Breaking down walls
Muslim couple, Mennonite congregation say friendship has transformed both
LOWER SALFORD >> Bachir Soueidan says there’s a universal language in the prayers and singing he and his wife, Salma, both Lebanese Muslims, have heard at Salford Mennonite Church.
“This community is an example for everybody to follow,” Soueidan said. “There might be some differences between our two religions, but that’s not what’s defining our relationship. What’s defining our relationship is the commonality that we have, and particularly when it comes to serving God and serving God’s people.”
“There’s differences between our two faiths that have been well documented, and we know some of those, but, really, at the core, the essence of both of our faiths is this desire to love God and to love [our] neighbor,” said Salford’s Lead Pastor Joe Hackman.
“That is what really unites us,” Hackman said, telling Soueidan that, “You have shown us how to love [our] neighbor in ways that motivate us to be better followers of our faith, and to try to ask how we can love our neighbors more fully.”
Soueidan, who came to the United States in 1962, said he and Salma moved to the local area in 1978 and into their current home on Freedom Way in Harleysville in 1979.
The move, for Soueidan to take a job in international sales at the former Lemmon Pharmaceutical Co. in West Rockhill, brought the couple from a community in which there were many other Lebanese and Muslims to one in which there were few, leaving them feeling somewhat
“As we get to know each other as human beings, we break down the walls of fear.” — Betsy Moyer
in a void, Soueidan said.
The relationship with Salford Mennonite, he said, started in the aftermath of Sept. 11, 2001, at a 2002 presentation in the “Islamic Insights” program at the Indian Valley Public Library, where the Soueidans met church members Phil and Betsy Moyer.
The ensuing friendship took away the feelings of being in a place where they were strangers, Soueidan said.
“We felt it’s home,” he said.
Through the church, the couple also met many other friends and was transformed, he said.
“It became a refuge for us,” Soueidan said, “particularly at times of pain and anguish about what was happening back home.”
The Soueidans have also helped transform the congregation, Hackman and the Moyers said.
“In addition to the gift of real genuine love and friendship that we’ve been able to share with you, I think you’ve given us the gift of understanding so much more,” Betsy Moyer told Soueidan.
In the past seven or eight years, the congregation sponsored two refugee families from Iraq and one from Iran, Hackman said.
The congregation had previously wanted to help refugee families, particularly Arabic-speaking ones, but couldn’t have done it without the Soueidans’ help, Moyer said.
“You invested so much time, so much of your
heart in helping us. You went along to doctor’s appointments. You translated at all kinds of meetings. You were here for us so that we could together live out our goals,” she said.
“Salma and Bachir, because of the connection that we’ve had with them, I think it gave the congregation the ability to feel like we could confidently reach out and try to help resettle some of these folks and several of these families have settled permanently in this community and are thriving largely because of Bachir and Salma’s work,” Hackman said.
“Because of Salma and Bachir’s generosity and friendship,” he said, “it has encouraged our own faith. It has deepened our own faith in significant ways as a church community.”
While watching news reports about the strife in the Middle East, he and Salma saw distortions and inaccuracies, Soueidan said.
“We wondered what is it that we can do to kind of project a different image of what everybody sees on television, and through you, we were able to do that because of your understanding and your empathy for the plight of people, the refugees,” he told Hackman and the Moyers. “We can talk to you freely about how we feel and how we look at things.”
The Soueidans have helped the congregation recognize cultural differences that wouldn’t have been otherwise known, Phil Moyer said.
“We as an American society are multi-cultural, we’re multi-racial, we’re multi-religious, and although sometimes that creates tension, ultimately I think that’s what helps make America strong and great, so I think there’s this larger dimension to how these kinds of relationships benefit larger society,” he said. “We often fail to recognize that.”
Soueidan also helps the North Penn School District, where he translates and helps explain cultural differences to Arabic-speaking families, Phil
Moyer said.
That includes sometimes being a negotiator of sorts between immigrant teens and their parents, Betsy Moyer said.
“They’re adjusting to the new American culture and want to do things that their parents find very difficult to understand,” Betsy Moyer said of the teens, “and so, they will come to these respected elders, Bachir and Salma.”
Salford members have traveled to Palestine and the West Bank to try to get a better understanding of the political and religious dynamics in the area, and the congregation has sent two young people to multiyear service in Palestine, Hackman said.
The relationship with the Soueidans likely helped bring that on, although it wasn’t necessarily the only factor, he said.
“The congregation encourages and fully supports our young people in going into service in all regions of the world, but there’s a special love for the Middle East,” Hackman said.
Information about the church is available at its website, Salfordmc.org.
On Sept. 17, the Soueidans held a meal for the congregation marking the 15th anniversary of Sept. 11, 2001, and the Muslim Eid al-Adha (sacrifice feast) holiday, Hackman said.
The meal date was chosen
to be able to coincide with both events, Betsy Moyer said.
“It was beautiful that they came in the same week,” she said.
The Soueidans decided during Ramadan to have the dinner, Hackman said.
“During Ramadan, Muslims are encouraged to be exceptionally generous,” he said.
The meal was catered by Damascus, a family run Syrian restaurant in Allentown, he said. The family are recent refugees, he said.
“That family is from a Christian town in Syria that was destroyed by ISIS,” Hackman said.
The meal was an “abundant feast,” he said.
The food just kept coming and it was delectable,” Hackman said.
Along with the catered restaurant food, Salma Soueidan made a yogurt and cucumber dish for the meal, he said.
The church offered to help cover the costs of the meal, but was told by the Soueidans that “this is our gift to you,” Hackman said.
The couple said the donations should instead go to the Mennonite Central Committee’s programs to support refugees, he said.
“Over $1,000 was raised to support those efforts,” Hackman said.
In 2006, Salma prepared all the food for a dinner the couple held at the church, Bachir Soueidan said.
Along with commemorating the fifth anniversary of Sept. 11, the 2006 dinner celebrated the end of Ramadan, Soueidan said. It was also part of the church’s Be Not Afraid, a weekend-long peacemaking event, Hackman said.
“It had just happened that Israel invaded south Lebanon and our village was pretty much destroyed,
so we had a fundraiser for our village,” Soueidan said.
His brother sent the church a list of names of people helped by the funds, he said.
Shawke Soueidan, Bachir’s nephew, a neurologist from Virginia, spoke at this year’s dinner about his experience of being a Muslim in this country, the honorable values of the U.S. and how this country has helped him and his family, Hackman said.
“I took it as him sort of just calling us all to live out our values and our faith,” Hackman said, “in the best way possible so we can all support each other.”
Another of the messages was about breaking down the walls of fear, Betsy Moyer said.
“As we get to know each other as human beings, we break down the walls of fear,” she said.
Knowing the Soueidans has helped bring a desire to get to know more Muslims, she said.
“It’s great to live together in this community,” Moyer said.