Patrick Sookhdeo  Patrick Sookhdeo (born 20 March 1947) is the director of the Institute for the Study of Islam and Christianity and was for 22 years International Director of the Barnabas Fund. Sookhdeo is an outspoken spokesman for persecuted Christian minorities around the world. He has made many media appearances in Great Britain and is an advocate for human rights and freedom of religion. Sookhdeo is a commentator on jihadist ideology, and has lectured British and NATO military officers on Islamic extremism. Patrick Sookhdeo was born in 1947 in British Guiana (now Guyana), to an originally Hindu father who had become a Muslim in order to marry Sookhdeo's Muslim mother. His family migrated to England in the late 1950s, and in 1965 the student Sookhdeo converted to Christianity. In 1967 he pursued studies at London Bible College (now the London School of Theology) and went on to obtain a doctorate in 2000 from London University's School of Oriental and African Studies. During that time Sookhdeo began exploring interfaith dialogue and became increasingly concerned by the brutality being leveled at Christian minorities in Islamic nations, and the Islamic death penalties for conversion from Islam. In 1975 with his wife Rosemary, Sookhdeo founded "In Contact Ministries", now called Servants Fellowship International, promoting evangelism and compassionate ministries in multi-cultural urban contexts in the UK. During this period, Sookhdeo was also one of the organisers of the early Greenbelt Christian arts festivals. In 1989, Sookhdeo created the London-based Institute for the Study of Islam and Christianity, and this saw the creation of a global database on extremist movements and ideologies whose followers were persecuting religious minorities across the Muslim world. By 1991, Sookhdeo was predicting that an "Islamic storm" was on the horizon. He is the International Director of the Barnabas Fund, a charity that supports persecuted Christian minorities around the world. Sookhdeo was awarded the 2001 Coventry Cathedral International Prize for Peace and Reconciliation. The Syriac Orthodox Church has awarded him St. Ignatius Theophoros' Decoration as Commander. He is also Chorepiscopus in the Syriac Orthodox Church. He is Dean Theologian of the Diocese of Abuja Province, Nigeria, and is ordained in the Church of Pakistan. Sookhdeo is non-residentiary canon of Khyber Diocese, Pakistan.