The story of Al-Aethawi\u2019s unlikely journey from Baghdad to Dearborn goes back to 1979.<\/p>\n
That was the year Saddam Hussein rose to power \u2014 and the year Al-Aethawi was born to a poor family who lived in a mud house with steel sheets as the roof. In the winter, rain dripped on the young boy, his sisters and parents as they slept.<\/p>\n
Each Friday, Al-Aethawi went to a neighborhood mosque to pray.<\/p>\n
But he never felt comfortable with a religion he believed called him to hate people he didn\u2019t know and offered no hope after his 4-year-old sister, Amina, died of food poisoning in 1996.<\/p>\n
Wissam Al-Aethawi, right, enjoys fellowship with Steve Spiceland after preaching at the Sunset Church of Christ in Taylor, Mich. (PHOTO BY BOBBY ROSS JR.)References to Bible verses in American novels that Al-Aethawi read piqued his curiosity, as did Tom Cruise picking up a Gideon Bible and reading from Job 3:14 in the movie \u201cMission: Impossible.\u201d<\/p>\n
At the massive Al-Mutanabbi flea market in Baghdad in 1997, Al-Aethawi \u2014 then an engineering student at the University of Baghdad \u2014 bought the Gospel of John….<\/p>\n