Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe told the story of his friend Pierre Claverie, Bishop of Oran, Algeria, who was killed in 1996.
The King has heard harrowing stories about the persecution of Christians who are traditionally remembered in the run up to Christmas.
Charles joined senior Christian clerics from the UK and Middle East for an Advent service at Westminster Abbey celebrating “light, hope and, above all, the peace of this season” that also reflected on the suffering some experienced for their faith.
The congregation, drawn from churches across the country, heard the testimony of Ribqa Nevash, a young Christian woman who fled Pakistan after suffering discrimination at school and college and for campaigning for women from religious minorities.
In his address, Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe told the story of his friend Pierre Claverie, Bishop of Oran, Algeria, who built bridges with the Muslim community before being assassinated at his residence in the 1990s.
The cardinal told the congregation: “All over the world ploughshares are being beaten into swords, violence is escalating from knife crime to war and today traditionally we remember especially those persecuted for their faith.
“The massive persecution of Christians in so many places, but believers of all faiths are being killed, often by members of other faiths.
“We see again the hideous rise of antisemitism, many of our Jewish brothers and sisters no longer feel safe.”
He described how Bishop Claverie “was hated by extremists because he reached out to Muslims” and was urged to leave Algeria by his friends but said “no one could leave the bedside of a friend” and was “pulverised” along with another man by a blast, detonated when he returned home from a trip in August 1996.
The cardinal added: “When I arrived for the funeral three days later, there was a nun still collecting their remains with a spoon.
“Hundreds of Muslims came to his funeral. At the end, a young woman stood up and said that, although she was a Muslim, he was her bishop too.
“And then there was this murmuring filled the cathedral. I said, ‘what did they say?’ – there were hundreds of Muslims saying ‘he was our bishop, he was our bishop too’.
“And today his tomb is covered with flowers brought by pilgrims, Christian and Muslim. This pointless violence flowered into friendship.”
In a foreword to the official order of service, the King, who is a committed Anglican Christian, said: “It is a great joy to gather with you in the most glorious setting of Westminster Abbey as we celebrate the light, hope and, above all, the peace of this season of Advent.
“This period is one of preparation, of readying ourselves and looking forward to the wonder of Christ’s birth.”
After the service, Charles met senior clerics representing the Greek, Syriac and Coptic churches and other bishops and archbishops and spoke to Mrs Nevash, who is originally from Faisalabad in Pakistan, and was granted asylum in the UK earlier this year.
Mrs Nevash, 25, described how she was able to openly celebrate Christmas after having to hide Christian festivities in Pakistan.
She added: “I need to do a lot of work for all the minorities around the world, to speak for them, I need to raise my voice.”
