TRAVEL & THEOLOGY
Welcome! I am a Doctor of Theology (University of Helsinki, Finland) and an authorized Helsinki guide. For reviews of my guiding, click here. On the right, you will find a link to my Doctoral dissertation (in English). You can also find me on academia.edu.
Coming from a Finnish-Iraqi and Catholic-Lutheran background, with a strong connection to Poland (spiritual conversion, Master’s degree, and wife!), I am passionate about languages, cultures, history, theology, and ecumenism. I would be happy to show you around Helsinki and Finland or to share my thoughts with your group/audience in the form of an online lecture or interview.
In Finnish, I have written seven popular theological books (on St. Paul, Vatican II, Finnish Catholic-Lutheran history, Mesopotamian/Iraqi Christian history, Laestadianism, and Rome). From 2019 to 2024, I was the Finnish-language editor of Vatican News, the official news agency of the Holy See. Since 2023, I have been co-operating with Kalevala village in Borowice to promote Finnish culture in Poland.
I am also a hyperpolyglot of sorts (and a member of HYPIA): I have completed at least one course or exam in 20 languages (and spent some time learning another 10+ on my own). I am an authorized Helsinki guide in Finnish, English, Polish, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and Swedish. I love to travel and I have been to about 50 countries. I also love reading and I read about 50 books per year.
I have written close to a thousand blog articles in Finnish, and recently, I started doing Youtube interviews. While most of them are in Finnish, on the right you will find my English interviews with Maltese Capuchin Fr. Hayden Williams and Irish Jesuit Fr. James Corkery.
Magic tricks and juggling are old hobbies of mine; and I sometimes still perform. In 2014, I won the 3rd prize in the Finnish Championships of Restaurant Magic. If you would like me to perform, teach, translate, write, or guide for you or your group, don’t hesitate to contact me!
Ratzinger and the Religions: Pope Benedict XVI and Interreligious Dialogue
Doctoral Dissertation, Univ. of Helsinki, 2019
SOCIAL MEDIA
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Featured articles:
Paradise Lost: The world’s debt to Iraq
Adamah Media, 2021
The Nordic Newman
Catholic Herald, 2018
Emil Anton 