Gulf

Reaching the Migrant Workers in Oman

The Sultanate of Oman is a mountainous land on the southeast coast of the Arabian Peninsula. The total population is 2.8 million, with 600,000 to 700,000 of the population being migrant workers from Southern Asia. Some of these workers are brought to the country under dubious or non-existent contracts and placed in situations amounting to forced labour. Complaints have been reported of long working hours, the withholding or non-payment of wages, lack of access to means of communication, confiscation of passports and other documents, and other forms of physical, mental, and verbal abuse.

A good number of these workers (often labourers and maids) are Christians who have little or no access to church or spiritual nourishment. The Bible Society in the Gulf has opened 4 resource centres in the different cities of Oman, Muscat, Sohar, and Salalah, to cater to the needs of these Christians. The Bible Society works very closely with the various churches and denominations in these areas to assist them in their various programmes. The ministry among the migrant workers is one of the most important and challenging ministries of all the churches in the Gulf. The Bible Society, working within the premises of the churches in various locations and cities in the Sultanate of Oman, would like to see the ministry among migrant workers develop, strengthen and succeed.

Please pray...
Pray for the distribution amongst migrants of 500 Bibles, 500 New Testaments and 1000 CDs (‘God's Story’, and ‘Jesus’) in Hindi, Sinhala, Tagalog, Bengali and English. Pray that people’s lives would be changed as they come in contact with the Word of God.

 

Photo: Mary (38) (left) and Ruth (44), housemaids from India who live in Dubai