Heeding Jesus' teaching to "love your neighbour as yourself," Christians from the United States and overseas have pitched in to help rebuild a mosque in Texas that burned down last week.
Jews have also joined in the effort, even offering their synagogue as a temporary worship place for the Muslim community in Victoria, a small city in Texas about 125 miles southwest of Houston with a population of about 65,000, according to the Huffington Post.
At least four churches have also offered their facilities for the Muslims to hold their services following the fiery destruction of the Victoria Islamic Center. The cause of the fire is still being investigated.
"We are praying that it is an accident because the thought of actually somebody doing something terrible like that is beyond imagination," mosque member Abe Ajrami told the Victoria Advocate.
"Jewish community members walked into my home and gave me a key to the synagogue," Dr. Shahid Hashmi, a co-founder of the Victoria Islamic Center, told The New York Times.
A GoFundMe page was set up for the reconstruction of the mosque, and it has raised $1.2 million of its $850,000 goal. The donations came from more than 23,000 people in seven days.
Many who donated commented on the recent rise in anti-Muslim sentiment in the U.S. and the controversial executive order signed by President Donald Trump on Friday, which temporarily banned immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries.
Children from a local Catholic school trooped to the mosque to form what Muslim leaders called "a human chain of love and peace."
Gretchen Boyle, an English teacher at St. Joseph High School, said their gesture is in response to the call, "Love thy neighbour" since the Muslim community is "literally our neighbours."
The Catholic students from the school presented the mosque elders with a tree sapling.
"The tree will be planted in the grounds of our new mosque & prominently displayed to remind us of this beautiful moment," the Islamic centre wrote on its Facebook page. "This is the spirit of love where the cross hugs the crescent."
Omar Rachid, a member of the Muslim congregation who organised the donation drive, said, "Our hearts are filled with gratitude for the tremendous support we've received."
"The outpouring of love, kind words, hugs, helping hands and the financial contributions are examples of the true American Spirit and Humanity at its best with donations coming in from all over the world," he added.
