Hovsepian was born in 1945 in Tehran, Iran into an Armenian Apostolic middle-class family. He had three younger brothers: Edward, Roubik and George. When he was 15, he joined the PentecostalAssemblies of God. In 1966, upon completion of his mandatory military service, Haik married Takoosh Ginagosian. In 1967, he pastored his first church in Majidieh, a suburb of the capital Tehran. Not long afterwards, he served in the military and was stationed in Gorgan, a city in Mazanderan, a northern province of Iran near the Caspian Sea, where he established a house church. In 1969 Hovsepian, his wife and their six-month-old child were driving from Tehran to Gorgan with an American missionary family, when their car struck an unlit tractor-trailer. The four children aboard were killed. The adult passengers survived, but Hovsepian and Takoosh suffered broken legs, from which they recovered.
Christian ministry
They returned to Gorgan, where they served in church pastoral work despite hardship and persecution. Hovsepian had a strong motivation to evangelise Iranian Muslims. He was an outspoken Christian apologist, evangelist and a gifted musician. He was responsible for initiating increased collaboration between evangelical churches within Iran after the Iranian Revolution. He became the Chairman of the Council of Protestant Ministers of Iran. Hovsepian spoke up for the rights of Christians in Iran. In 1993 he was one of only two church leaders to refuse to sign a declaration stating that they would not allow Muslims or Muslim converts into their churches. He also refused to sign a statement that Christians enjoyed full rights in Iran. He compiled a detailed report on violations of religious freedom and invited Professor Reynaldo Galindo Pohl, the United NationsSpecial Representative to Iran, to visit the country and meet Protestant ministers and government officials to discuss these violations. He also met the Ministry for Islamic Guidance for Minorities to call for the government to respect the rights of religious minorities set out in the 1979 Constitution. Bishop Hovsepian and the denomination he represented, the Assemblies of God, were ordered to comply with the following directives:
Church members must be issued membership cards and produce them upon attendance;
Membership lists, complete with addresses, must be handed over to governmental authorities;
Meetings must be confined to Sunday, not Friday the officially recognized day of Muslim worship;
Only members could attend Sunday meetings; and
New members could only be added to the membership and admitted to meetings once the Ministry of Information and Islamic Guidance had been notified.
Haik deliberately disobeyed and defiantly declared that "Never would bow down and comply with such inhumane and unjust demands" and that "our churches are open to all who want to come in." He was killed after protesting about the treatment of his friend and colleague Mehdi Dibaj at the hands of the Iranian government. Hovsepian mounted a campaign for Dibaj, and on January 16, 1994, Dibaj was released. Three days later Hovsepian vanished from Tehran. His death was reported to his family on January 30, 1994. While the government initially denied all involvement, Iranian Christians and independent observers claimed that he was murdered for his beliefs.
Arresting two suspects
In July 5 of 1994, a few days after 1994 Imam Reza shrine bomb explosion, and months after Hovsepian Mehr's murder two women who were allegedly from People's Mujahedin of Iran and were going to bomb Mausoleum of Ruhollah Khomeini and Fatima Masumeh Shrine were arrested. In a TV interview, one of them related Hovsepian Mehr's murder to People's Mujahedin of Iran. Abdelfattah Amor, United Nations Special Rapporteur on the question of religious intolerance made a visit to Iran in 1995 where he was able to speak freely in Evin prison with the women charged with murder of Hovsepian Mehr and two other Christian leaders. Amor concluded in his UN report that the Iranian Government had apparently decided to execute Bishop Hovsepian Mehr and two other Christian leaders in order not only to disrepute the Mujahedin organization by declaring it responsible for those crimes, but also, to decapitate the Protestant community.
Legacy
Takoosh and her four children eventually migrated to California, to be surrounded by a large diaspora of Armenians and Persians, including family members and friends from Tehran. Takoosh and her children are frequently asked to speak at conferences, and their children are in different Christian ministries. Haik's brothers, who work as pastors, are also ministering outside Iran.
