Arab outpost

Religion | U.S. Census takes steps to count Arab-Americans but most would rather assimilate | Robert Carle

James Allen Walker for WORLD

NEW YORK—Step into Brooklyn's Church of the Virgin Mary, with its domed ceilings and marble columns, and it's like stepping into Lebanon. On Sunday mornings, the cantor sings the liturgy in Arabic, his deep baritone voice echoing off the stone walls of the incense-filled sanctuary. Icons and murals depict Jesus and saints as Middle Easterners with dark olive skin. "It's like seeing the Bible in color," says Father Antoine Rizk, who has pastored the church since 2004.

Rizk is an Arab-American, one of the 1.3 million living in the United States (according to the 2000 Census) or 3.5 million (according to the Arab American Institute). Two-thirds of them are professing Christians.

Arab-Americans earn master's degrees and doctorates at twice the national average, and Arab-American income levels exceed the national average by 20 percent.

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August 01, 2009, Vol. 24, No. 15

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