An ongoing conversation about America, the Middle East, and Jesus

Yemen is everywhere right now. Headline crawlers at the bottom of the screen on nearly every channel mention Yemen at least once. With the recent Christmas Day attack on the Detroit-bound flight still fresh in everyone’s minds, Yemen has suddenly become a household word—right up there with Al-Qaeda and Hezbollah. A month ago, most Americans weren’t thinking about Yemen at all. Now we’re watching press conferences with Yemen’s deputy prime minister of defense, and waiting for decisions to be made by our government regarding the future relationship of our countries.

I’ve been to Yemen. I have friends there, and I’ve worked closely with businesses and government leaders in an attempt to aid the country’s economy. Yemen is a beautiful, historic country, but it has significant challenges. There is poverty, and deep social and ethnic tensions. It’s a tough place.  But, then again, things that are worth doing, worth investing our lives in, often are difficult.  They take sacrifice. They take effort on our part.

In recent years I’ve worked alongside the Center for Global Strategies in multiple projects working toward friendship and partnership with the people of Yemen. We coordinated conferences in Yemen in 2006 exploring economic growth and the role of the private sector. We brought in business people and various experts to discuss topics such as systematic ethics and corporate governance and corruption. In 2007, we hosted a delegation from Yemen in South Carolina to discuss potential business, educational and tourism partnerships. Through all of this, we’ve continued to build friendships, and developed mutual respect and appreciation for one another.

Yemen is as complex as it is beautiful. It cannot, and should not, merely be written off as a hot-bed of terrorism and anti-American sentiment. Our relationship with Yemen, now more than ever, must be handled with thoughtfulness. I encourage you to expand your knowledge of this country, go beyond the rhetoric and be a part of achieving a more hopeful and positive future for us all.  If we shrink back now from the critical role of building bridges and working toward peace, we all lose.

On January 28^th, I will talk more about Yemen and the challenges and opportunities we face. Be sure to register online now for the web event, “Why Do You Fear Me?”