Samir Atallah

I have a friend who sends me, at times, an article by the writer Samir Atallah. My friend knows that I follow Atallah every day. What he does not know is that, every time I receive an article from him, I read it again. I have never offended his generosity. In a gathering in which the Orthodox Youth Movement (MJO) had honored Metropolitan George Khodr, and in which Atallah was one of the speakers, I told him in a quick greeting: “you are my teacher every day”. I wanted to thank him. There are people who save you without them knowing. Atallah, being “this river” (as described by Ounsi El-Hajj), has made it his job to rebuke me if I got tired of waiting for the words! He heard me with the bow of a fruit-bearing tree. With these lines, I did not want to deter my friend's generosity towards me, but rather to thank him as well. They are the friends who want us to enjoy “the flowing fruit”, once and twice, every day.