Christmas in Baghdad

"It is Christmas Eve. I am in an Arab country that has a sizable Christian minority. Some are celebrating Christmas tomorrow. A group preaching inter-faith understanding is holding a dawn mass in a few hours.

I cannot help but think of the Christians of Iraq. Although they may have not been as free as they would have liked to be, they were perhaps one of the most privileged Christian communities - save for in Lebanon - in the Middle East.

The Baathist order had separated Church from State, so to speak, although that may have wavered towards the end of the 90s. Nevertheless, Christians were not hunted down. They weren't forced to convert, as some have told me is currently happening in southern Iraq.

They weren't forced to veil.

And they weren't forced to celebrate Christmas hiding at home or going to Church in the morning having to look over their shoulders for fear of a crazed Arab Wahabi freak imported from abroad to create havoc and wanton destruction."
Truth about Iraqis