Hungary is forming a new government department to assist persecuted Christians around the world, it has been reported.
Prime Minister Viktor Orbán decided to establish the new department after meeting with Pope Francis and Middle Eastern patriarchs in Rome at the end of August, and the government has kicked the department off with a 3 million Euro grant.
Eduard von Habsburg, Hungary's ambassador to the Holy See, said that Hungary has already been working to help persecuted Christians and that "[t]his is the prolongation of a policy that's been in place for a long time."
The Hungarian government has helped Christians and other minorities in danger to get visas and helped in building a Christian school in Erbil, Iraq, last month, writes churchmilitant.com today.
Habsburg commented that the Hungarian government "follows the philosophy that the best way to give them a chance is to help them to stay at home, in their countries and to find help there ... to help them have the chance of receiving help on the spot."
He also remarked, "Somehow the idea of defending Christians has acquired a bad taste in Europe, as if it means excluding other people," but, according to him, that's not true. Hungary's new initiative is meant to set an example for other nations to help Christians.
The prime minister is one of the few European leaders to take a proactive stand to help Christians and to resist uncontrolled immigration from the Middle East, widely seen as a means to spread Islam and terrorism in Europe.
PM Orbán made a speech in March in which he said that mass migration "is masquerading as a humanitarian cause, but its true nature is the occupation of territory. And what is gaining territory for them is losing territory for us."
He added that "those who have come here with the intention of changing our country, shaping our nation in their own image, those who have come with violence and against our will, have always been met with resistance."