The persecution of Christians in Nigeria has been in the headlines in recent months, with some secular critics casting doubt on the scale of the problem.
Religious freedom agency Open Doors recently published a report to help Christians understand what's really going on in the West African nation.
Open Doors says that several Islamist militant groups have built up a major presence in Nigeria, particularly in the Muslim-majority north of the country.
These groups have unleashed waves of violence across the area, with thousands killed every year and millions driven from their homes.
But the violence is regional, with most of the attacks taking place in the northern parts of Nigeria.
Many Christians living in the south – particularly in places like Lagos, the most populous city in sub-Saharan Africa – don't face daily violence for their faith in Jesus.
However, with increasing frequency, violence has begun to spill into some of the southern, Christian-majority states.
A tangle of different factors are at play in Nigeria. A significant factor is power and control. The extremists all want control, to rule over the land and the people who live there.
Another factor is poverty: if you have nothing, you are susceptible to radicalisation by Islamist groups.
The Fulani people, who are mostly nomadic herders, face a scarcity of resources, which has driven herding groups further south in search of fertile land for their cattle. But Christians own most of the farming land.
However, elements of the Fulani tribe have been radicalised with violent Islamist ideology that justifies subjugating Christians as infidels. This creates an environment where religion is a key component of the violence.
The claim that Christians are being specifically targeted is hotly contested, not least by the Nigerian government. Many secular journalists have been quick to accept the Nigerian government's claims of the violence being non-religious. However, the statistics show a clear pattern.
According to the Observatory for Religious Freedom in Africa, which has painstakingly collected data on civilian violence and deaths in the region, the trends show that more Christians are killed by the extremists than Muslims, given the relative population size of Muslims and Christians in northern states.
In fact, if you are a Christian, you are 6.5 times more likely to be killed than a Muslim and 5.1 times more likely to be abducted. This does not make the suffering of a Muslim less tragic; it just makes it less likely.
