Afterword

A Javanese teacher on a chair of equal height. A woman with bullock carts in the famine years. A prophet with bare feet. A slave who received her freedom in Venice. An elder who prayed before it was light. A sadhu who walked into the mountains and did not come back. A doctor who threw his diplomas into the sea. An archbishop who stood his ground.

They did not know each other. They spoke different languages, belonged to different churches and lived in different times. What they shared was that they did not see the faith as something that belonged to foreigners. They made it their own, in their own language and in their own country, and they often paid a price for it.

With some of them we know less than we would like. Sometimes the sources are scarce, sometimes later admirers made the story more beautiful than it was. I have tried to be honest about that. What remains is still enough to make you quiet.

The second volume tells the story of eight others, from a freed slave who became a bishop to an evangelist from Argentina.

After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues. (Revelation 7:9)