October 17, 2002

The arrival of the internet has sparked local entrepreneurship.

Marthame spent the evening with Deacon Firas at his brother's internet cafe. Firas is new to the internet, and though he has email, he has not yet learned how to compose, use an address book, or a search engine. He's in the process of rebuilding his church. Unfortunately, given the situation at hand, churches here are rarely self-supporting.

Those in the Galilee are in a better position, and he has built relationships with them, but the results of those are still in process. His bishop has encouraged him to look internationally and build connections there in order to do so.

A simple yahoo search yielded 8000 results for the word "Melkite", something that sent his mind reeling.