Displaced Iraqi Christians in America have said that this Christmas they will be praying for relatives still living in their homeland.
On a recent overcast Sunday morning in northwest Chicago, the pews of the small wood-panelled St Ephrem Chaldean Catholic Church were filled to overflowing. Among the rows of Massgoers sat Firaz Rassam and her sisters.
After the Mass, Rassam and her sister, Victoria Rassam, said they "pray, pray that (Victoria's) children would be able to get out (of northern Iraq) in time" before any major ISIS attack or any other conflict reaches their neighbourhood in Ankawa, a Christian hub in the Kurdish region. Firaz Rassam, who arrived in Chicago in September, said this year she would not be able to celebrate Christmas "with the type of happiness that (her family) normally would celebrate."
