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Time and again, through the course of our work, we’ve met children who are suffering because of their faith. This suffering often goes unseen, and these young people pay a very high price: with their education and their future.

This is a huge and under-reported issue. And it goes to the very root of discrimination in certain countries. As our partner in Pakistan, Michelle Chaudhry, said, “Education is our best hope for tackling fundamentalism.”

That’s why CSW is launching a bold new initiative in 2018. Together we want to ensure that all children have the same opportunities in life. That every child, whatever they or their family believe, can have both faith and a future.

With this campaign we’re trying something new, and of course whenever you do that, you never quite know how it’ll go. That’s why I’m asking for your blessings and prayers on our plans, that together we can impact the lives of thousands of children.

In some Mexican communities, children from minority religion families are barred from school as a way of coercing their parents to join the majority faith. Today, please pray that these children would be allowed to resume their education.

At school, you assume you’re going to learn facts: but in Pakistan, that isn’t always the case. Children are taught using a biased curriculum that actively disparages other faiths and emphasises the importance of Islam, even in non-religious subjects like science. This is unacceptable: pray that the curriculum would be reformed so that it promotes tolerance, understanding and celebrates the contribution of all religious groups.

Another issue in Pakistan is the abduction and forced marriage of young girls and women from Christian and Hindu families. Girls and women are kidnapped as they go about daily life. They are married against their will to men they don’t know and forcibly converted to Islam – they even have to change their names and are prevented from seeing their families. Please pray that these girls and women are able to return home to their families and for this terrible practice to end.

In China, the children of human rights defenders are unfairly punished at school as a way of putting pressure on their parents. When she visited the UK last year, Grace Gao spoke vividly of being beaten at school because of the work of her father, human rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng. Pray protection over all children facing the same experiences: no child should be punished for the work of their parents.

It’s a similar story in Cuba, where in some schools pupils and teachers bully and punish children of pastors who are being targeted by the government. It often gets so bad that they stop going to school altogether. Pray that God would protect these children too, and allow them to be safe and happy at school.

When we visited Nehemiah Camp, a camp for people displaced by violence in Nigeria, we saw many children, from babies to teenagers, who had been forced to flee their homes due to attacks by militia from the Fulani tribe. A few are able to attend local schools, but the majority can’t due to lack of fees or insufficient school places. They are also traumatised, having witnessed violence and lost fathers, close relatives and friends. Please pray for comfort, healing and provision.

Lord, you are the one who asked for children to be brought to you when you were teaching. You loved them, and made time for them, and watch over them even now. We bring to you all the children who are suffering because of the faith of their parents, those who are beaten and isolated, and whose future is taken away. You know that every child deserves faith and a future: we humbly beg you for that today. Amen.