The Abu Dhabi vicar who defends the destitute
In a career spanning decades, Andrew Thompson has supported the poor and the destitute, writes Caroline Byrne
It is not unusual for sexabuse victims, unpaid labourers or domestic servants to turn to places of worship for sanctuary.
But Rev Andrew Thompson was taken aback a few months ago when he found a Ugandan woman clinging to the altar in St Andrew’s Church in Abu Dhabi, crying out to God for protection.
“She escaped from a sex-trafficking gang and the thing that was really frightening her was that the traffickers told her, ‘If you run away, we are going to use black magic’,” Mr Thompson said.
The vicar called the police and the victim was moved to an Emirati women’s shelter during the investigation and court hearing. The Anglican church later helped to arrange her flight home.
Before her departure, UAE authorities returned the woman’s fingernail clippings and a lock of hair held by the gang, so she no longer had to live in fear of a curse.
“They didn’t have to do that but the UAE police went out of their way in this particular case to make her feel safe,” Mr Thompson said.
It is an extraordinary tale but sex trafficking is not unique to the UAE or the UK, where Rev Thompson was born and later ordained.
He has counselled some of the world’s poorest during a 30-year career of charitable and religious work in Britain, Jordan, Kuwait and the UAE. Mr Thompson has been pastor of St Andrew’s Church in Abu Dhabi since 2010.
With Easter coming and his 50th birthday due in June, he was in a reflective mood on a recent visit to London.
Mr Thompson was born with a hearing impairment but he reads lips and patiently answers questions about his spiritual journey from England to the UAE, and life as a Christian in a country where 76 per cent of the population is Muslim and Islam is the
Yes, I live in a Muslim majority country but … we are not treated as second-class citizens. Quite the contrary
REV ANDREW THOMPSON
Pastor of St Andrew’s Church in Abu Dhabi
official religion. “Yes, I live in a Muslim majority country and yes, we are a very small percentage of the population, a religious minority but we are not persecuted,” he told The National.
“We are not treated as second-class citizens. Quite the contrary. We are given a very visible profile and we are involved in international conferences, sometimes at the government’s expense, to represent the Christian community in the UAE.”
The church was his calling from an early age. Rev Thomson was born in Crawley, in south-east England. After studying behavioural sciences and Islamic communities he moved to Jordan in 1990 to work with Palestinian youths, then to Dubai as an Anglican church youth worker.
He was married in 1994, trained as a Church of England priest in the UK and moved back to the Middle East, shifting between Ras Al Khaimah, Fujairah and then to Kuwait in 2006, where he was the chaplain of the local parish of St Paul’s.
Mr Thompson was awarded the MBE in 2011 for services to human rights and promoting interfaith dialogue between Christians and Muslims while working in Kuwait.
It is estimated that several hundred thousand Christians live in Abu Dhabi, many from India, Nepal and the Philippines. Christians make up 9 per cent of UAE residents.
Mr Thompson has a congregation of about 15,000 mostly professional expatriates but he is also on the front line helping Abu Dhabi’s most disadvantaged and working as an interface between Anglican faithful and the Muslim community.
But a chaplain’s role is not just about spiritual needs. Rev Thompson has a much more worldly problem – money.
He is hoping to build the region’s largest Anglican church in Abu Dhabi. Construction is under way on land in Mussaffah donated by the President, Sheikh Khalifa, a testament to the UAE’s tolerance. More than 40 congregations operate in the region with the support of the UAE Government.
Mr Thompson’s new church is to be called All Saints but it is only 60 per cent complete. A key donor pulled out several years ago and he needs to find almost Dh25 million to finish the building.
“We’ve hit a bit of a bump due of finance,” he said. “We were hoping to get a commercial loan from the local banks.”
Mr Thompson is hoping for a commercial investor or donations.
When building is finished, All Saints will be able to hold several thousand worshippers at a time, so in theory it could provide a spiritual home for other Christian denominations, hosting 40,000 people in 12 hours.
More than 50 groups now use St Andrew’s Church to worship, including Greek Orthodox, Egyptian Copts, the Korean Methodist Church and the Church of Pakistan.
The Anglican church was originally hoping to host All Saints Church’s opening last weekend with an Easter service. Instead, the deadline passed without fanfare.
But Mr Thompson remains hopeful. His Easter message on Sunday was uplifting, focusing on the call of the church to be “resurrection people”, rather than people focused on injustice and death.
“We look with hope to overcome and transform bad news into good news,” he said.