Only a few Afghan converts have surfaced in the past decade, and the government has typically dealt with them swiftly and silently: They are asked to recant, and if they refuse, they are expelled, usually to India, where an Afghan church flourishes in New Delhi.

In a country of crippling poverty, ethnic fault lines and decades of war, Islamic piety offers many Afghans a rare thread of national solidarity. To reject Islam is seen as tantamount to treason.

“Religious identity is the only thing that Afghans can claim,” said Daud Moradian, a professor at the American University in Afghanistan. “They do not have a national identity, they do not have an economic identity, and there is no middle or working class here.”

That leaves Josef almost nowhere to turn for protection. The police would be no help. Converts report being beaten and sexually abused while in custody. His family in Afghanistan is also a dead end: His uncles are hunting for him now, too.

Josef said he lost his faith well before he knew what would replace it. Most of his siblings emigrated to Germany when he was a teenager, but he stayed behind to look after his aging, ailing parents. He drove a taxi at night and studied medicine, earning a degree from Kabul Medical University.

He hung on through civil war, repressive Taliban rule and Western invasion, but a senseless shooting he witnessed at close range in 2009 that left an 8-year-old boy dying in his mother’s arms finally shattered his resolve to stay.

He borrowed money from his family and worked double shifts until he could pay a smuggler to get him to Europe. He left behind his mother, who died soon afterward, and his pregnant wife, who moved to Pakistan to be with her family.