A Seventh-day Adventist has died after arsonists destroyed her house during an attack on the village of Baine, Solomon Islands, in December.
A Seventh-day Adventist has died after arsonists destroyed her house during an attack on the village of Baine, Solomon Islands, in December.
Some 200 people doused buildings in Baine with fuel and set them on fire in the early hours of Dec. 22. The town is the headquarters for the Adventist Church in the region.
“It seems the purpose of the attack was to destroy the permanent buildings and not to hurt the villagers,” says John Turner, treasurer for the church in the Western Solomon Islands.
Among the 20 buildings destroyed were the houses of two church members, the Adventist district director, two Adventist teachers, and a shop and a service station owned by two Adventists.
The same group also destroyed eight houses in the village of Mase the next day.
Bruce Roberts, president of the church’s Trans-Pacific region, believes the attacks could be revenge for crimes committed eight months earlier by former members from the villages. “The arsonists call themselves the Christian Missionary Church,” he says. “They seem to have created a religious mix of Christianity and tribal values.”
Roberts is asking church members to pray for victims of the attacks. “They are isolated, they are devastated and they need our support,” he says.
Nearly 14,000 Adventists live in the Western Solomon Islands.