The Iranian government and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) are taking steps to seize St. Peter Evangelical Church in Tehran — the oldest Protestant church in Iran — while demanding that families living on the historic property vacate at once. Church leaders say this is part of a broader crackdown against Iran’s evangelical Christian community.
According to church officials, armed intelligence agents and regime representatives showed up and threatened church leaders with jail time, ordering the 20 low-income Christian families residing on the compound to leave immediately.
Church leaders say the property is being taken through EIKO — the Execution of Imam Khomeini’s Order — and re-registered through the Islamic Revolutionary Court in a process designed to strip the church of its legal standing.
St. Peter Evangelical Church was founded in 1872 by American Presbyterian missionaries and has served Tehran’s Protestant community for nearly 150 years. Known locally as the Qavam church due to its location on Si-e-Tir Street — formerly called Qavam-ol-Saltaneh Street — the church sits on a city-block-sized compound in the heart of downtown Tehran.
In a formal letter signed by the Executive Secretary of the Synod of the Evangelical Church of Iran in Diaspora, church leaders described their “severe distress” over the situation and accused Iranian authorities of growing bolder since negotiations toward a possible US-Iran agreement got underway.
“The regime is no longer afraid of the international community,” the letter states.
Officials say authorities have already taken a 10,000-square-meter garden belonging to the church, which is now occupied by four IRGC officials. A new property deed has reportedly been issued in the IRGC’s name, leaving church employees and members legally classified as trespassers on land the church has historically owned.
Iranian authorities have countered that the church had improperly rented portions of the property to its members.
Church leaders connected this latest action to the destruction of the Evangelical Church of Mashhad on June 4, describing both incidents as part of a growing pattern of pressure on Iran’s Protestant community.
“It is clear that without a swift response to this crisis, we may be deprived of our last remaining church centres in the country,” the synod’s letter warned. The letter called on the international community to step in and stop “the ongoing process of expelling Christians from their places of worship and the occupation and destruction of these properties.”
Human rights advocates and the Anti-Defamation League’s Task Force on Middle East Minorities said they are documenting the property seizures as illegal evictions and serious violations of religious freedom.
