Embodied interreligious engagement: Female gendered bodies,reconciliation,and sport in Djibouti

Introduction

The expression and feeling of being a woman, in a female body, differs from woman to woman and around the world. As Dr Kirsteen Kim (2012: 75) wrote, “[w]hile gender is universal, it is always culturally expressed.” When foreigners enter a new culture, they go through a range of experiences referred to as culture shock: the stress of adapting to new patterns of behavior. The female experience of gendered ¹ culture shock does not easily map onto the commonly used W-shape culture shock and adjustment framework developed by Gullahorn and Gullahorn (1963) and still relied on today in cross-cultural training. Nor does it follow Oberg’s four steps of cultural transition: “honeymoon,” crisis, recovery, and adjustment (Ward et al., 2001: 81). An important but often neglected aspect of female culture shock includes gendered experiences that can be, or become, traumatic.

My thesis is that participation in sports holds unique potential for further research as intentional embodied interreligious engagement that can offer Christian and Muslim women valuable resources for reconciling what trauma ruptures, namely their relationship with their own bodies and their communities. The article looks at how foreign Christian women in a Muslim-majority context may experience culture shock as trauma in unique ways particular to the female body. First, I look at the gendered experience of culture adjustment for foreign women in Djibouti, which includes stress and harassment, moving it from adjustment into a trauma experience. Then, I briefly define reconciliation and discuss how it relates to bodies, community, and spirituality, which leads into an exploration of interreligious engagement and embodiment in the realm of sports. Finally, I conclude with suggestions for personnel and organizations, and for further study.

Context: Djibouti

Djibouti is a small Pac-Man-shaped country in the Horn of Africa bordered by Somalia, Eritrea, Ethiopia, and the Red Sea. The local population is Somali, Afar, and Yemeni with significant expatriate populations from Ethiopia and French-speaking African nations, as well as expatriates from all around the globe. This demography demonstrates an ethnically diverse community and an extraordinary ability to maintain peace in a volatile region. Though on a fast track to development, Djibouti remains economically depressed and vacillates in its enforcement of human rights regarding women, of special note in this article. Female genital cutting (mutilation) has been illegal since 1995 though UNICEF (2023: 4) reports 90% of women have been cut and found no evidence of criminal convictions. According to a 2020 United Nations report, only 26.2% of the indicators used to measure Djibouti’s progress on Sustainable Development Goals regarding gender were available. Notably missing were statistics on and methodologies used to measure gender-based violence, domestic violence, and sexual harassment (UN Women, 2020). Reports indicate high levels of sexual harassment and gender-based violence (GBV) without legal repercussions, such as spousal rape, which is not illegal, though these reports lack specific numbers (US Department of State, 2019).

Despite the lack of concrete statistics regarding violence targeting local Muslim women, these indicators point to the reality of its existence. Local women also face gendered challenges in the form of access to education, employment, and poverty. In total, 60.5% of Djiboutian women are illiterate and only 19% are employed, compared with 81% of men, contributing to a high level of poverty among women (USAID, 2020). The experience of GBV by local Muslim women, and the potential resultant trauma is relevant in this article, as it affords an opportunity for Muslim and Christian women to come together in solidarity, vulnerability, and healing, thus becoming a potential ministry space.

The phrase “foreign Christian women” deserves further definition. For the purposes of this article, the phrase includes any woman living in Djibouti who identifies as Christian but is not Djiboutian. There are, of course, foreign women in Djibouti who do not identify as Christian. As this article discusses interreligious engagement, I will focus on women of Christian and Muslim faith. These women may come from other Muslim-majority countries; thus, they may be familiar with certain forms of Islam or gendered interactions but may lack Djibouti-specific cultural understanding, linguistic capabilities, or meaningful local support networks. They may come from non-Muslim majority nations, and find some of these interactions unfamiliar. These women may come from countries where harassment is common or uncommon but, in either case, as foreigners, they lack the local knowledge and community resources to form a healthy response. Being foreign and a religious outsider can contribute an added layer of complexity, increase a sense of vulnerability, and lead to misunderstanding. Even culturally gendered interactions that are not harassment may be interpreted as such due to misinterpretation and missed culture cues.

Noting Djibouti as a Muslim-majority country does not intend to imply that harassment occurs uniquely or even predominantly in Muslim-majority communities, nor that Djibouti is unique in this regard. Rather, noting the Muslim presence in Djibouti is intended in this article to demonstrate the opportunity for interreligious engagement around the topic of gender and harassment and to highlight the potential resources Christian and Muslim spirituality can contribute.

Foreign Christian women adapting to Djibouti discover that feeling like a woman here is quite different to feeling like a woman in their home cultures. Sarah Homan (2016: 108), an Australian living in Nepal, vividly articulates this gendered culture shock:

In Australia as a woman I feel more confident, respected and carefree. It’s almost shameful to say, but I never thought about what it meant to be a woman in Australia . . . In Nepal it is a completely different and embodied experience.

Part of this could be due to the reality of culture shock and being an outsider, common to women globally as they move between cultures and nations. Often, however, the experience moves beyond culture shock, and Homan refers to what she endured in Nepal as daily forms of violence and expressed the need to brace herself before leaving home. She relied on clothing and postures to hide her body, forming barriers between herself and others, and felt a desire to be invisible (Homan, 2016: 108).

Women in Djibouti encounter gendered culture in similar ways. Clothing, ideas and implications of immodesty, greetings, physical space, eye contact, skin contact as when passing coins on a bus, acceptable locations in a house, how to sit and what to sit on, level of one’s voice, and being ignored in a mixed group are only a few examples. There are also verbal interactions that point to gender in unanticipated ways. Barbs about a married woman’s husband taking on more wives and multiple proposals for single women who are referred to as “girls” until they marry and become “women,” dehumanize and overly sexualize women. Thus, women “become more aware of (them)selves as a gendered being” (Altork, 2007: 107).

Further, there are harassment and assault. These are not aspects of culture to which any woman foreign or local should adapt but they do form an important and unwelcome piece of a woman’s cultural transition. The US Embassy in Djibouti (2022) reported that: “[t]he law specifically enumerates protection against domestic violence, harmful cultural practices, sexual harassment, and discrimination” though victims are hesitant to report. However, the World Bank database lacks statistics on gender-based violence in Djibouti. Based on interviews and personal experience, the following is a partial list of anecdotal experiences of foreign women in Djibouti: lewd gestures; punching and pinching of breasts and buttocks; being stoned; hair pulling; flashing; forced to watch masturbation; being followed, chased, pushed, or tripped; sexually explicit comments; sexualized threats; pinned against walls and groped; general unwanted touching; requests/demands for sexual favors in exchange for doing work.

Insidious trauma

Women cannot escape their female bodies and enduring these daily forms of violence and gendered culture takes a toll. Daily discriminatory events can lead to cumulative trauma, especially when they occur over a long period of time, also called insidious trauma: “Insidious trauma refers to the psychological impact that low levels of discrimination can have when experienced throughout a lifetime” (Miles-McLean et al., 2015: 364). Interpersonal sexual objectification has been conceptualized as a source of insidious trauma. Contributing factors to insidious trauma in sexual harassment are the compounding ² effects of time, race, whether a person has a history of sexual violence, and whether they can respond and react or are trapped. Each of these impact foreign women in Djibouti, including their lack of cultural knowledge on how to respond, which can lead to feeling trapped in the moment or in the culture.

To many Christians, “trauma” may seem too dramatic a term and foreign Christian women face pressure to avoid naming these harmful events as trauma. Reasoning can include:

A study by Schaefer et al. (2007) found that 64–70% of American missionaries in West Africa experienced at least three significant traumas compared with 5–10% of the US general population. Another study found that missionaries experienced similar levels of stress to FBI agents or combat military personnel (Rance, 2014: 8). These are already daunting statistics, but the studies include primarily singular event trauma such as kidnapping, rape, and evacuation, and do not touch on the insidious or complex trauma developed over time. Several studies argue for a “more comprehensive view of trauma that considers both large-scale events and smaller, yet still challenging events that occur more often (e.g., being stared at, catcalled, or touched)” (Miles-McLean et al., 2015: 364).

Failing to address insidious trauma leaves women feeling alone in the experience and contributes to their silence. This will impact a woman’s ministry, family, and community. Shelly Rambo (2016: 6–8) describes three effects of trauma: a deepened awareness of human fragility, the limits of human cognition and language to describe an experience, and the challenges of moving in the world in time. The result can be a rupture in a person’s identity, memory, and relationships. Reactions to trauma vary and depend on factors such as “the nature of the trauma, personality, pre-trauma experiences, belief systems, support networks, and culture” (Gingrich and Gingrich, 2017: 342). Effects of insidious trauma include depression, disordered eating, anxiety, dissociation, decreased feelings of safety, and hypervigilance (Miles-McLean et al., 2015: 364–65).

Rather than insisting on a predictable cultural transition from honeymoon to crisis to recovery to adjustment, women need ongoing reconciliation, and need access to culturally appropriate and available resources. This is necessary for their own flourishing, for their effectiveness in ministry, and importantly, it holds potential for partnering with local women.

Ministry of reconciliation

The Lausanne Cape Town Statement of Faith contains the powerful words, “God accomplished the reconciliation of believers with himself and with one another across all boundaries and enmities” (Birdsall and Brown, 2011: 39). Robert Schreiter (2005: 79) calls the former, vertical reconciliation and the latter, horizontal reconciliation. He argues that theological and missiological writings have focused on the vertical reconciliation between God and sinful humans and presents five characteristics for understanding the more neglected horizontal dimension. Reconciliation is a work of God in which we cooperate, God begins the process of healing the victim, reconciliation makes both victim and perpetrator a new creation, the pattern of healing and redemption is patterned on the passion and resurrection of Jesus, and reconciliation will only be complete when God has reconciled the whole world (Schreiter, 2005: 80). To Schreiter’s vertical and horizontal reconciliation, I add a third directional focus; internal reconciliation with one’s own body and conception of self after rupture.

Al Tizon defines reconciliation theologically as “God’s initiative to restore wholeness to a shattered creation” (Tizon et al., 2018: xviii). Tizon notes the conceptual, sociological, and missiological objections to reconciliation as a paradigm of mission such as that when there has been no conciliation there can be no reconciliation. Reconciliation initiated by the Church in power is simply another power play, and the Church’s complicity in historic harm. However, he concludes that, quoting Brenda Salter McNeil, “reconciliation is a Biblical concept . . . modeled by the reconciling work of Jesus” (Tizon et al., 2018: xx).

Christian women in Djibouti, whether missionaries or not, are bearers of the message of Colossians 1:19–20a: “For in Christ all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things” (RSV). They embody this message in a world replete with brokenness and it is essential to ground a ministry of reconciliation in Christ. Without Christ, reconciliation is reduced to “moral codes or cheap therapy” (Jørgensen, 2014: 266).

The rupture caused by the ongoing stress of gendered cultural adjustment, sexual harassment, and assault can manifest in feelings of resentment and anger directed at the host community, employment organizations, coworkers and spouses, women themselves, or God. Women may feel the host culture is the “cause” of the harassment, or impotent in the face of it. They may believe the employment organization failed to prepare, protect, or support them. If coworkers and spouses do not experience the same things or do not appreciate the impact, women could experience tension in these relationships. Women may feel they made a mistake, “asked” for it, or did not respond strongly enough. These experiences may lead women to question God as they wonder why God would call them here and then not protect them? And finally, women may experience dissociation from the community and themselves.

A ministry of reconciliation recognizes the potential for wholeness as a “fundamental dimension of God’s relationship with creation and the church’s missionary identity and activity” (Lakawa and Fitchett-Climenhaga, 2022: 294) without denying the reality of pain. This can lead to post-traumatic growth, which develops a stronger sense of self, an openness to new possibilities and goals such as a sense of mission or plan to help others be safe, and increased compassion and empathy (Fallot and Blanch, 2013: 372). But how can someone urge others to “be reconciled to God” if they are experiencing rupture from those very others, or from the culture and community in which they live and serve? It is my contention that interreligious engagement between foreign Christian women and Djiboutian Muslim women holds potential for individual reconciliation, communal reconciliation, and the good news of being reconciled to God in Christ. ³ It is to interreligious engagement that I now turn.

Interreligious engagement

Stephen Bevans proposed that mission today must be characterized by dialogue (Bevans and Schroeder, 2004: 268). He posits four types—dialogue of life, dialogue of action, dialogue of theological exchange, and dialogue of religious experience (Bevans and Schroeder, 2004: 292–93)—and categorizes interreligious dialogue as prophetic dialogue: “As dialogue it demands attentive listening, conversation skills, empathy, study, respect. As prophetic, it demands honesty, conviction, courage, and faith” (Bevans and Schroeder, 2004: 293, emphases in original). Dialogue encompassing life, action, theology, and religious experience is what is meant in this article by “engagement” and Bevans describes the type of posture required for doing this with integrity, conviction, and respect for the other.

Much of interreligious dialogue has taken the form of books or academic presentations in which members of each religion share their perspectives. But God’s mission modeled in the incarnation is inherently relational. Along with being relational, Christians involved in interreligious engagement with Muslims must acknowledge the resources Muslims bring spiritually and culturally. Asma Afsaruddin (2007: 389) presents three Quranic concepts relevant to interreligious engagement, embodiment, and reconciliation: “(1) the knowledge of one another, based on respect for diversity and difference; (2) the commonality of human beings, based on righteousness and ethical conduct; and (3) the reconciliation of hearts which is a cornerstone of Islamic peace building.”

Interreligious engagement begins with respect for and knowledge of the other but to contribute to peace building or reconciliation efforts, it must move beyond the intellect and into arenas of life: “[I]nterfaith engagement deals with ordinary people living life amid their vulnerabilities and challenges. It engages people across religious lines to address the common needs of humanity” (Munyao, 2021: 129). Foreign Christian women in Djibouti will naturally engage with Muslims as they address their common needs: school, shopping, language lessons, employment, healthcare, athletics, and so on. However, interreligious engagement is purposeful; it does not happen by dint of geographical proximity or shared activities. Interreligious engagement happens when people of different religious systems interact in intentional ways, acknowledge their differences, and allow these to contribute to the relationship rather than divide.

Matthew Kaemingk urges Christians toward engagement “that is not so much theological but sensual, habitual, aesthetic, and narrative-based” (Kaemingk and Smith, 2018: 219). The interreligious engagement proposed in this article centers on relationships developed through a shared geographical location, common insidious trauma experiences, and exploring body movement through the rituals available in sports. As such, it becomes embodied interreligious engagement.

Embodiment is the “experience of being a body in a social context” (McBride, 2021: ch. 1, Understanding Embodiment, para 1). Schreiter writes that effective reconciliation is not abstract but involves concrete contextual constraints such as politics, economics, sociology, culture, and religion. Based on this, he concludes, two questions are: “what does reconciliation mean in this context” and “who are the actors in reconciliation” (Schreiter, 1998: 62)? Reconciliation for foreign Christian women in the social context of Djibouti means participating in God’s work of wholeness, healing, and delight in relationships. The actors in this process are foreign Christian women and local Muslim women, reaching across boundaries to support one another.

Embodied interreligious engagement as a pathway to reconciliation through sports

There are several challenges inherent with interreligious engagement. First, people of faith are often hesitant to participate in the spiritual rituals of another religious system. Whether this hesitancy arises from fear or respect, it remains a barrier to experiential, embodied relating on the level of spirituality. Djibouti is one such location. A Muslim participating in Christian rituals, even contextualized or adapted ones, faces enormous pressure from family and clan. A Christian participating in Muslim rituals faces similar pressures, and accusations of syncretism or heresy. Also, in many locations around the world, Christians and Muslims lack knowledge of, or trust in, one another. There can be misunderstandings, misconceptions, and prejudice. Religious rituals have the potential to divide and exclude based on religion, denomination or sect, and culture. Finally, some argue that authentic interreligious dialogue between two missionary religions is a myth (Akah and Anthony, 2022).

For these reasons, interreligious engagement in Djibouti must begin on neutral territory, be grounded in the incarnation, and have as its aim mutually joyful attachment. The neutral ground I propose is shared participation in physical activity, namely sports. ⁴ The incarnation emphasizes presence and togetherness rather than the sending paradigm that can produce a self-righteous and superior “us vs. them” mentality (Radcliff, 2020). Joyful attachment is a concept developed by Evelyne Reisacher, and it exemplifies what incarnational cross-cultural life can look like. She writes that attachment theory is concerned with repair after relational rupture, and emphasizes the vital import of regaining mutual joy after relational stress, specifically in relationships between Christians and Muslims (Reisacher, 2016: loc. 915).

This relational connection through religiously neutral shared activity, presence, and repair can build toward the reconciliation Christian and Muslim women need. Insidious trauma, gendered culture shock, and sexual violence occur to and in the body. Direct reconciliation with the perpetrators is rarely possible, but as foreign Christian women develop relationships with local Muslim women, they can come to see these women as partners for a more just world, as cultural guides in learning appropriate ways to respond to incidents, and as support in solidarity. Interdependence rather than independence will lead to more resiliency (Schaefer et al., 2012: 146) and guards against a western imperialist mindset. About the joy of cross-cultural friendships, Henri Nouwen (2006: 38) wrote: “True joy is hidden where we are the same as other people: fragile and mortal . . . It is the joy of being with others as a friend, a companion, a fellow traveler.” This joy builds attachment, which then builds resiliency, which contributes to reconciliation.

Why sport?

Sport brings humans together physically. This has cultural significance as foreign and local women need reasons to meet and gather, especially in locations where suspicion of outsiders is high. Sport offers meaningful shared symbols and rituals of participation which “establish a sense of order and disoder [and] create cultural bridges and walls” (Adogame 2015: 194). Sport forces a communal outlook and awareness through physical interaction. Sport involvement improves women’s body image and self-perception as well as increasing their physical strength and endurance, which can improve overall mental health and resiliency. Sport defies gender stereotypes oppressive to women: “The liberation of [women’s] bodies [through sport] has been, and is, an essential requirement for their wider physical, social, cultural, economic and political freedom” (Mangan and Hong, 2001: 2).

In terms of interreligious engagement, there are several overlapping theoretical structures and rituals between religion and sports, leaving room for moving beyond sport in the future, as relationships deepen and more explicit spiritual dialogue occurs. These include a community of teammates and a leader; “sacred” objects such as uniforms, shoes, stopwatches, balls; rules and expectations; set apart time; certain location; emotional investment, and embodied practices as there is no sport without a body (Sterchele, 2007: 214–15).

Considering that sport is an embodied form of play moves this engagement into the level of embodied spirituality. The body is not separate from the soul and it is in this unified soul-body that humans encounter God. Erik Dailey (2016: 504) argues that as “we utilize all the physical capabilities that our bodies contain, we strengthen this bodily gift that we have from God and we literally strengthen this means by which we have for knowing God.” Dr Hillary McBride (2021: ch. 10, Movement Matters, para 2), quoting a personal email exchange with neurologist Jerome Lubbe, writes: “movement is the single greatest resource in our human experience . . . Movement is paramount for our physical, mental, emotional and relational health.” McBride goes on to describe the myokines released during muscle contractions as making humans more inclined toward being team players, more creative, more hopeful, and more resilient.

The group dynamics of sport provides a way to meet the fundamental need to belong (Eys et al., 2019: 399), which has been ruptured by trauma. As women participate in sport, they begin to form a group social identity (Eys et al., 2019: 402) and to view one another positively. Even cultural or religious others become in-group members, countering the negative experiences and increasing the foreign woman’s identification with the local people. Sport provides a way to learn to recognize and express emotions culturally and respond accordingly (Eys et al., 2019: 401). Reisacher (2009: 160) identifies this as having potential for creating strong attachment bonds.

Other positive outcomes of group sport participation include supporting one another’s mental health, social support, developing in communication, learning deep cultural values and behavior, and cohesion (Eys et al., 2019: 406–8). There is also the psychological benefit of physically working out the stress in a safe space. Safety is Judith Herman’s first stage of trauma healing (Lakawa and Fitchett-Climenhaga, 2022: 300). Lakawa brought Muslim and Christian women together in Indonesia to explore restoration after violence via interreligious engagement and dance. The women “experienced a space where their stories of trauma and the possibility of healing were intertwined in ways that allowed them to be vulnerable” (Lakawa and Fitchett-Climenhaga, 2022: 306). The unspeakability of trauma renders words ineffective but as women build relationship, they become safe for one another in the freedom offered by movement.

Christian women have historically been involved in healing missions that are “holistic, integrated, embodied, incarnated, and creatively transformative. They reveal efficacious healing mission as simultaneously public and personal, collective and individual, and culturally embedded yet boundary-crossing (Lakawa and Fitchett-Climenhaga, 2022: 299). As women experience healing through vulnerability, movement, and relationship, they become wounded healers, a profoundly reconciled and whole posture from which to engage in more dialogical interreligious exchange.

Addressing the limitations of sport

There are numerous roadblocks to interreligious engagement in sport for women in Djibouti. Sport itself is limited. Sport sociologist Jay Coakley (2015: 402) branded the “great sport myth” (GSM), which sees sport as positive and pure, impinged upon by flawed humans and structures. Another myth often criticized is that of sport as inherently peace building. This article is not suggesting sport as the cure-all for insidious trauma or reconciliation and healing for Muslim and Christian women, which may often require another level of care. Organizations, teams, and workplaces of foreign Christian women need to address insidious trauma in pre-field trainings, normalizing the conversation, and equipping staff. They should provide access to trained mental health professionals, and should expect to hear stories of harassment and assault, being ready to respond appropriately.

Other factors to consider include location, security, work and family time constraints, accessibility, and lack of knowledge and opportunity. In Djibouti there are also strong cultural ideas working against women’s participation in sport such as ideas that running will render a woman infertile, male aversion to women with muscle tone, belief that giving birth renders women physically incapable of running, and that vigorous movement will cause the uterus to fall out and breasts to sag. However, young Djiboutian girls’ participation in sport has increased in recent years with handball and volleyball teams, a football club, a running team, a private women’s gym, and an enclosed walking track. Women in Djibouti could form walking groups, informal aerobics classes on private rooftops, lobby existing sports clubs for a women-only afternoon, and start neighborhood associations for a sport of interest. To increase participation among the foreign women, organizations and employers could allow time in working hours and job descriptions for women to participate in leisure activity with the local population.

Suggestions for foreign Christian women and their communities

The concept of sport as offering reconciling potential between Christian and Muslim women through interreligious engagement remains theoretical and anecdotal. This article lays out a theory in need of further research, merely scratching the surface. Research possibilities include exploration into individual versus team sport, competitive leagues versus intramural or club sport, whether specific sports are more effective than others, as well as looking into particular details of sports such as leadership structures or local cultural values. Other possible areas worth exploring include whether sport is, in fact, an effective tool for future religious engagement. Importantly, inclusion of local women’s voices and perspectives will be vital to any future research, a gap in the current article.

Embodied interreligious engagement is an area with great potential for further study, as is the impact of sport on historical concepts of gender and women’s bodies in missiology. Embodied interreligious engagement grounded in a neutral activity that develops safe, trusting, and vulnerable relationships can then move to more overtly religious interaction. Trauma-informed ministry in a cross-cultural context is also an important area for research, both looking at the outsider’s experience, and the insider’s.

Building from sport toward more explicitly spiritual interreligious engagement, I suggest research on the areas of narrative and prayer. Narrative could include sharing personal testimonies of life and faith and could be culturally grounded by using folk tales, poetry, or epic songs, all of which, in the Djiboutian context, are interactive and physically engaging events, bringing them into the realm of embodied practice. Narrative engagement could also include less physical interaction and more dialogical interaction, keeping in mind Bevans’s four types of dialogue. Toward this end, I suggest using the stories of the women shared between the Quran and the Bible such as Lot’s wife (Waliha in Islam), Potiphar’s wife (Zuleikha), the Queen of Sheba (Bilquis), Eve, Hagar, and Mary (Miriam). Each woman’s story touches on embodiment and gender in unique and powerful ways. Embodied prayer is another possibility. It does not need to look like Islamic or Christian forms but can be creatively and culturally transformed in ways that communicate to the practitioners. Entering the holy scriptures and religious practices of an other develops the epistemological humility necessary for a truly interreligious exchange.

One final suggestion for further study is both a quantitative and qualitative evaluation of insidious trauma among foreign Christian women abroad. How is this affecting their vision and mission, ability to learn language and culture, their interactions with the host nation? What is the impact of trauma on longevity, productivity, spirituality, adjustment, and community engagement? How are women around the world responding and what would those impacted find helpful? Does experience differ based on one’s nation of origin, ethnicity, or personal expressions of religion? This would be useful for churches, organizations, teams, and individuals.

Conclusion

In this article I have presented sexual harassment, assault, violence, and gendered culture shock as contributors to foreign Christian women in Djibouti experiencing insidious trauma, which ruptures their relationships with their bodies and their communities. I proposed a ministry of reconciliation as a fruitful missiological lens, and embodied interreligious engagement through the modality of sport as offering potential for experiencing reconciliation. Finally, I offered a few practical suggestions for the Djiboutian context, and ideas for further study.

God is reconciling the world to Godself. Reconciliation restores dignity and humanity, heals ruptured relationships, and offers hope for a more just future. Reconciliation also makes space for the vocation of being wounded healers. Christian women living in Muslim-majority contexts can be transformed through brokenness, becoming ministers of reconciliation in Christ.