Creepy Christian evangelicals are too much in abundance here for my comfort. I met B. last year outside the primary school where I was waiting for my son to return from a class trip to Dubai where he and his classmates had fun at Wild Wadi amusement park, a popular spot for American movie stars to visit, Brad Pitt and Angela Jolie recently spotted, and Jacko spotted there a few weeks ago wearing a white lycra full-body suit, looking very skinny, only his eyes and mouth exposed.
B. was kind of furtive in his probing questions and retreated when I said I attended the Catholic church here. I suspect my pastor, Fr. Matthew, a tough Indian that brooks no BS, has warded him and his ilk off. He was not too overbearing, civil enough not to gush with obsequious pleading for my lost pagan Catholic soul. He said that he was in charge of religious curriculum, ordering and getting books, but I don't recall the name of his Christian fellowship organization or whether he even mentioned it, but I suspect he is associated with the center of Protestantism here, the Oasis Hospital, which has Arabic translations of the Bible displayed throughout the hospital on the walls of the waiting rooms.
After he boasted that there were 257 congregations of about 20 members each throughout the Emirates, he asked me how many attended the Catholic Church in Al Ain. I had to pause because I really didn't know, there are so many. At least one thousand I said.
G. and I discuss Christian evangelism frequently. Recently we were discussing conversion, how the evangelicals get their hooks into lost souls, unsuspecting though they may be, but willing nevertheless. Recently A. has succumbed. She is a very sweet woman but has proably felt the alienation that comes with the expat life here. The other day she was distributing an invitation to the parents of the families in our building of flats. It was a small well-designed invitation to "A Night with a Purpose", the title of the talk was "THE PURPOSE DRIVEN LIFE". G. agreed with me that it was like a Salvation Army soup kitchen kind of affair. But G. thinks that evangelicals have conformed to the times with a kind of popular psychology self-help appeal, that they are sophisticated in their tactics, Stalinism he calls it. There was also "Free Dinner, Music and Video".
B. was kind of furtive in his probing questions and retreated when I said I attended the Catholic church here. I suspect my pastor, Fr. Matthew, a tough Indian that brooks no BS, has warded him and his ilk off. He was not too overbearing, civil enough not to gush with obsequious pleading for my lost pagan Catholic soul. He said that he was in charge of religious curriculum, ordering and getting books, but I don't recall the name of his Christian fellowship organization or whether he even mentioned it, but I suspect he is associated with the center of Protestantism here, the Oasis Hospital, which has Arabic translations of the Bible displayed throughout the hospital on the walls of the waiting rooms.
After he boasted that there were 257 congregations of about 20 members each throughout the Emirates, he asked me how many attended the Catholic Church in Al Ain. I had to pause because I really didn't know, there are so many. At least one thousand I said.
G. and I discuss Christian evangelism frequently. Recently we were discussing conversion, how the evangelicals get their hooks into lost souls, unsuspecting though they may be, but willing nevertheless. Recently A. has succumbed. She is a very sweet woman but has proably felt the alienation that comes with the expat life here. The other day she was distributing an invitation to the parents of the families in our building of flats. It was a small well-designed invitation to "A Night with a Purpose", the title of the talk was "THE PURPOSE DRIVEN LIFE". G. agreed with me that it was like a Salvation Army soup kitchen kind of affair. But G. thinks that evangelicals have conformed to the times with a kind of popular psychology self-help appeal, that they are sophisticated in their tactics, Stalinism he calls it. There was also "Free Dinner, Music and Video".
posted by Al Kover(t) at
12:59 AM
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