Iranian women shop for Christmas decorations in Tehran on Saturday (AFP)
ishtartv.com - middleeasteye.net
Saturday
24 December
Tehran
might not seem like the most obvious pitstop for Santa Claus, but Iranians love
the ornate side of Christmas and it is also one of the safest places in the
Middle East for Christians.
The
past month has seen shoppers flocking to the Armenian district of Somayeh - the
biggest Christian area in the city - to pick up fake trees, and stock up on
baubles, reindeer toys and plastic snowmen.
"It's
really interesting and attractive for us," said Niloufar, a Muslim women
in her 30s who was out shopping with her husband on Christmas Eve.
"I
love the decorations, the tree. We see it as showing a kind of respect for
other beliefs. And of course I like all the chocolates!"
Shoppers
lined up for selfies with one of several Santas stationed outside stores on the
main drag.
One
Father Christmas, full of the festive spirit, broke into an impromptu dance to
a popular Iranian pop song playing outside a food stall.
Hamed
Davoodian owns a grocery store on the street, and said the community never
faces any trouble from the authorities.
"Why
should we? [Armenians] have been here for 400 years. They are great to
us," he said, adding proudly that Christians fought alongside their fellow
Iranians during the brutal war with Iraq in the 1980s.
"There
were 30 to 35 martyrs from our neighbourhood," he said.
Thousands
of Christians have emigrated to the US and elsewhere since the Islamic
revolution in 1979, leaving only 120,000 Christians, according to the last
official count.
Most
are Armenian - who are Orthodox Christian - along with a few thousand Assyrian
Catholics.
Despite
the exodus, Christians are officially recognised and protected, along with Jews
and Zoroastrians, under laws introduced by the revolution's founder, Ayatollah
Ruhollah Khomeini.
There
are limitations. Converting Muslims is illegal, which leads authorities to
crack down on Persian-language Bibles. Services must be carried out in the
original language of the ethnic group.
Human
Rights Watch says Persian-speaking converts face persecution.
But
there are none of those concerns at St Joseph's Catholic Church in central
Tehran on Christmas Eve, where it is standing-room only for the midnight mass,
delivered in the Assyrian language.
Archbishop
Ramzi Garmou told AFP that Christianity in the region dates back to the second
century when St Thomas passed through on his way to India.
Having
once numbered in the tens of millions, the Christian community is now tiny, and
Garmou said he normally sees only a few dozen for Sunday mass - not least
because it's a working day in Iran and traffic is horrendous.
"But
I've always said that the strength of the church is not in the number of its
followers but the faith they show in their daily lives," he said.
He
is grateful that Iran is such an oasis of peace in a region beset by war, and
in which Christians face mounting persecution.
"Thanks
to God, we really live in peace and security, but our neighbours live in
anguish and violence. We pray for them tonight," he said.
Iranian woman lights candle during Christmas Eve mass at St Joseph Armenian Catholic church in Tehran (AFP)
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