Achmed Otaiba is being very careful these days.

Otaiba, a 23-year-old native of the United Arab Emirates attending the University of Kentucky, says he’s just "been walking straight from the car to class, not wandering around, curtailing some of my freedoms in a way so that I won’t face the wrong people at the wrong time. It makes more sense to be careful."

He has good reason to be cautious. Since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, unknown suspects driving a black pickup have assaulted three international students on the University of Kentucky campus. In each case, the people drove up to a student walking alone, handed him a blank piece of paper as if asking for directions, then punched him in the face when he handed it back. One student was Indian, one Palestinian, and one Japanese. Someone else threw rocks through the windows at the Islamic Center near the Kentucky campus a few days later. And in Evansville, Ind., a man rammed his car into another student Islamic Center, telling police he did so in response to the Sept. 11 attacks.

Fear over such attacks present a unique opportunity for Christian students to reach out to Muslims in love.

"People have been made aware that we’re not as in control as we thought we were," says Dan Arneman, a 22-year-old University of Kentucky senior who belongs to a group called Cats for Christ. "It used to be you couldn’t talk about God or you were a bigoted hatemonger. This is a time when people have questions and we need to have answers because they’re willing to listen now."

At Kentucky, Christian and Muslim student groups are beginning to come together for candlelight vigils and discussion. Two days after the attacks, a leader from InterVarsity Christian Fellowship who asked that his name not be used in this article e-mailed a letter to the Muslim Student Association, letting them know that "we were praying for you as well as the victims of these tragedies."

"The Muslim students responded well and invited us to a candlelight vigil," the leader tells Boundless. "Later they invited us to a forum on the current events from a Muslim’s perspective. We spoke of more meetings with our groups. I’m happy for the dialogue that’s happening."

Arneman is happy to hear about such gatherings.

"I think this could be the beginning of a bridge of understanding. I don’t know that it is yet," Arneman says. "A lot of Christians I know are pretty content with what they know."

University of Texas-Austin sophomore Kate Tannous, a Christian who is half-Lebanese and a Middle Eastern studies major, is surrounded by Muslims in her classes but says she has not yet found a way to discuss her faith with them.

"I think we should continue to have our same conversations with them," she says, "and make sure they know you care about them and you don’t stereotype them with the rest of these (terrorists). Given the right setting, I think I could discuss (my faith) with my Muslim classmates."

Cross-cultural witnessing is never easy, says Bill Devlin, president of the Urban Family Council in Philadelphia, Penn. Devlin, an evangelical Christian, has lived outside his personal comfort zone so long he probably can’t remember what it was like anymore. He makes a habit of building friendships with Muslims, Sikhs, gays and lesbians, feminists and Jews -- anyone whose views are typically seen as hostile to the Christian faith. Many have come to Christ as a result of those relationships -- and those who haven’t still know there is a Christian in Philadelphia who loves them.

Devlin points out that rejection is one of the most powerful negative emotions known to man, one most people are not willing to risk experiencing. But there are ways to create that "right setting," to love people who are not like you and may be hostile to your faith in practical ways.

"A lot of evangelical students are probably saying, ‘I can’t meet with Muslims!’ " Devlin says. "But you have to step outside yourself. Be vulnerable. Be transparent. This is not the Yellow Brick Road. It’s the Way of the Cross, and that means rough-hewn timber scratching into your bare, beaten back. So hang in there. Don’t isolate yourself from Muslim students."