7
THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF CONVERTING MUSLIMS?
Herman Melville wrote in his diary of his visit to some American missionaries in Jerusalem in 1856, "In the afternoon called upon Mr. And Mrs. Saunders, outside the wall, the American Missionary.-Dismal story of their experiments. Might as well attempt to convert bricks into bride-cake as the Orientals into Christians. It is against the will of God that the East should be Christianized."'
Another American missionary, Dr. Samuel Zwemer, in his very useful book The Law of Apostasy in Islam, rather oddly quotes Canon W. H. T. Gairdner to the effect that "conversions from Islam in the East Indies and parts of Africa run into tens of thousands: and in other parts of the Moslem world, such as India, Persia and Egypt, they are regular and familiar phenomena," and then heads his first chapter, "Why So Few Moslem Converts?" and laments the "small visible result."' Zwemer is closer to Melville's opinion than to Canon Gairdner's. Could the meagerness of results, asks Zwemer, be due to the harshness of the law of apostasy in Islam? It certainly acted as a powerful deterrent. Even during the period of intense Christian missionary activity during the nineteenth century, it was applied merclessly in public in the very city Zwemer himself was later to work in-Cairo-as this example from E. W. Lane shows:
Apostacy from the faith of El-Islam is considered a most heinous sin, and must be punished with death, unless the apostate will recant on being thrice warned. I once saw a woman paraded through the streets of Cairo, and afterwards taken down to the Nile to be drowned, for having apostatized from the faith of Mohammad, and having married a Christian. Unfortunately, she had tattooed a blue cross on her arm, which led to her detection by one of her former friends in a bath. She was mounted upon a high-saddled ass, such as ladies in Egypt usually ride, and very respectably dressed, attended by soldiers, and surrounded by a rabble, who, instead of commiserating, uttered loud imprecations against her. The Kadee, who passed sentence upon her, exhorted her, in vain, to return to her former faith. He own father was her accuser! She was taken in a boat into the midst of the river, stripped nearly naked, strangled, and then thrown into the stream.3
Even in countries where executions of apostates have been abolished, the renegade's life is far from secure. An act of apostasy brings shame and social disgrace on the family of the apostate, who must be killed by family members to restore family honor and to expiate the collective humiliation. Even if the apostate survives attempts at poisoning, he will suffer from continuous social persecution and ostracism, and be treated as a traitor to his religion, his nation, and his culture.
Despite the paucity of converts, Zwemer does manage to give dozens of examples from history, and from his own experience as a missionary in Egypt. Zwemer quotes the following instances of persecution as found in the reports of the Egypt General Mission (1903-1922):
A father saw his son reading the Bible, and taking it from him consigned it to the flames, and attempted to fatally injure the boy by throwing him over the balusters. Later the lad received a second copy of the Word of God; and a tract which for weeks he carried hidden in his pocket. When the father finally chanced to see it, he gave the boy a cruelly severe beating, and continued his ill-treatment until his son was forced to leave home.
We read that another convert was beaten daily with a native whip (only those who have seen them know what they are like). Since he remained obdurate, burning pieces of wood were brought and placed, red hot, on his body to force him to recant, but it was all of no avail. He said, "Kill me, and I will go straight to be with Jesus." Some of his companions suffered in a similar way. In one case a father decided to kill his son, so he poured paraffin oil all over him, and was just going to light it when an uncle came in and pleaded for the life of the boy. The father listened to the appeal, then banished his son from his home for ever.
In 1912 a storm of persecution arose against A. T. His clothes were taken away, his Bible burnt. His father attempted to poison him. His uncle shot him, the bullet entering his leg. His father told him to make his choice between his for tune (some £2,000) and his faith, and with the chief men of the village actually entered his private apartments in the house (his harem, or wife's rooms), a terrible insult in Islam, to search for incriminating papers. Twice attempts were made to poison him; twice they attempted by bribes and threats to make his wife unfaithful to him. The whole story of this man is one of loneliness, poverty and contempt, cheerfully borne for Christ.
In 1923 a young man in one of the villages of the Delta accepted Christ and secured work as a cook. At home his Testament was burned, and his brothers made it very unpleasant for him; but that was as nothing compared to the storm which broke over him when, after due preparation, he decided to go forward and openly confess Christ in baptism. Relatives from far and near gathered at his home, threatening and cursing him: a cousin, who had been in jail, said that even if he hid in a fortress of brass he would get him out and kill him. Under the threats and hatred the young man's courage failed, and he promised not to be baptized then. Three times he has now come to the point of being baptized, and through fear has withdrawn each time. His brothers, who have often heard the Gospel, are dead against him-his own mother, who really loves him, would rather see him dead than baptized.'
The psychology of conversion is a complex subject in itself, and I doubt there is any one theory that would account for all the phenomena. A Muslim abandoning his faith for humanism or atheism is likely to give rational explanations why belief in any of the tenets of Islam is no longer intellectually tenable, and her reasons would differ substantially from a Muslim who converted to Christianity.
Ernest Renan was once asked whether it was true that he had, on abandoning Catholicism, embraced Protestantism. He replied testily, "It was my faith that I lost and not my reason."5 James Joyce has a similar exchange:
-Do you fear then, Cranly asked, that the God of the Roman catholics would strike you dead and damn you if you made a sacrilegous communion?
-The God of the Roman catholics could do that now, Stephen said. I fear more than that the chemical action which would be set up in my soul by a false homage to a symbol behind which are massed twenty centuries of authority and veneration.
-Would you, Cranly asked,in extreme danger commit that particular sacrilege? For instance, if you lived in the penal days?
-I cannot answer for the past, Stephen replied. Possibly not.
-Then, said Cranly, you do not intend to become a protestant?
-I said that I had lost the faith, Stephen answered, but not that I had lost selfrespect. What kind of liberation would that be to forsake an absurdity which is logical and coherent and to embrace one which is illogical and incoherent?'
Muslims who have converted to Christianity would be deemed, by Muslims who are now atheists and humanists, to have left one form of unreason only to adopt another. But what reasons do Muslim converts to Christianity give for their conversion? These converts evidently found something in Christianity that they felt was lacking in Islam. Many are attracted by the figure of Jesus, others find the Christian dogma of forgiveness of sins comforting, and still others are impressed by the charitable behavior of individual Christians around them. But if there is a common thread running through these conversion testimonies, it is that Christianity preaches the love of Christ and God, whereas Islam is forever threatening hellfire for disobeying, and obsessively holds up the wrath of God in front of the believer. In other words, the two religions have two totally different conceptions of God: In the former, God is near, loving, and protective, God the Father; in the latter, God is a remote, angry, tyrannical figure to be obeyed blindly. Or as one Muslim convert to Christianity was quoted as saying in a truly astonishing article that appeared in the Algerian Arabic daily El Youm in December 2000, "Christianity is life, Islam is death."' The article is worth quoting in full, since it lays to rest the myth of the impossibility of converting Muslims:
In Kabylie[, Algeria], people of all ages are converting to Christianity.... The (Protestant) church of Ouadhias has played an important role in the proliferation of the number of conversions in Kabylie, and it is considered the Mother Church, never having ceased its activities, even after Independence 11962] and the departure of the French and humanitarian missionaries.
... The media have played a great part in the conversions in Kabylie, the majority of radio stations have a strong following in this region, (many listening] to Radio Monte Carlo and particularly the popular broadcasts in Amazigh. As [one listener said,] "80% of' the reasons which impelled me towards Christianity came, from Radio Monte Carlo. " There are also other radio stations such as "Miracle Channel" (7SAT) [a satellite channel received via dishes], and most of the faithful confirmed that they listen to these stations which broadcast the Christian message across the world.
... [T]he person responsible for the church at Ouadhias about the conversions [told a reporter] that there were more and more every day, his church alone celebrating 50 baptisms per year. The deterioration of the image of Islam during the crisis has played its part in this rise of conversions to Christianity and the adoption of its principles. What is happening and what has happened in Algeria, such as the massacres and killings [in the holy month of Ramadan, December 2000, alone, 340 people were killed, making a total of 2700 killed by the Islamists in the year 2000.8] in the name of Islam, has led many, when asked what the difference, in their view, was between Islam and Christianity, to declare: "Christianity is life, Islam is death." For Sarnia, a secondary school pupil, the proof of the difference between Islam and Christianity was the mixing and relationship between the sexes, the former forbidding it, and the latter allowing it.
... Bibles [are distributed] in three languages, Arabic, French, and Amazigh, and video- and audio-cassettes on the life of the Messiah, son of Mary, translated into Amazigh.... As to the financement of these places of worship, ... the Churches of Ouadhias and Boghni [are] entirely supported by the gifts of the faithful. At the end of each month, workers pay in 10% of their salary, on top of the donations....
... Protestantism is more developed in Algeria than Catholicism.9
This is indeed a very remarkable phenomenon; as the article notes, one church alone recorded fifty baptisms a year-in a country where a woman wearing lipstick could result in an entire family, elderly women and children included, having their throats cut.
Other recent accounts of conversions to Christianity in large numbers come from West Africa. A new reception center was inaugurated in Pambuegua, in Kaduna State in Nigeria, to accommodate the large number of former Muslims recently (in 2001) converted to Christianity. Many had been threatened with the death sentence under SharFFa laws established by some Nigerian states, and all had their belongings and property looted by Muslims. Evidently, many hitherto Muslim Nigerians had been unaware of what it meant to have Islam applied to the letter, resented its intrusion into their way of life and their private lives, and decided to convert to Christianity. That is when their situation became truly dangerous.")
TESTIMONIES
Many conversion testimonies" from Islam to Christianity are moving, sometimes harrowing, and always witnesses to the converts' courage. They are all sincere personal records of deep religious experiences. Nonetheless, many are cloyingly sentimental, embarrassingly gushing about peace, harmony, and Christ's love.
Testimony I. Why I Became a Christian, by Desert Son
I was born in Saudi Arabia as a member of a Muslim family. We were a very happy family, and I loved my relationship with them. I also felt very happy because I did all the things that God asked me to. I had learned one-sixth of the holy Koran by heart and a lot from the Hadith. When I was a teenager, I was an Imam for the mosque.
I was always very serious to do all that God ordered me to do-fasting during Ramadan, praying five times a day or more, hajj, and so on. I was, at that time, very much desiring to meet God at the last day, even when I had no guarantee. But I had always hoped for this. My hope grew when I started to think about fighting in the name of God (jihad) in Afghanistan. I was sixteen years old. My parents would not let me go because I was too young. So I decided to wait until I was old enough.
I always had love and respect for the Muslim people. There was no love or respect in my heart for the Christians, and the Jews were my first enemy, of course.
Far Away from God
After some time, the devil found his way into our home and our life, and my life became very hard. Slowly I drifted far away from God until the time that I believed in no God at all.
My life became busy. I had a very good job and earned a lot of money. Still, I was not happy because I was afraid for the day that I would die. Sometimes a question came to my mind-Will I be with God in heaven or not? And it was very frightening to think about this, even for seconds, that I would not be there. What about my future?
A Little Prayer
One day I had a big problem in my life. I was in my room looking through the window up to the sky. Then I remembered God, and I wanted to pray to him to ask him for help, but which God should I pray to? Allah? I was sure that he was very angry with me because I had not prayed for a very long time. Or Jesus? I knew he had done a lot of miracles in the lives of other people. Then I said, "Jesus help me!" I don't know why I spoke like this. I sat down on my bed and spoke to myself, "What is this stupid thing you just did?" Anyway, I did not expect anything to happen or the problem to go away. However, one and a half days later, my problem was solved! I decided to find out who this Jesus is. Is he God, as the Christian people say, or is he a prophet, as I know from Islam? At this time, I left my country and went to Europe.
The Dream
On the third day, my circumstances became very difficult for me, and I decided to go back to the Middle East. During that night I had a dream. I was standing in a cross shape with a low wall around it. In my right hand, I had a big stack of white, unwritten papers. I was standing at the cross beam, and I was looking to a small group of people who were standing at the top. They all wore long white clothing, but one of them was different. He was standing at the right side, and with his left hand he was leading the people through a door in the wall. Beyond the door was light, and I could not see what was in there. One moment I was standing in the dream, and the next moment I was seeing the cross from above. It was difficult for me to understand this. When I woke up the next morning, I felt a very beautiful happiness in my heart that I never had before. And I felt a love in my heart and from inside my body a very special feeling. I felt also I just wanted to walk and to walk and to ask every one I met, Do you know Jesus? It was more than a great feeling. It was happiness that I had never known before in my life.
After one year of reading the Bible in an honest way, I understand now what happened to me. I found my way to God, the real God, the Lord Jesus Christ.
I hope now for all the people I love, my family, my friends, and everyone else to change also and begin to read the Bible in an honest way. I am sure that God will help them to find their way.
My Life Now
I feel love in my heart, and I am very happy to know Jesus. When I was a Muslim, I could never imagine that the Christians were right. After that, I found out how much God loves me, and I became a Christian. Yes, he loves me, he loves you, and he loves the whole world. Jesus Christ loved us, and he still does. And don't forget in the last day nobody can save us, only Jesus Christ.
Dear Brother/Sister: Come to know Jesus before it is too late. John 8: 12:
When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, "I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.""
Testimony 2
I was born in a mixed parentage family. My father is a devout Muslim and my mother a Christian who was converted to Islam upon marriage to him. I was raised up in a normal Muslim locality and community, where all I saw through Islamic glasses and never a view beyond Islam. I took for granted what I was trained and taught, that is, Islam was the ultimate in everything, i.e., religion, scientific facts, etc. all existed in the Koran. During my teens I saw the other facet of Islamic life or rather now started viewing things more objectively. I started going to college and made new friends from other communities. My mom stumbled upon the fact that my dad was a womanizer and later on my mom realized the sad truth that he had secretly married his two mistresses. No doubt there was never enough money in the house to give us a decent lifestyle or education. The worst thing about this all was my dad was justifying all his illicit actions and relationships by quoting the Koranic verses at random. At first I thought he was bull shitting his way through, but upon reading the facts, i.e., the verses, I was stupefied to realize that these nonsensical verses did exist. He even threatened our very existence as a family by scaring my mom with the three most dreaded syllables for a woman married to a Muslim man: "talaq talaq talaq [I divorce thee, I divorce thee, I divorce thee]." But one fine day my mom, being a woman of strong character, decided to call if off before he could.
Later on I went on to work in another country and came across my mother's relatives (whom I was not much in touch with when I was in India). For the first time, though I was in a totally Islamic-dominated culture, I got more close to my mother's family. At first I couldn't make sense of why I saw so much peace, love, and family stability reign among non-Muslim families, i.e., you dont get to see two or more wives bickering with each other. I questioned my beliefs and values for the first time, and slowly started my way toward the truth. I worked in the hotel industry in the Middle East and all that I saw was the other side of Islam: the holier-than-thou locals womanizing, drinking, etc., but on the hide. I always pondered if my religion, Islam, was so divinely ordained by Allah and so perfect then why hadn't it made an impact on these Muslims. All I could say about my coreligionists was that they were only good in criticizing and being judgmental of other creeds by quoting the Koran! In fact now at this point I started delving deeper into this subject. I surfed the Web for these sites where I could come across unbiased material critically evaluating all religion, and started studying comparative religion. My interaction with my mother's family and their colleagues helped me see the truth more clearly without the "horse's eyepads" one is forced to wear as a Muslim.
Two years ago, I did what I really wanted to do and be. I had gone on a vacation to India and baptized myself a Christian. I would like my previous coreligionists to know that no missionary has converted me with false propoganda, etc., as they always claim when a Muslim converts and leaves his religion. I have seen a true dark side of Islam, which cannot be denied, as it is written in clear Arabic, and Yusaf Ali's English translation can vouch for it; and I have see the true love of God in the Bible and in the behavior and actions of Jesus's followers and the humanist, secular values of the Western world. Now I am a peace with myself ... and would never like to tread that dangeraous path of Islam again."
CASE STUDIES
Kuwait
Amnesty International reported the case of "Robert" Hussein Qambar'Ali, a convert to Christianity who was declared by a Kuwaiti Islamic court an apostate on May 29, 1996.'1 Robert Hussein, a forty-five-year-old Kuwaiti businessman, converted from Islam to Christianity in the early 1990s. In his interviews with news agencies, Hussein revealed that since his conversion became public he has received numerous death threats and lived in constant fear for his life. His conversion was denounced equally in mosques and parliament. He was forced to change his residence often as a security measure. His marriage broke up because of family opposition to his conversion.
A lawsuit to declare Hussein an apostate was brought against him by three independent Islamist lawyers. If successful it would have stripped Hussein of his civil rights. Hussein first appeared in an Islamic family court, which has jurisdiction over personal status and family matters, on March 6, 1996, where he confirmed that he had become Christian and proposed changing his name to "Robert Hussein," but insisted that the three-judge panel had no jurisdiction in the case. He asked for his case to be sent to the Constitutional Court on the grounds that Article 35 of the Kuwaiti Constitution allows for freedom of thought and belief. The said article reads, "Freedom of belief is absolute. The state protects the freedom of practising religion in accordance with established customs, provided that it does not conflict with public policy or morals."
At a further hearing before the Islamic court on April 24, the Islamist lawyers asked the court to strip Hussein of his nationality and civil rights for offending against Islamic law by abandoning his Islamic faith. Hussein again asked to be put before the Constitutional Court, adding that he felt he was being punished as if the court had already found him guilty of apostasy. He reported that "for six months I haven't seen my kids, my family, my home. I blame the Kuwaiti government. They do not come forward and say `this man is protected by the Constitution.' " Those lawyers who showed a willingness to defend him asked for fees of $1 million (U.S.), which he could not afford to pay.
On May 29, Hussein was declared an apostate by the Islamic court. The presiding judge was later asked if the ruling would be taken as permission to kill Hussein and replied, "That is possible," but added that killing an apostate would be a violation of Kuwaiti criminal law, under which there was no penalty for apostasy as there was in Islamic law. Hussein lodged an appeal against the Islamic court decision to the Court of Appeal. The first hearing was set for September 15, 1996.
Amnesty International notes that "Article 18 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), which Kuwait ratified in May 1996, upholds freedom of religion, including the right to change one's religion. General commnet 22(48) on `Freedom to have or to adopt a religion or belief,' made by the United Nations Human Rights Committee [UNHRC] on July 1993, expressly recognizes that Article 18 of the ICCPR entails the right to replace one's current religion or belief with another, or to adopt atheistic views."
While Hussein is not facing any penalty imposed by Kuwaiti authorities, the mere fact of being labeled "an apostate" makes him a target for human rights abuses by nongovernmental actors. Various religious figures have pronounced that apostates from Islam should be punished by death. Even a member of the National Assembly demanded that Hussein be stoned to death. To allay Hussein's fears and to appease international public opinion, the Kuwaiti department of of legal advice repeated that freedom of religion is protected under Kuwaiti law and that the putative death threats were baseless.
With the help of various religious and human rights organizations Hussein came to the United States. "It is his dream that one day the people of Kuwait will be free, not only from the tyrannical rule of the Amir of Kuwait, but free to think, to explore and to find the truth for themselves." He currently resides in the United States with his wife and daughter. Husein has since published his story in Apostate Son. II
Yemen
A Somali living in Yemen since 1994, Mohammed Omer Haji converted to Christianity two years ago and adopted the name "George." He was imprisoned in January 2000 and reportedly beaten and threatened for two months by Yemeni security police, who tried to persuade him to renounce his conversion to Christianity. After he was rearrested in May, he was formally put on trial in June for apostasy under Article 259 of Yemen's criminal law. Haji's release came seven weeks after he was given a court ultimatum to renounce Christianity and return to Islam or face execution as an apostate. Apostasy is a capital offense under the Muslim laws of "sharia" enforced in Yemen.
After news of the case broke in the international press, Yemeni authorities halted the trial proceedings against Haji. He was transferred on July 17 to Aden's Immigration Jail until resettlement could be finalized by the UNHCR, under which Haji had formal refugee status. One of the politicians who tabled a motion in July 2000 in the British House of Commons was David Atkinson: "Early Day Motion on Mohammed Omer Haji. That this House deplores the death penalty which has been issued from the Aden Tawahi Court in Yemen for the apostasy of the Somali national Mohammed Omer Haji unless he recants his Christian faith and states that he is a Muslim before the judge three times on Wednesday 12th July; deplores that Mr. Haji was held in custody for the sole reason that he held to the Christian faith and was severely beaten in custody to the point of not being able to walk; considers it a disgrace that UNHCR officials in Khormaksar stated they were only able to help him if he was a Muslim; and calls on the British Government and international colleagues to make representations immediately at the highest level in Yemen to ensure Mr. Haji's swift release and long-term safety and for the repeal of Yemen's barbaric apostate laws."
Amnesty International adopted Haji as a prisoner of conscience in an "urgent action" release on July 11, concluding that he was "detained solely on account of his religious beliefs." The government of New Zealand accepted Haji and his family for emergency resettlement in late July after negotiations with the Geneva headquarters of the UNHCR.II
THE NUMBER OF CONVERTS TO CHRISTIANITY IN THE WEST
Hass Hirji-Walji, the son of Indian Ugandans, tells how he was attacked in a park in Minneapolis in 1975 by three men. They knocked him to the ground, held a knife to his throat, and asked him to profess Islam. He was saved by the chance arrival of some children from a nearby school. Hirji-Walji had recently converted to Christianity, and his story had been published in a magazine with a large circulation. This account had attracted the attention of some Muslim Arabs who decided to deal with the apostate themselves."
Prof. James A. Beverly recounts a more recent tale of an apostate living in North America who received death threats and was granted police protection.18 Even in the West, Muslim apostates fear for their lives and find it difficult to come out in public; hence, the difficulty in finding reliable statistics for conversions in the West. However, we do have some figures for adult baptisms in French Catholic parishes. The latter parishes also record the religion of origin of those baptized. In the year 2000, 2,503 adults were baptized, of which 9 percent were of Muslim origin; thus, 225 Muslims apostasized in France alone in 2000.19 Unfortunately, I do not have figures for any other Western country.20
NOTES
1. Herman Melville, Journal of a Visit to Europe and the Levant, ed. Howard C. Horsford (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1955).
2. S. Zwemer, The Law ofApostasv in Islam (London/New York: Marshall Brothers Ltd., 1924), pp. 14-15.
3. E. W. Lane, An Account of the Manners and Customs of the Modern Egyptians (1836; reprint, New York: Dover, 1973), p. 108.
4. Zwemer, The Law of ApostasY in Islam, pp. 60-62.
5. I have never been able to remember where I heard this story. If anyone knows the source I would be grateful if they would contact me in care of the publisher.
6. James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist As a Young Man (1914-15; reprint, Har- mondsworth, England: Penguin Books, 1992), pp. 264-65.
7. From El Yount [al-Yawm], Algiers; reprinted in Courrier International 531 (January 4-10, 2001): 29. Translated from the French by Ibn Warraq.
8. Statistics from Courrier International 531 (January 4-10, 2001).
9. From El Youm [al-Yawm], Algiers; reprinted in Courrier International 531 (January 4-10, 2001): 29. Translated from the French by Ibn Warraq.
10. "L'Actualite interreligieuse," Actualite des Religions 31 (October 2001): 14.
11. Many testimonies can be read at www.answering-islam.org/Testimonies/index. html. For a full bibliography, see Jean-Marie Gaudeul, Appeles Par le Christ: Its Viennent de l'Islam (Paris: Cerf, 1991): English edition, Called from Islam to Christ (Monarch Publications, 1999).
Other collections of testimonies include: W. M. Miller, Ten Muslims Meet Christ (Grand Rapids, Mich.: W. B. Eerdmans, 1980); A. T. Wallis Jr., Indonesian Revival: Why Two Million Came to Christ (Pasadena, Calif.: Gabriel Resources, 1977); and Jan Tamur, Ex-Muslims for Christ (Birmingham, England: Crossbearers, 1980).
12. Posted at www.answering-islam.org/Testimonies/desertson.html. Quoted with the permission of Desert Son, who can be contacted at desertson 1 @yahoo.com.
13. Posted at www.secularislam.org. Reprinted with permission from the Institute for the Secularisation of Islamic Society.
14. Amnesty International, "Kuwait: Hussein Qambar'Ali: Death Threats," Al Index (MDE 17/05/96) [online], web.amnesty.org/802568F7005C4453/0/893E69A437755B52 80256900006933ED?Open&Highlight=2,Qambar [August 1, 19961.
15. Robert Hussein and Sharon Green, ed., Apostate Son (Colorado Springs: Najiba Publishing, 1998).
16. Christianity Today, August 28, 2000.
17. Hass Hirji-Walji and J. Strong, Escape from Islam (Eastbourne, England: Kingsway Publications, 1981), pp. 99-102.
18. J. A. Beverley, "Something Terrifying and Intolerable," Faith Today (January/ February 2000): 11.
19. "Les Pentes Croisees du bapteme," Le Figaro, Paris, April 12, 2000, p. 9.
20. Please contact me in care of the publisher if you have statistics on this subject.