(Bonn, December 12, 2006) The South African based German theologian Christof Sauer has been appointed co-director of the International Institute for Religious Freedom (IIRF) of the World Evangelical Alliance (Bonn, Cape Town, Singapore). The chairperson of the institute’s Council, Rev Dr Paul C Murdoch announced that Dr Sauer will mainly focus on the supervision of academic programmes and the compilation of an international bibliography.
The IIRF is a global network of researchers and experts which is working towards the establishment of reliable facts on the restriction of religious freedom and for the introduction of the subject in academic research and theological curricula. In addition to upcoming projects it will attempt to produce reliable scholarly estimates of the annual numbers of Christian martyrs. The academic board consists of a representative each of the World Evangelical Alliances, the European Evangelical Alliance, of the German and Austrian Evangelical Alliances, as well as of the International Lausanne Movement. A Singapore based advocate provides legal counsel. Prof Dr Thomas Schirrmacher is the director of the institute.
Rev Dr Christof Sauer, Cape Town, supervises doctoral students in missiology at the University of South Africa in Pretoria and is the Academic Liaison Officer of the German based Network for Education and Research in Europe (GBFE). Before that he directed a research centre on Islam in Cape Town. Sauer is an ordained pastor of the Württemberg Evangelical Lutheran Synod (national protestant Church) in Germany and serves as a missionary of the United German Mission Aid (VDM), Bassum, Germany. His research focuses on persecution and martyrdom of Christians in theological perspective, particularly that of African and Asian theologians.
Downloads
- Portrait of C Sauer (jpg)
- letterhead of the IIRF for a list of the main persons collaborating in the IIRF (pdf)