Political Quotes

“Thank you, Congressman Fortenberry. Mr. Speaker, a couple of things. First, I associate myself with the remarks made by my colleagues. I think that there is a concern regarding our religious freedoms here in the United States. But for just a moment, I want to draw the attention of those watching and the Speaker to an issue of Pastor Saeed Abedini. He is an American, originally from Iran, who is now incarcerated for 8 years--this is his sentence in Iran--for crimes, as they defined it, that happened 13 years ago. This is a question of religious freedom which involves an American citizen who happens now to be abroad. Pastor Abedini is 33 years old, was born in Iran, and there converted from Islam to Christianity. Here, that would not be a big deal because we have religious freedom. Theoretically, so does Iran. In his early twenties, he helped start house churches. It was legal to do so. At some point, he moved to the United States and married his wife, who I gather her family also is originally from Iran. They have two children and they live in Idaho. He went back to Iran to work on a nonsectarian orphanage. He was arrested by the state police and incarcerated, at first they said for activities disruptive to the state. Now they apparently are attributing it to his work in house churches around the year 2000. But he has been incarcerated in prison and is tortured. He's been taken to the hospital on a couple of occasions.…”