Mexico (MNN) — Mexico’s constitution guarantees religious freedom. But evangelical Christians don’t always see it lived out.
Persecution happens on a community level. An article from WORLD in June 2024 reported on Christians north of Mexico City who were driven out of their homes for not participating in local religious rituals.
Persecution also happens on a government level, as Alejandro and Nayeli Vieyra know. The Vieyras serve with Radio Encuentro Internacional (in English, Radio Encounter), a partner of Trans World Radio in Mexico.
When it began several years ago, Radio Encounter’s network of broadcasters openly shared their faith in Christ and invited listeners to go to church.
(Photo courtesy of Rahib Yaqubov/Pexels)
The programs were incredibly popular. But some people weren’t happy with what they heard, as the Vieyras soon realized.
Speaking through a translator, Nayeli says, “The government found out that behind the airings were Christian believers and that we’re encouraging the listeners to have a better life, a different point of view of life.”
Alejandro added. “They found out because on air we were carrying things about God. They saw that the radio was very popular and that it wasn’t Catholic churches that were airing the programs. So that caught their attention.”
A series of letters from the government soon came their way. An investigation began in 2021. In 2024, the government revoked four of their licenses in specific locations across Mexico.
“It is because there is a close relationship between the Catholic Church and the government,” says Alejandro. “The Catholic Churches can have radio stations, but [not] the evangelicals.”
(Logo courtesy of Trans World Radio)
Despite these challenges, the Vieyras knows the programs their network of local broadcasters send out have reached many. Prison inmates gather in small groups to study Scripture together alongside one program called “Through the Bible.” Children have received Christ as a result of the gospel programming too.
This is a deeply fruitful ministry, and the Vieyras ask for your prayers. It’s a delicate situation between people who follow indigenous religions, the Catholic Church, and evangelical Christians. (More on that here.) Ask the Lord to bring about a change.
“Pray that God [softens] the hearts of the Catholics to understand that by law there is [religious] freedom in Mexico,” says Nayeli.
“Pray for us to find a strategy to be able to share our faith in a way that doesn’t brings any problem that can lead to [revoking of] our licenses in other places.
“We are seeing that God [closes] some doors, but He opens another [one] that allows us to keep sharing the gospel with many people in Mexico.”
Learn more about Radio Encounter.
Header photo of radio towers in Catazajá, Chis., Mexico is a representative stock photo courtesy of Jose G. Ortega Castro / Unsplash.
