AFRECS E-Blast: December 20, 2022

Posted on by AmerFriendSudan

Encouraging Words from National Leaders of the Episcopal Church
The Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church, Michael B. Curry, on October 1 conveyed by video to a group of South Sudanese pastors gathered in Kansas City his regret that the Episcopal Church had not been more welcoming in the years following their 2000 resettlement in various regions of the US, from Maine to San Diego.  (Courtesy of Canon Ranjit K. Mathews, Diocese of Connecticut; and Episcopal Church Communication Office.)
Julia Ayala Harris, a laywoman elected President of the House of Deputies in July 2022, sent the diaspora pastors her own message. She recalled how time she spent years ago in Juba, Rumbek, and Yambio now encouraged her to remind the Eleventh Assembly of the World Council of Churches, when discussing peace in Europe, to remember also the wars in Africa.

Executive Director’s Update
As we come to the end of 2022, I am inspired by the progress registered in AFRECS’ partnership with the Episcopal Church of South Sudan and the Episcopal Church of Sudan.  AFRECS Board member James Hubbard and I were able to observe this progress first hand during our visit to the Sudans August 10-25.

  • In the Diocese of Terekeka in Central Equatoria we had conversations with Mothers’ Union leaders conducting trauma healing sessions with groups of women.  The women are learning literacy in the Bari language, dealing with each others’ wounds from gender-based violence, and establishing livelihoods from the savings they mobilize.
  • In an Internally Displaced Camp near Juba we spoke to and listened to enthusiastic students at the orphan school created by Bishop John Gattek.  Fortified by substantial funding from St. Margaret’s Episcopal Church, Annapolis, Maryland, the school has grown from 50 children in 2017 to about 500 today.
  • We visited the site of the future campus of the Episcopal University of South Sudan, accredited this year by the South Sudanese Government.  AFRECS has this year provided support for the physical infrastructure of the new campus as well as scholarship aid to needy students.  The University will add greatly to very limited opportunities for higher education.
  • Because churches are growing there, the Episcopal Church of Sudan created a new diocese in the Kadugli/Nuba Mountains area, where AFRECS has been assisting girls to continue studying at the Hope Primary School.

These churches are bringing Jesus’s message of good news to the poor.  We urge you to continue to support AFRECS morally and financially so that we can strengthen our partnership.

I wish you God’s blessings in this holy season of Christmas.

Dane Smith
Executive Director

Who’s Where?
Diocese of Bentiu:  AFRECS helped fund a successful peace and reconciliation conference and training session in the Upper Nile Diocese of Bentiu attended by both Joseph Garang Atem, Bishop of Malakal and Archbishop of the Internal Province of Upper Nile, and Bishop John Jal of Bentiu.  The conference, over a two-day period in late October, was an excellent opportunity for relationship-building among church and lay leaders, including those resident and those based outside Bentiu.

Boston University: Dr. Michèle Sigg, director of the Dictionary of African Christian Biography,  has announced that a short biography of the late Dr. Oliver Meru Duku, a native of Kajo-Keji, health director for southern Sudan, and Principal of Bishop Allison Theological College, can now be viewed online at https://dacb.org/stories/south-sudan/duku-oliverm/

Atlanta, Georgia: Abraham Deng Ater has published his autobiography, My Lost Childhood.

Wilmore, Kentucky: Jacob Thon Guot has published his autobiography, The Lost Is Found.

Homeland Devastated, Diaspora Prays to Heaven
by Richard J. Jones

Pastor Kwathi Akol Ajawin raised his family in a peaceful suburb of Washington, D.C.  Now he grieves for the three thousand children, women, and elderly displaced civilians massacred in November in the homeland of the Shilluk, an ethnic group estimated to number around one million people. Now he prays fervently for an end to the interethnic violence in Upper Nile State.

Violence in July between rival splinter groups from the Sudan Peoples Liberation Movement/Army – In Opposition (SPLM/A -IO) was exacerbated in November when Lou Nuer militia known as the White Army, using machineguns,  attacked a camp for flood victims in Dethouk Payam, according to the UN Relief and Rehabilitation coordinator Paul Awin.
Displaced people arrive in the town of Malakal, Upper Nile State, after being attacked in Adidiang village on 7 September 2022 (Radio Tamazuj) 
Kwathi requests friends of the Sudans to pray with him for God’s mercy on the people of Upper Nile. He holds up the vision of the prophet Ezekiel ( 34:25): “I will make with them a covenant of peace and banish wild animals from the land, so that they may live in the wild and sleep in the woods securely.”

A Prayer Offered
by David Colin Jones, retired suffragan bishop of Virginia

Lord, Christ, embolden the leaders of your churches in Sudan and South Sudan to bring hope and promise to the suffering, the discouraged, the poor, and the homeless.  Give them grace to love and to care for your people.  Protect them and guide them to do your will.  All this we ask in the Name of Jesus,  our Lord.
We are deeply grateful that contributions from you, our supporters, continue to nurture AFRECS in expanding our impact.  You make a difference in the essential peacebuilding work of the Episcopal Church of South Sudan, so needed in these challenging times. We hope you will make a contribution to support AFRECS’ work with the people of the Sudans and will offer a prayer for them. You can contribute online at https://afrecs.org or send a check made out to AFRECS to P.O. Box 3327, Alexandria, VA 22302.
This issue was compiled by Richard Jones, Anita Sanborn and Phil Darrow. AFRECS is eager to receive your comments, news, or corrections at anitasanborn@gmail.com.  Earlier issues of this E-Blast are available and searchable at www.afrecs.org/news/eblast.