Loving Our Neighbour

On that day a great persecution broke out against the church at Jerusalem and all except the apostles were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria. Those who had been scattered preached the word wherever they went. (Acts 8:1,4 NIV) Read More

The day after bombs exploded on the London Underground in 2005, we received a phone call from Fatima*. We had lost touch with her when she moved house. But now she was living near one of the explosion sites and was phoning because she was afraid. She would not go out of the house without her Muslim headscarf, but she was scared that if she did wear it she would be attacked. Read More

The advice in the old books of etiquette is that you don't mention sex, religion or politics. If in doubt, talk about the weather.   This may be good for polite British society, but we had a few things to learn when we arrived in the Arab world! The weather was not a stimulating topic for conversation. With more than 300 days of sunshine per year, we sometimes sympathised with Elijah who was pleased to see a cloud the size of a man's hand! On the other hand, religion was always a topic of discussion. Read More