The Home Office has issued a warning to churches, claiming they risk undermining the integrity of the asylum system.
Sources said the department has warned Christian churches that they are risking the reputation of the asylum system as a result of their intervention in the asylum system.
Immigration files, published yesterday, revealed that Abdul Ezedi - a convicted sex offender - was granted asylum in Britain after he claimed conversion to Christianity.
His application was backed by a church minister, something that was critical in persuading a judge to allow the application, despite warnings from the Home Office that claimed he was "using religion for his own ends" after he answered questions about Christiainity incorrectly.
The Home Office has issued a warning to churches, claiming they risk undermining the integrity of the asylum system
PA
A Home Office source told the Telegraph that James Cleverly called a meeting with the "vast majority" of Christian churches in the wake of Ezedi's death.
The source said: "We wanted to relay the potential damage to those churches of being seen, rightly or wrongly, as acting against the integrity of our asylum system, where Christian conversion has been brought up at appeal. In this case, the consequences were appalling.
"That reputational risk is only amplified by the fact someone who denied knowledge of Ezedi at the time had in fact known of him within their church, and had supported and vouched for him."
Ezedi, who travelled to the UK illegally in 2016, died while on the run after attacking a mother and her two daughters with a corrosive substance in Clapham in January.
In 2018, he was convicted at Newcastle Crown Court of sexual assault and indecent exposure and was given a 45-week suspended prison sentence and placed on the sex offenders register for 10 years.
On his second attempt to seek asylum in the UK, Ezedi claimed that he had converted to Christianity - which would put his life at risk if he returned home to Afghanistan.
At his third appeal, a priest vouched for his conversion claiming he was "wholly committed" to his new faith.
Tim Loughton, who sits on the Home Affairs Select Committee, told the Telegraph there should be a full investigation into the case.
He said: "The details of this shocking case go to underline the suspicions we have had all along that migrants are playing the Christianity card to game the system in too many cases,” he said.
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“But there is a worrying disconnect here between the Home Office who look at these cases rigorously and decide there is not a credible claim, then on the same evidence tribunals seem to think they know better and overrule the detailed work that the Home Office has already done.
“Clearly the system is not working properly. We need to have a full investigation into why it is that in too many cases, tribunals think they know better and are overruling the experts in the immigration service.”
In the wake of Ezedi's death, it emerged that as many as 40 asylum seekers on the Bibby Stockholm barge were said to be converting to Christianity, sparking fears that migrants are claiming to have changed their religion in order to be granted asylum.
Of the 300 migrants on the Bibby Stockholm barge, nearly one in seven were attending churches under supervision from local faith leaders, a local church elder said in February.
