Imagine this.

You come from Hassakeh, in the far north-east of Syria, on the border with Iraq and Turkey, home to around 150,000 people, fewer than 4 per cent of whom are Christian. You are a pastor. A woman. To progress in your education, you must attend a face-to-face course in Beirut for one semester.

Your journey begins at 6 am. You dress in black and conservatively, with a Roman collar and a large cross on your chest. You have booked two seats on the bus to Damascus, to ensure you are not addressed or drawn into conversations along the way. The other day, at the school you run, a father brought his young daughter (aged 7) wearing a niqab. He asked that she be seated only alongside other girls. Your school welcomes 900 pupils, 85 of whom are Christian. On the streets, you hardly see anyone but fully veiled women. Recently, a friend’s sister had to give up her place in a long queue to let a woman wearing a niqab through.

To get to the bus station, you have to take a taxi. The journey to Damascus takes between 12 and 14 hours. You have to stop at least twice an hour for breaks or to carry out repairs on the bus. It often happens that the bus breaks down and has to be replaced, which adds a few hours to the journey. On the way, you watch the traffic go by through the window. All day long, you don’t see a single Christian woman on any of the other buses. You arrive in Damascus around 8 pm. You have booked a room in a Catholic hospice, which gives you a friendly rate: $40 instead of $50 because you are clearly a Christian. Early the next morning, having changed your outfit, you take a taxi out of the city, then another heading for Beirut. The driver, a Lebanese man, talks about the way Lebanese people are treated in Syria. You do not reply and remain polite and reserved. Along the road, endless convoys of lorries are at a standstill. Many have set off from the port of Tartus (in northern Syria) and are heading for the port of Beirut. If they are not carrying perishable goods, they can wait here for up to five days without moving an inch. There is no transport visible in the other direction. At the border, apart from waiting, you have to pay to obtain the correct visa and leave the country, and show all sorts of documents. You have to pay again to enter Lebanon: $75 in total. You’re lucky, because you have an official written document from the Church. Otherwise, it’s three times as much. You change taxis at the border. You arrive at the university at around 10.30 am with a box of Syrian sweets under your arm for everyone. After your lecture this afternoon, you retrace your steps one by one. But this time, the queues at the border are long; all the cars get checked. You’ll get home late the following evening – if all goes well. You’ll have to make this journey five more times before Christmas.

‘God is good,’ you say. A sponsor is funding your entire semester of study. It costs several thousand dollars. Without that, there’s no chance of obtaining the required certificate.

In your small parish, the Sunday collection brings in about $5. At your school, parents have to pay $400 for the whole year. Most of them can’t manage to find that money. Out of the nine hundred pupils of your school, not even ten per cent are Christians. But Christian schools do not charge pupils from Christian families; otherwise, they would have to attend state school. Since the Turkish invasion in 2019, the state has stopped supplying electricity. You have to buy or hire a generator and pay a further $300 a month. There is no running water. A water tanker comes to the neighborhood and you must go and fetch water – and pay for it. “Can you imagine a school or a church without electricity? On Sundays, we have to provide water, and often a hot meal as well. Without donations, we simply cannot manage. People come to church because it is their only refuge, an hour-long oasis in the week.” All official offices are closed. The state is absent. The only people to be seen are bearded men, who have recently started wearing the green uniforms of the regular Syrian army.

“God is good.” You love your ministry.