The released American pastor says he is one of the most hated men in Turkey & # 039;
The released American pastor says he is one of the most hated men in Turkey & # 039;
Pastor Andrew Brunson, the American who was arrested in Turkey for two years before his release over the weekend, he said he is "one of the most hated men" in the country where he lived and worked for more than 20 years because of the Turkish government's accusation that he had spied on and was linked to terrorism.
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"Right now, he's probably one of the most hated men in Turkey," Brunson told ABC News boss George Stephanopoulos on Tuesday on "Good Morning America."
Brunson, 50, was a Christian evangelist in Turkey for more than 20 years before being arrested in October 2016 and accused by the Turkish government of espionage and links to terrorist groups. He, his lawyers and the United States deny those charges.
"Our purpose in going to Turkey was to tell people about Jesus Christ, we did it very openly, and we never got involved in anything political," Brunson told Stephanopoulos. He said he and his wife were surprised by his initial arrest, which occurred on his eldest son's birthday.
Prior to his release over the weekend, the Brunson case had created a profound break in relations between the United States and Turkey, with the Trump government strongly committed to securing his freedom and punishing his NATO ally with economic sanctions for not doing it. An evangelical Christian pastor, it had also become a battle cry for defenders of religious freedom in the United States.
The Turkish court sentenced him on Friday to three and a half and a half years, but given his time served and that was his first arrest, his house arrest and the travel ban were lifted. He left the country that Friday on a US military plane and stopped in Germany to perform a medical evacuation before landing in Washington on Saturday. There he met with President Trump in a welcome celebration of the Oval Office, where he prayed with the president.
"My wife and I prayed for every president, and we never had the opportunity to do it in the Oval Office," he said with a smile.
For Brunson, that emotional moment was also how he survived his time in prison: "The way I survived was simply to spend hours in prayer, just to maintain my sanity."
He was initially held in solitary confinement and later with 19 other prisoners in a cell with capacity for only eight, he said. Isolated by language, culture and religion, he said he was increasingly concerned about his physical safety, given the accusations against him.
Still, the whole experience may have yielded something good, he said.
"Although this caused us a lot of pain, I think God is using this, I was planning to use this to bring blessings to Turkey, now there are millions of people praying for Turkey," he said.
After 23 years in the country, "working ... in the dark", he said that he and his family still love Turkey.
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SOURCE LINK ERESVIRAL.COM https://www.beviral.online
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