and violence following the July 3, 2013 overthrow of President Mohamed Mursi
and the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party. http://tinyurl.com/lellshe http://tinyurl.com/nmylte2 http://tinyurl.com/mep6jqo
·
Pray for those
who have lost loved ones in the violence between pro-Mursi supporters and the
Egyptian military. An estimated 300 people have been killed and hundreds
wounded during the weeks following Mursi’s overthrow.
·
Please
pray for a peaceful resolution to this political struggle as mass rallies of
hundreds of thousands of people, both for and against Mursi, continue in Cairo.
Faces of Children
·
Please keep Faces
of Children prayer partner Kathleen Davies and her family held close in prayer
following the death of her grandmother, Peggy Armstrong.
·
Pray for Faces of
Children intercessor Rachal Eriksen and her family as they grieve the death of
Rachal’s mother Mignon Pearson.
·
Please pray for
Faces of Children prayer partner Carol O’Briant and her husband Jim as he
recovers from a stroke. Pray for healing and comfort during this difficult
season.
