Today I was in Haifa in a neighborhood full of Arab businesses and Arabic signs, all of them closed because it was Sunday. I was looking for a hardware store to duplicate some keys, following a friend’s directions to a lone Jewish store that would be open. On Sunday. As I got nearer my destination, I saw a huge stone church with signage above the arch—in Arabic!—and two scoutmasters conversing at the door in Arabic. I had stumbled on an ethnically and linguistically Arab Christian neighborhood that takes its faith seriously.
Ramaswamy has the name and complexion of a man of Indian descent. I don’t know what religion he is, although he’s probably Hindu. But he might be Christian for that matter.