The persecution of Christians in Canada is accelerating, as authorities in Calgary, Alberta, in a dramatic highway takedown, have arrested a second pastor for defying COVID restrictions by opening his church.
Polish-Canadian Pastor Artur Pawlowski, and brother Dawid Pawlowski, were apprehended by a swarm of masked police on a busy highway on Saturday after he refused to comply with a government order to keep his services at reduced capacity and enforce social distancing and mask- wearing. Pawlowski reportedly held church services as usual on Saturday, ignoring threats of arrest if he flouted government rules, when he was pulled over on the freeway, surrounded by five police vehicles.
Rebel News reporter Ezra Levant tweeted that Pawlowski is “charged with ‘inciting’ people to go to church.”
Prior to the pastor’s aggressive arrest — it appears he refused to get up and walk, so the police dragged him by his arms across the asphalt, as if he were a terrorist or a mass murderer — parishioners of Street Church allegedly expelled the police from the sanctuary during services, expecting them to “return in full force.” Rebel News’ Adam Soos posted a video of the incident on Twitter (see below).
Pawlowski is the second Christian pastor to be imprisoned in Alberta, once considered the “freest” province in Canada, wrote Soos. The first was Pastor James Coates, of GraceLife Church in Spruce Grove, near Edmonton. Coates, unlike Pawlowski, turned himself in to authorities and spent 35 days in a maximum-security jail after he refused to comply with a health order issued by Alberta Health Services (AHS), requiring him to turn away parishioners and maintain the required reduced church capacity. Coates’s trial began on May 3.
According to the news site ChurchLeaders, “Up to 1,000 people are permitted to listen to the trial online, but there will be no video streaming of the proceedings. One of the likely reasons why is that the public health prosecutor was granted permission not to reveal her identity after she expressed concerns about security.”
Soos, breaking the news of Pawlowski’s arrest, exclaimed, “This is something they do in Communist China, and it’s happened twice here in Canada…. Wal-Mart and Costco are open across Canada, so are liquor stores and marijuana stores. But a Christian pastor cannot open his doors without a massive police raid.”
Pawlowski, who escaped Communist Poland, has been very outspoken in his warnings against “encroaching Communism” in the West, as governments tighten their grips on communities in the name of health and safety. He has openly protested against Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s authoritarian government, holding weekly Gospel readings on the steps of Calgary’s City Hall, as he stands bravely for the liberty to worship freely.
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