"The TV studio hums just a few feet from his church office in northern California, but pastor Hormoz Shariat is still a last-minute arrival to his own show. Behind the scenes are teams of phone counselors and hip young producers.I hadn't really thought about what happened to the Iranians that found it necessary to become expatriates following the bloody revolution of the late 1970s.
Waiting behind an Islamic veil 7,000 miles away is an exploding house-church movement in Iran, whose compatriots eavesdrop on the illegal satellite programs produced daily by Pastor Shariat's Iranian Christian Church (ICC).
If there is a budding missional community of Muslim-background believers in America, it is the Iranians. These believers' passion is to reach Muslims worldwide, and they are being energized not by the now-grown children of the Islamic Revolution, but by their bicultural kids longing to discover their Persian roots. ..."
This article is about a subset of those expatriates -- Christians -- and how they cope with maintaining their identity in a culture that is quite different than that in which they grew up. Along with that, this community is dealing with their children who are drawn to churches other than the ones their parents attend.
The Iranian Christians are also using video technology to help maintain ties with the congregations they left behind in Iran, which often need to operate clandestinely.
There is much in this story to ponder.
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