Christianity Daily featured this summer’s conference in an article published last week titled, “How Can Christians Participate in Combating Persecution in North Korea? Conference Aims to Weigh In.” The article highlights The Bridge’s overall purpose and why this year’s conference is focused on North Korea. Read an excerpt below:

How Can Christians Participate in Combating Persecution in North Korea? Conference Aims to Weigh In

By Christianity Daily/Rachael Lee

For the second time, International Christian Concern (ICC) will be hosting its annual conference spotlighting a specific region in which Christians are facing severe persecution. This year’s conference, which is taking place from June 2 to 3 at Saddleback Church, will focus on North Korea.

The conference, called The Bridge, will feature leaders of churches, non-profit organizations, and government agencies.

Among those invited to speak include Rick Warren, founder and pastor of Saddleback Church; Florida Senator Marco Rubio; Suzanne Scholte, president of the Defense Forum Foundation; David Curry, CEO of Open Doors USA; Mervyn Thomas, CEO of Christian Solidarity Worldwide; North Korean defector and TED Talks speaker Joseph Kim; and North Korean defector and author Hyeonseo Lee, among others.

International Christian Concern
(Photo : Courtesy of International Christian Concern)
International Christian Concern will be hosting its second annual ‘The Bridge’ Conference in Southern California. This photo was taken in last year’s conference, which highlighted the persecution faced by the church in the Middle East.
International Christian Concern, which has done work aiding, advocating for, and spreading awareness of the persecuted Christians around the world for some 20 years, decided to begin hosting these annual conferences called The Bridge with hopes that there would be greater collaboration between the various influencers in addressing the problem of persecution, including those working on the field, churches, government agencies, and non-profit organizations, according to ICC’s president Jeff King.

Though each group plays a crucial role in providing the resources that the persecuted church needs, King said, even more could be done if those groups could work together.

North Korea in particular is a nation in which Christians are severely persecuted to the point that “it falls into a different category and people just forget about it because it seems so unfixable, so beyond what anyone can do,” according to King.

Yet King expressed hopes for the future of the Korean peninsula.

Read the article in its entirety here and register today for The Bridge!