Jim Hope lives near Skipton and is a member and local preacher in the Methodist Church there. Together with Barbara Glasson from the Touchstone Centre in Bradford, he recently spent a week as a guest of the Bishop of Multan Diocese, Church of Pakistan. Here he writes of some of his
impressions...

Heat, noise, chaos, bureaucracy, generosity, helpfulness, guns – a whole bundle of often contradictory impressions jostle for dominance – and that’s before we’ve even left Islamabad airport!

“Why are you going to Pakistan?” asked a slightly bemused security official at Manchester Airport as we queued for our flight, the only white faces on board. In truth I wasn’t at all certain of the answer: to deliver some basic training to some of the Church’s pastors, to visit some rural villages and draw comparisons with the Dales communities, to help build a developing partnership with the West Yorkshire Methodist District – it all seemed terribly vague and unfocused at that stage. Pakistan International Airways treated us royally, with free use of the VIP lounge while we awaited our internal flight to Multan, and Bishop Leo and his young family welcomed us into their home with delight. Not much relaxation time though...

However, the Bishop’s programme was thrown into some disarray as on the Sunday, 36 hours after our arrival, there came the news of the bombing of a Christian congregation in Peshawar.

Multan is in the Indus valley in central Pakistan, a long way from Peshawar in the north, but the Christian community is so small and dispersed that there are many links between them, and there was a palpable sense of shock, grief and some anger which found expression in a series of very moving inter-faith gatherings and candlelit vigils in and around Multan Cathedral.

The Bishop and his colleagues stood side by side with Muslim clerics, other faith representatives and ourselves, and many spoke passionately of the need to refrain from violent reaction and petition the government for better protection of vulnerable minorities. It was heartening to learn later of similar solidarity being expressed in West Yorkshire communities.

Jim Hope

  • Next week Jim continues his story of where hope and growth are to be found in Multan even in the grimmest and most challenging of circumstances.