I am finding that the new presence and awareness of Islam in the United States stimulates my sense of irony. There has been an enormous rush of interest in Islam since Sept. 11, 2001. As you can imagine, this might be for all sorts of reasons. Let me suggest a few:

First, many Americans genuinely want to do a "catch-up" on an increasingly important religious tradition that few of us know much about. This is a valuable corrective to our ignorance and isolation and hopefully Christians are as much a part of it as anyone else. Mark Ryan has helped us all enormously here in his series of lectures on Islam last year and continuing into this next term.

Second, there is a powerful relativistic inclination that celebrates the plurality of religious options, at least in part as a way of undoing of any residual Christian consensus. This direction seems committed to painting Islam in the most positive possible light. It sees Islam's proclivity to violence, denial of political freedom and view of women as being only marginal aberrations and perhaps even marginal aberrations caused more by the sins of Christendom or even "Christian America" than by anything intrinsic to Islam.

Third, and this is the most interesting to me, one is more aware of homegrown Americans looking to Islam -- drawn to it as a possible personal faith. Of all ironies, it looks as if 9/11 could have been a boon to Muslim "evangelism" in the US. This makes me scratch my head pretty hard, but one idea came to mind. American people have been extraordinarily committed to materialism, to financial security and personal comfort. You don't need to minimize the plight of the disadvantaged in the US to say that never have so many people been so successful at amassing money, possessions and possibilities. Yet at the same time there is a sense of disillusionment -- of money, possessions and possibilities not being "where it's at" despite all the carrots held in front of our noses.

I wonder if Americans are attracted to those who have visibly found something beyond their own comfort to live for, all the more so if it is different from what we are used to, maybe even seen as a bit exotic. Even Osama bin Laden can inspire a strange admiration that he turned his back on his family's millions to spend years sleeping on floors, on the couches of friends and teachers, and from cave to cave. A suicide bomber represents the extreme of having a cause bigger than his own comfort to live for. Could it be that sheer exhaustion with the hollowness of so many American values makes some open to a faith that so clearly takes people beyond those values? I suspect that the idea of committing suicide for Allah does not always provoke the horror that we might hope it would, but instead a wistful attraction to a cause that could give anyone such a clear and powerful sense of purpose.

Of course America is the land of polarization, so interest and attraction to Islam is not a universal or even the prevalent response. The other side of the polarization is a sense of outrage at Islam and at Muslim people, which has no desire to further understand them or to love them. "Love them? Look at what they did to us!" Unhappily, there seems to be plenty of this in the Christian church.

We have just celebrated the one who as a tiny baby was identified as "Christ the Lord". May we be able to understand the non-negotiable importance of his presence here, even in our relativistic times. But may we also labor to understand how to live out his teaching of love for all people, even for those who have made themselves our enemies.

We finished a great autumn term just before Thanksgiving. We were quite full and actually had to turn students away at times, as did all the other branches of L'Abri. We had a good group and happily had a large proportion of them stay for almost the whole term. That meant that they got to know each other very well and also that they were able to cover a lot of ground in their studies and tutoring sessions. We were intrigued to see how students of extremely different backgrounds, sometimes initially horrified with each other, became closest friends. It has been a lesson to us all about the depth of cultural differences in this country, but the even greater common human depth that is there under God if we take the time to know each other. Thank God for this good term and pray for the students who were here.

Mark and Terri have big news, that Terri is pregnant, due in late July. This is a great joy, but she is still feeling pretty sick and has a serious blood clot in her leg that is keeping her immobilized at the moment. Pray for the baby and for her health as well.

The Morrells are doing well and the children are thriving. Luke has become an extraordinary reader, devouring stacks of books. I suspect Nate is thinking of changing his residence from the big house to the snow bank between the houses.

It has been a joy to the Keyes family that Ben is back from a wonderful time at the English L'Abri, and that Chris and Liz are expecting a child in May. (Grandparents!?) Mardi and I went to South Korea in October for a trustees' meeting and two conferences. Thank God for the faith and courage of the Korean L'Abri members and pray for God to honor their work in the midst of the struggles of their country.

Doug LaFountain and Tommi Shaw were workers with us who left in the late summer and early fall respectively, but both have been busy. Doug was married over New Years weekend to Jessica House who had been a student and a helper with us. Tommi will be getting married in early February to John Poelstra, who was a student at the Swiss L'Abri and helped in our international accounting. Do pray for God's blessing on them.

Another thing to give thanks for is that we have hired Bobbie Smith to come in several hours each week to do the book keeping in our office that Tommi had been doing. The transition went easily and she is doing a great job.

We are grateful for two very helpful helpers this last term, Joel and Jonathan. Pray for Joel for the next steps in his life and for Jonathan as he comes back to help us again this winter.

Thank God for a good end to our year financially, since we have felt, along with everybody else, the effects of economic downturn. Pray for God to continue to provide for us financially and in every other way.

The L'Abri trustees just decided to accept the gift from some Canadian businessmen to make an offer on a property for a new Canadian L'Abri on Bowen Island just outside of Vancouver harbor. It looks like a beautiful place. The offer has just been accepted and if everything goes according to plan, Doug and Maggie Curry, now at Greatham, will be heading up the branch, but not much else has been decided yet. Pray for this new possibility and for the Curry family.

Please pray for an intensive J-term course in "Cultural Apologetics" that we will be teaching here at L'Abri for two weeks for Gordon Conwell Seminary, starting on Jan. 13. We have a dozen seminary students coming and four others.

Pray also for our winter term, which begins Jan. 29, that God will bring the people, he wants to have here as students, and work in their lives. Pray that he will guide the lectures, discussions, work and all the informal times together.

Pray for Edith Schaeffer's health. She has been unwell over Christmas.

Please pray for speaking that I am doing away from L'Abri this winter and for things here while I am gone. I will be at the L'Abri conference in Minnesota, Feb. 6-9; Covenant Seminary, March.11-16; Azusa Pacific University in L.A., March 23-26.

Pray for the L'Abri conferences in Charlotte, N.C., July 31- Aug.3, and in Portland Ore, Aug.7-10. More information will be on our website, www.labri.org.

Finally, pray that as we teeter on the edge of war, that war might still be averted, and that the Light of the World would shine into our country and every country of the world.

Dick Keyes