My family always wanted to leave Iraq. My mother dreamt of living in Europe, North America, or Australia since she was a teenager. My dad also wanted to leave since he was a teenager. But we couldn’t leave until 1998 when I was 15 years old. We spent a year in Jordan and my sister, who is 2 years older than me, and I both accepted Christ in our lives there. I think being Roman Catholic teens, having our first communion a couple of years earlier, left us with a lot of questions and very few answers (if any). My sister, being a very social person, got first interested in knowing Christ as a Savior through going to church in Amman, Jordan. There was a pastor there who was teaching about Christ as a Savior and how trusting in Him can change our lives, gives us eternal life, and that… read more
Catholic
In the past year there were many tragic cases of teen suicide, so I decide few months ago to write about my experience with depression and suicidal thoughts. I hope this writing will be of help to someone who needs it. Background As you might know I grew up in Iraq to a Roman Catholic family. In the Middle East depression and suicide are almost taboo because of ignorance. Many people equate depression with mental illness (not that mental illness is something to jeer about), and so the general thought patterns goes something like this, “You can’t marry him because his brother has depression and tried to commit suicide once!†To them depression is like bad genes you really don’t want your children to have. So people often times become depressed but don’t tell anyone and don’t get any treatment because they feel ashamed. And if a family member attempted… read more