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Sad times Posted on 07/26/2010 12:00 AM   |  EMail to Friend   |  View Comments (6)

Magdeline's rape was only partially motivated by religious discrimination. Depravity&lack of respect for other human beings exists all over the world&is a consequence of the ‘fall’. Although we hear of people with all kinds of disorders&mental illnesses or criminal intensions, there is an undeniable disdain&indignity with which Christians are treated in the work place. For many years we have seen the decline in conditions for Christian nurses. What was once a profession for Christians is today a competitive field where Christians are being increasingly side lined&cannot even afford to enter for nursing schools to train. Christian Mission run nursing schools are side lined by the government&it is becoming increasingly expensive&difficult to develop&maintain such institutions which once sent out committed missionary nurses, 2008's last blog ‘Time in ICU’, speaks of the dilemma in which the Christian nurse finds herself. Christian nurses are vulnerable&in many instances alone with Muslim men who see that vulnerability&bank on it. As a Christian Magdelin was already a minority. I am certain that the Doctor who raped&hurt her severely would not have done so if she was an influential Muslim student. This is what I was talking of a few days ago when talking about Haider. Although friendly¬ open discriminatory, were I not a fellow student, were I in fact a nurse or a secretary, I know I would have been a lot more vulnerable. It starts as flirting&then the idea of a Christian being without the cover of Islam becomes an excuse to harass&torment them as they have no honour anyway. Events like these occur regularly&have made us conscious of people like Haider. I never want to be paranoid, but too many a Christian girl has become unequally yoked with a Muslim&too many a Christian girl has become the victim of sexual harassment that has left her feeling disgraced&unclean&therefore easily conned into marrying her abuser to save her further humiliation. Do not get me wrong. Muslim girls are victimised every single day but the abuse they bear has a different motivation. They are abused for being women, weaker than men&sexual objects, they are abused because the men believe they have the power to abuse them&because they believe that their women (Muslim women) are the bearers of their (the men’s ) honour. The violence a Muslim woman faces is seen almost as disciplinary to improve her&make a better bearer of her family’s honour. Whereas the abuse that a Christian woman faces is laced with punishment&a violation of her family’s&community’s honour. It stems out of a combination of emotions&beliefs.First the basic lack of acceptance of Christians in Muslim lands&secondly but just as significantly the lack of respect for Christians who are considered low caste (from remnants of old Hindu beliefs&caste ideas). This is what the Maarias of the Muslim world face. In their vulnerability will you send them your prayers&your love. Will you remember them before the Lord Jesus. Because your prayer could be the difference between them being raped&getting home safely to sleep in one’s own bed. Your prayer can make the difference between abuse&dignity. Your prayer can heal the scars&wounds of women like Magdeline. As she drifts in&out of consciousness, pray she not be haunted by the face of her abuser but will behold the face of Jesus by her bed? He will make all the difference in who Magdeline becomes in the days ahead. Pray for justice&for this to be an opportunity for us to minister the love of Christ to our nation – no matter how hard it seems.

When enough is ENOUGH Posted on 07/17/2010 12:00 AM   |  EMail to Friend   |  View Comments (8)

Yesterday we were without electricity for hours. We did have the generator going but the internet operator charges more if you want to use the internet on the generator. Its all a money making trick. I was sharing with you about Haider. This is a serious prayer request. Many Christian girls go through situations like this and i need your prayers for myself and all my Pakistani Christian sisters. As I told you Haider is mostly benign but also so ignorant that anyone could influence and manipulate his thinking. His brother has become a Mullah and I wonder if that has anything to do with his strange behaviour of late. If unchecked and not nipped in the bud these ignorant conecpts can turn into something more siniciter. Of later Haider has begun to joke about marrying me. At first I laughed it off as it was a joke once a year but now its becoming a regular. He thinks as a Christian I have a Passport to somewhere in Europe or America and so I will be able to take him. He says it as a joke but I am becoming uncomfortable by his constant calls and obsession with me writing a letter to get him a european visa or about us getting married and me converting. I was gentle in how I handled it but I think I may have to make a more drastic move because he has begun to call in the wee hours of the morning. I sleep with dadi and she gets disturbed. If she finds out a Muslim boy is calling me at 3 am she will have a heart attack straight away! I told him I am committed to Jesus and marriage is sacred so we should not joke about it. I thought if I put overtly religious language on it and made it a very serious religious issue he would back off. But he keeps talking about it&telling me about all his girl friends&all his flirting ever since Hina rejected him&then saying 'I tell you because you are a Christian&will not condemn me for promiscuity'&always makes reference to the 'american movies'. Am becoming a little uncomfortable. I care for his soul but I feel a check in my spirit. I do not want him to react if I reject him too much. But I think the time has come to be firm in what I say. Pray for me and the thousands of other Christian girls who go through this every day. A lone Christian girl on campus or in the work place is very vulnerable. If Haider spins the story tomorrow that we have been seeing each other &had a relationship, apart from Omair every one will believe him. I am not alone because many Maarias become caught up in situations like this. I have discipled him. I have shared Christ through my life, but now it is time to show that Christ gives me courage and dignity and no one will walk over that dignity.

Two friends. Posted on 07/16/2010 12:00 AM   |  EMail to Friend   |  View Comments (0)

In the first year of college when I first met Haider, aka the class joker, he was in love with my friend&when she rejected him he was really broken up over it so I tried to reach out to him&help him.He would share his heart &tell me how it hurt to be treated like a joke&he wished people would get to know him better. I always kept a distance but grew to love him as a sister. For which Omair (truly a big brother to me on campus) was not too pleaed. He likes being the Hero to the Christian girl at school and protecting me from who he calls the 'bearded hypocrites'. If any one spits in my direction, Omair spits back &so on. I do not agree with his attitude&pray he will change&know the Jesus way one day. But my relationship with Haider is different. I trust Omair with my life, if I were alone with him I know he will never take advantage of me or use me or ask me to convert. His mother used to be a Christian and so he has respect for Christians. (Sadly she converted to marry his father). But Haider is just different. Haider intersperses our conversations with questions like 'you eat pork right - Christians are commanded to eat pork right? That means I cant eat in your house'. Although dripping with ignorance, his comments leave the door open for dicussions. But it also leaves me to believe that his opinions about Christian girls must be similarly ignorant. If Christians are allowed to eat pork which is unclean to the Muslims&Christians girls do not cover their heads, nor have rules about not touching the Bible when menstruating (Muslim women do not say their prayers or touch the Koran or fast during their period)- then surely Christians girls have no morals or ethics. Such ignorance may seem benign at first and I thought by my lifestyle I could challenge his misconceptions. There will be a power cut any second and I do not want to lose this so am sending it to you now. Pray for Haider and Omair. I have a prayer request will share with you in my next blog.

Rain at last Posted on 07/13/2010 12:00 AM   |  EMail to Friend   |  View Comments (2)

RAIN! FINALLY! Thankyou Lord! It was so hot. So many people across the country have died from the heat. Finally the monsoon broke. The heat was thick and the haze was surrounding our bodies, clawing at our lungs, making the breathing hard and laboured. Not to mention one's clothes clinging from the perspiration and suffocating the skin. Everywhere we have been the stench of perspiration and the like of breeze has made it impossible. Butchers shops must have been the worst. We had so many power cuts and internet breaks. People have bought generators and Back up systems to keep their freezers and computers from crashing. The food has to be put away immediately or it will go off. Two nights ago I forgot to put the rice away after dinner while I was helping dadi get ready for bed. When I came back to clear away the dinner plates and food - I could already smell the rice going off. Amma had warned me but as usual I thought I new better! I felt sad and said sorry to God as I threw it away. After all so many people in my country are not able to buy Rice and Sugar and flour because it is so expensive. Despite having overcome our sugar shortage because we had a better Cane crop this year, the shops refuse to bring the sugar down. And here I was throwing away two cups of rice (Rice for 4 people). Today we had a feeling it would rain. It has rained in Lahore two days ago. So we hoped it was headed our way. The heat was closing its grip, like someone throttling us. Unless you sit under the Air Con you have no releif but to run the air con you neen electricty and you know when the bills come you will have a heart attack from the figures. I sat with a jute hand fan on the porch with the pedestal fan going. We have had this fan since I was only little. As soon as it turned 4 I rolled up the chik (a jute roll up blind which is rolled down in the afternoon to keep the house cool and keep the sun off). Seconds later a whitish grey dove flew past me and as she did a hot breeze grew in teh garden and hot rain drizzled over us. In Seconds the smell of earth filled the air and every one was in the garden. Sharifaan started making pakoras (fried chickpea flour snacks) and hot tea was brought out. In the heat Hot tea or Cold drinks are the ticket! Every one knows the cool rain is only cool as long as it lasts and the after breeze blows. The following hours will be humid and sticky. But the breaking rain and the preceding heat remind me of the laws of this land. It is how it is to be a Christian. The laws suffocate and throttle us. They keep us from breathing. Nights and days are restless as the blasphemy law, the hadood ordinance and the apostacy law cling to us and make us week and inhibbited, following us and threatening every word we speak. Your prayers are a white dove to many who are in prison for the faith or live in these circumstances for Jesus. The white dove I saw seconds become the cooling rain came down and freed us from the clawing heat. Thank you for the doves you send our way. Send a flock of prayer to Rani today. To Mahira, to Zulekha, to brothers and sisters in Iran and Afghanistan that they would feel a cool drop of rain, smell the fragrance of freedom and hope in Christ Jesus as you pray for them.

Meena and Rani Posted on 07/07/2010 12:00 AM   |  EMail to Friend   |  View Comments (5)

There is still no news of Rani. There have been other icidents of young Christians being kidnapped. There is no reason to think its by the same people, but as the word of God tells us it by the same powers and principalities at work among those who allow him to use themselves. So while her mother is still distraught and her whereabouts continue to be a mystery, we plead with you to go to the Father. Ask His Son, Jesus who is our only true advocate, who has paid the true price and needs to prove nothing more to us. Ask Him to intercede for Rani and for a victory in this situation. It is so hot that one cannot step out between the hours of 12 and 4. To do so is to ask for heat stroke or burns. So around 5 we go out and water the garden and the plans to cool the earth down. The plants are dying with the heat. There was hardly a breeze today. I wonder if Rani has even a fan to keep her cool. The heat can kill. I wonder if she has water to drink and has not become dehydrated. Every evening there is a little 6 year old Meena who walks past our house. She is tiny and oh so cute. Her mum stands on her roof and watches as Meena goes to the corner shop to buy some candy. She is only tiny and is wrapped in a white hijab which covers her head and surrounds her face. Today she wore a pretty flowered pink and turquoise shalwar kameez and stopped to talk to me. I always ask her about school and what she learnt. Meena is not shy. My eyes follow her to the shop and then all the way back to her home. I am terrified someone will pick her up. She is so small. When I was little things were not so bad now we are always concerned about what some nasty person could possibily do to little ones like Meena. After Rani I have become a little paranoid myself. But Baba reminds me, although there are very sick people out there, Meena wears a hijab and a amulate around her neck which shows against the white of her hijab. It identifies her as a religious child and so she is least likely to be picked up for abuse and to be sold into prostitution. She is marked by her hijab abd amulate as the honour of Islam and that will stop anyone from hurting her. I wish Rani's cross has weilded the same. I wish someone had seen her Christ's own and not touched her or taken her away from us. Both Meena and Rani are equally special to Jesus. Please pray for girls in this land. For safety for them. How we need to feel safe !