Four Iraqi Christian children were beheaded by Islamic State terrorists after refusing to renounce the name of Jesus Christ and convert to Islam.
In an interview last week with the Christian Broadcast Network published on the Orthodox Christian Network, Canon Andrew White, an Anglican priest known as "Vicar of Baghdad," revealed in sobering detail the plight of Christians in Iraq and they violence they are suffering at the hands of ISIS militants.
White recounted how ISIS militants beheaded four children, all of whom were under the age of 15, when they refused to say that they would follow the Prophet Muhammad and told the ISIS fighters that they will always "love" and "follow" Jesus.
"How do you respond to that?" White asked. "You just cry. They are my children. That is what we have been going through. That is what we are going through."
Related: Chaldean Christian leader: ISIS 'Systematically Beheading' Children in Iraq
The priest also recounted another incident in which a Christian man was forced by ISIS to say the Islamic words of conversion, or else all of his children were going to be beheaded. Fearing for his children's lives, the mans sucumbed to terrorist's' demands.
Shortly after, the man called White to ask if Jesus still loved him even though he had said the Islamic words of conversion.
"[Militants] say to one man, an adult, 'you say the words of conversion or we will kill all of your children.' He was desperate. He said the words," White said. "Then he phoned me and said '[Father], I said the words, does that mean Yasua doesn't love me anymore? I have always loved Yasua. I said those words because I couldn't see my children be killed.' I said, 'Jesus still loves you. He will always love you.'"
White fled from Baghdad to Israel after receiving personal death threats from the Islamic State, said that it is "impossible" for Christians to live in Iraq due to the Islamic State's horrific mistreatment of believers.
"It is impossible to describe how it really is. It is so awful..They have threatened to kill me. They are after me. They wanted that Abuna [Father] from England," White said. "So the Archbishop of Canterbury said 'you've got to leave now.'"
He added that over 250,000 Christians have been displaced due to ISIS activity and are now living as refugees in the Kurdish North.
ISIS mistreatment of children and religious minorities has become increasingly brtual, going well beyond forced conversions. According to reports, men and women are mercilessly slaughtered by the militants, and hundreds of children are being either beheaded and their bodies cut in half.
In an interview with CNN earlier this year, Chaldean-American businessman Mark Arabo highlighted the unspeakable acts Sunni extremists are committing against Christians in Iraq.
"There is a park in Mosul, where [ISIS] they actually beheaded children and put their heads on a stick and have them in the park," he explained. "More children are getting beheaded, mothers are getting raped and killed, and fathers are being hung."
ISIS militants are also kidnapping and selling off baby girls as sex slaves; according to a recent pricing guide released by ISIS, Christian and Yazidi girls aged 1-9 are sold into slavery for less than $200 to fund militant activity.
A United Nations report has also revealed that ISIS militants are using children as human shields in battle and also force them to donate blood to wounded ISIS fighters.
"The situation is far too terrible to even explain but it is the children that is the worst thing," White wrote in a recent Facebook status update.
"Lord will you have mercy on your people? I know you will Lord but it so hurts. Who was it who said they would like to go to Jordan at Christmas? We need you."
