Category: News

Recipients of the newly translated Bible with Archbishop Joseph Garang Atem Zorial, former Bishop of Renk, who played a major role in the Dinka Cam translation project.

St. Mary’s Episcopal Church in Arlington, Virginia rejoiced to learn that 300 copies of a new translation of the Bible – decades in the making — into the Dinka Cam language were received by Bishop Simon Chuang at St. Mathew’s Cathedral in Renk, South Sudan, just before Pentecost this year, allowing thousands of people to hear of God’s saving acts in their own language.

Among the 60 indigenous language groups of South Sudan, speakers of Dinka (also known as Jieng) are the most numerous, and Cam is an important dialect of the Dinka language. St. Mary’s, along with St. Paul’s Church in Alexandria, Virginia has prayed for these Bible translators since 2002, when the rector, Andrew Merrow, and Russell Randle, a lawyer, visited them at the Kakuma Refugee Camp in Kenya. The visitors saw translators carefully checking portions of their work with speakers of various Dinka dialects. Persevering until 2023 through relocations and the deaths of some translators, receiving publication assistance from Wycliffe Bible Translators, in the fall of 2025 a total of 30,000 copies of the complete Dinka Cam Bible were delivered to Juba, the capital of South Sudan.

Elsewhere, an ongoing effort to put the Bible into the Burun language suffered a setback. Russ Hersman of Wycliffe Bible Translators has worked for many years with Canon Nabil Abdalla, Director of the ECS Translation Department. Most recently they have been laboring to complete the Bible in Burun.  The Burun are a Nilotic people numbering about 50,000, who live primarily in the Blue Nile State of Sudan with some elements residing in South Sudan. Working under the auspices of Bishop Simon Farajalla Mahdi of Wad Medani Diocese in Sudan, they were within six months of finishing the Burun New Testament, when civil war broke out in 2023.  The translation team was recently obliged to regroup in Juba, South Sudan, to finish the task.  At the end of June, Canon Nabil reported that US $8,500 just withdrawn from the bank to fund the Burun and other translation projects was lost when a team member’s bag was snatched by a thief, possibly an inside job. Nabil just heard that his son in Cairo, married in January, has been taken to prison. Another son in Cairo has disappeared.  Nabil thinks he and some other friends may have tried to escape to another country. The situation in Egypt is no longer safe for Sudanese refugees.

Russ Herman prays, “Heavy burdens. Lord God of the universe, you know all things. Please make things right for our dear brothers and sisters who are suffering.”

Gabriel Ismail Abudigin, senior among the Episcopal bishops of Sudan (L), is in danger of inheriting the title given nine months ago to his son, Daramili Abudigin (R), as “Last Pastor left Standing” in El-Fasher.

Food is scarce in El-Obeid, a city of 500,000 people in the dusty central Sudan region of Kordofan, but bank transfers of donated US dollars, including those from AFRECS, allowed the Rt. Rev. Ismail Gabriel Abudigin, the senior bishop in the Episcopal Church of Sudan, to deliver modest amounts of foodstuffs and cash in June to needy households through the parishioners of his one continuing congregation. (Our friend John Poole of Bradford, England, pronounces the name ah-boo-DI-jn, putting the stress on the next-to-last syllable, like the English word “pigeon”.)

Bags of much needed food are readied by parishioners for distribution to inhabitants of the besieged city of El-Obeid.

Violent disorder was already being reported in December 2025, when the Roman Catholic bishop of El-Obeid, Yunan Tombe, returning home from a meeting in Juba, encountered—in separate incidents—the Sudan Armed Forces and, immediately afterward, the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces. “Guns (were) given to the lads and (they were) instructed to carry out their usual business, which clearly was execution,” the bishop said in a message. Despite suffering heavy blows on his neck, face, and sides of the head, he added, “Thanks to the prayers of the church, I was saved. A leader of the paramilitary emerged from his office and ordered the gunmen to free the church people.”

AFRECS believes that the wife and children of the bishop’s son, Daramali Abudigin, remain in El-Obeid, alongside Bishop Abudigin and other members of the Episcopal Church of South Sudan. Fr. Daramali, an Episcopal priest known as “the last pastor left standing in El-Fasher” in 2025, is believed to remain 300 miles to the west in Darfur, assisting homeless residents of El-Fasher who fled that massacre.

AFRECS is grateful for the report from the Port Sudan office of the Episcopal Church of Sudan that our transfer ofUS $65,000 was received in December 2025 and January 2026 has been distributed among 5 of the 6 dioceses in the province, with most funds going to Khartoum and Wad Medeni, cities with the largest populations. Approximately 10% was distributed in El-Obeid, where since 2023 the church has shared relief supplies with Muslim as well as Christian inhabitants.

Read more: The Times of London article “They fled a massacre. Now the city that gave them refuge may be next.” July 1, 2026

HUMANITARIAN APPEAL LETTER

To send a letter to your senator or representative:

Use the following links to find the relevant contact information (email, mailing address, phone, etc.).

• Contacting US Senators
• Find Your Representative

Copy the text to your letter or email or create the talking points you will use for your telephone call.

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Dear Senator /Dear Representative

American Friends of the Episcopal Church of the Sudans (AFRECS) has watched with ever increasing distress the unfolding catastrophe in Sudan. That catastrophe began with the military intervention of October 2021, which derailed a transition to democratic rule, and has been rapidly expanding in scope since April 2023, when the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and the Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) went to war with each other.  The RSF has received massive arms supplies from the United Arab Emirates (denied by the UAE). The SAF has been amply supplied by Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Iran.

Death toll estimates range from 150,00 to 400,000, according to the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies. Fourteen million have been displaced. Two-thirds of the population – over 30 million – need humanitarian support. For well over a year Sudan has been recognized by the United Nations and the U.S. Government as the largest humanitarian crisis in the world.

Thus far Sudanese and international efforts to end the crisis have failed. That is in part because there has been a lack of attention to the Sudan crisis in a world of multiple conflicts. Recently the United States, the United Nations, the African Union, the League of Arab States, the European Union, numerous European states, and the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD – the regional group for the Horn of Africa) affirmed their commitment to the Sudanese people, to a peaceful and democratic future, and to the territorial integrity of the Sudan. Following consultations with Sudanese political stakeholders, that group reaffirmed the urgent need for “a humanitarian truce, leading to a permanent cease-fire,” and the beginning of “a comprehensive and inclusive civilian-led dialogue process.”

Accordingly, we urge Congress to:

1. Insist that the U.S. Government give high priority to promoting a solution to the Sudan crisis;
2. Urge the U.S. Government:

• to put pressure on those governments providing arms to the RSF, the SAF and other militia groups to cease arms transfers immediately, including arms-supplying governments which deny such transfers;
• to find additional measures, together with international partners, to pressure the RSF and the SAF to reach a humanitarian truce;
• to exercise leadership in a vast humanitarian effort, when a truce is realized.

Anita Sanborn, President

Dane F Smith, Executive Director

In a hard-hitting July 12 op-ed in the New York Times, prominent journalist Nicholas Kristof noted that national governments speak out against the horrific violence in Sudan but refrain from talking about the role of the United Arab Emirates, chief armorer of Gen. Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo’s Rapid Support Forces.  Kristof hints that the present may be a good time to spotlight the Emirates. Abu Dhabi wants to avoid unfavorable publicity because it has its own candidate to succeed UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres at the end of this year.

The President of AFRECS, Anita Sanborn, and I, urge Episcopalians, other Christians, and people of good will everywhere to sign our letter (or write your own) and send it to your Congressional representatives in support of two pending bills which would limit US sales of weapons to the UAE as long as it arms the RSF.

AFRECS Humanitarian Letter

Senate Bill: S.935 – A bill to prohibit sales and the issuance of licenses for the export of certain defense articles to the United Arab Emirates, and for other purposes.

House Bill: H.R.2059 – To prohibit the issuance of licenses for the exportation of certain defense articles to the United Arab Emirates, and for other purposes.

A UN fact-finding mission has concluded a careful and massively detailed investigation of the massacres in El Fasher last September, stating that material crimes of genocide by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) against Zaghawa and Fur people were “overwhelmingly present.” Tens of thousands are still unaccounted for.

A London Times reporter describes the agony of displaced residents of Darfur fleeing the massacres in El Fasher only to face the possibility of the same today in El Obeid, capital of North Kordofan. In El Obeid, families are starving while dodging indiscriminate drone attacks just to stay alive,” said Jan Egeland, secretary general of the Norwegian Refugee Council on July 7th. “The world has been warned about this crisis and let it happen anyway.”

Agencies including Christian Aid, Catholic Relief Services, and Pax Christi have pleaded, “El-Obeid must not be allowed to become the site of further grave violations and preventable humanitarian catastrophe.”

Executive Director

Dr. Edward Eremugo Kenyi reports from Baltimore, Maryland: “Again this year we celebrated at St. Matthew Catholic Church, 5401 Loch Raven Boulevard. The event was well attended, with over 120 participants from Northern Virginia, District of Columbia, Maryland, and even Pennsylvania, including women and children. Yes, I sang some of the Easter songs in Arabic, and Mr. Emmanuel Hakim led on the keyboard. Pastor Kwathi Ajawin gave the homily, centered on I Corinthians 15:19-26. I have the homily on YouTube.” Mother Margaret Yar Deng, leader of the Dinka-language congregation at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Alexandria, Virginia reports good participation on the Sunday after Easter.

by Dane Smith

Sunday morning February 8, 2026, we drove further north for about forty-five minutes, left the road, crossed a wide, sandy wadi, and arrived at a grove of massive mango trees. Bishop Andudu, Assistant Bishop Hassan, and other clergy donned their vestments and joined a wide circle of perhaps a hundred men and women under the trees. After an opening prayer, various choirs of young women appeared, singing in Moro, the language of this part of the Nuba Mountains. After each of two Scripture readings, a choir appeared or reappeared. Eventually the bishops and the foreigners were introduced and asked to speak. 

I spoke briefly in Arabic to introduce AFRECS and describe our work for the Episcopal Church of Sudan and of South Sudan. Mentioning my earlier visits to Sudan, I rejoiced in my first visit to the Nuba Mountains. I noted we were considering, with Bishop Andudu’s encouragement, a possible program in trauma healing. 

Rev. Jared Wensyel, Executive Director, Sudan Church Partners, preached a sermon in English, translated into Arabic. Over time, the numbers rose steadily, to perhaps three hundred. We were sharing a uniquely African worship experience. It had relatively little in common with services I have attended in the Juba cathedral, which I could recognize as Episcopal rites. The service ended after three hours, and we repaired to another grove of tree for a lunch of chicken, rice, and goat innards, with strong sweet tea.

Why worship in the mango grove? For one thing, it certainly was a lot cooler than worship in one of the several churches we saw along the way, without fans, heated to ninety degrees by the incessant morning sun.

The real reason, however, is security. The Sudan Armed Forces has targeted large gatherings of church people, in the dioceses of Kadugli and the newer diocese of Heiban, with drone attacks. An attack on a 2023 Christmas gathering in Dilling killed several Christians. So, precautions are taken with large gatherings, particularly those involving Christian leaders. The precautions might also relate to disquiet among Muslim leaders over rapid gains in Christian numbers in the Nuba Mountains, with its mixed population of Muslims, Christians, and traditional African religions.

Christian evangelism is expanding rapidly in this area, sealed off thus far from the depredations of the Sudan Armed Forces or any authorities in Khartoum or Port Sudan. This area is under the control of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/North. Their agents, unknown to me, were circulating in our area – a mode of quiet policing to avoid trouble. To the north of this area, in Kadugli and Dilling, where Muslim authorities are still in general control, there is little church expansion. 

General Abdelaziz al-Hilu, popularly known as Aziz, is the strongman of the Nuba Mountains. A major figure in the SPLM/North, Aziz has kept the Sudan Armed Forces out of the Nuba Mountains. He has the reputation of being perhaps the most capable commander in the country. He has favored a democratic polity and separation of religion from the state.

It generated some perplexity when he signed an agreement with the Rapid Support Forces of Gen. Mohammed Degalo to create the “Government of Peace & Unity” in early 2025 and assumed the number two position. Bishop Andudu says Aziz concluded early on that, while both sides in Sudan’s civil war were evil, he needed to avoid having both against him, if a settlement were reached between the two. Given the more recent Islamist slant of the SAF, he sided – for the moment – with the RSF. The latter has pledged secular rule in their area. That seems a reasonable interpretation.

O God, by your providence the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church; as the martyrs of the Sudan refused to abandon Christ even in the face of torture and death, and by their sacrifice brought forth a plentiful harvest, so may we be steadfast in our faith in Jesus Christ; who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, for ever and ever.

In 2018, the General Convention of The Episcopal Church meeting in Austin, Texas, encouraged dioceses and congregations to observe the Feast of the Martyrs of Sudan on the Sunday closest to May 16^th. It called for public prayer plus personal outreach to Sudanese and South Sudanese immigrants in our vicinities. This governing body urged “exploring appropriate efforts to assist their effort to foster peace in South Sudan and Sudan, and among its disparate tribes.”   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ezra_Baya_Lawiri

Following his death in Nairobi in April, the South Sudan armed forces transported the body of Bishop Nathaniel Garang Anyieth to Juba to lie in state at All Saints Cathedral in Juba. He was finally laid to rest at the Episcopal Cathedral near his compound in Bor, in the Upper Nile region. Canon Jerry Drino of San Jose, California, reports that the Archdeacon for the Episcopal Church of South Sudan in Kenya, Michael Bul Tor, accompanied the bishop’s body to Bor, along with four busloads of Episcopalians from Kenya.

by Leslie Siegmund

Our covenant with the Diocese of Ezo had held good for more than a quarter of a century — through wars, independence for South Sudan, and the tenure of several bishops — until in 2025  the United States imposed a travel ban on visitors from South Sudan, torpedoing our invitation to the Rt. Rev. Isaac Ephraim J. Bangisa, current bishop of Ezo, to visit our parish in Great Falls, Virginia. We needed a workaround.

Then we called to mind our mutual acquaintances, Ezo’s and St. Francis’s, with the Diocese of Salisbury in England. Bishop Isaac had visited Salisbury when he traveled to the 2022 Lambeth Conference. We had corresponded sporadically with members of the Sherborne Deanery-Ezo Link Team in Salisbury for about 10 years, exchanging information about projects and fundraising. Could we meet halfway between Africa and the U.S., in England?

Dr. Andrew Tomkins, a retired researcher on tropical diseases, and his wife Celia offered to host everyone at their large home. Bishop Isaac and Mama Nora obtained UK visas and arrived February 25^th. The next day, four members of St. Francis—Priest-in-Charge Weston Mathews, Deacon Nancy Searby, and parishioners Jack Mathias and myself—landed at Heathrow for the three-hour drive to Salisbury. The workaround worked.

We women attending the local Mothers’ Union meeting, where Mama Nora spoke about her Mothers’ Union in Ezo and showed photos of women learning to sew on machines purchased with donations from Sherborne. Over afternoon tea and cake, we met our counterparts on the Ezo-Sherborne Link team. Saturday, we filmed interviews with Bishop Isaac and Mama Nora, learning more about Ezo’s need for a functioning secondary school. Around the Tomkins’s generous dining table, we worked to update our covenant. Zoom connected us with St. Francis parishioners back in Virginia after their Sunday morning service. Before our return to the U.S., we learned of the UK-based Sudan Medical Link Team (https://www.salisburysudanspartnership.co.uk/about-us/) which supports Episcopal Church of South Sudan clinics with medical supplies, equipment, and training of health workers, focused on maternal and child health and combatting malnutrition and malaria.

Once back home in Virginia, we were thrilled to raise enough money to help build the high school in Ezo—the first Episcopal secondary school in that Diocese. Construction started on April 10^th. Our Associate Rector, the Rev. Joy Warburton, was able to connect with Mama Nora over Zoom and exchange Mothers’ Union information. Joy also worked on a plan to connect St. Francis and Ezo youth. We anticipate future connections between St. Francis, Sherborne, and Ezo, exploring the fruits of this unexpected but fortuitous workaround.

As we celebrate May 16 the Feast of the Martyrs of Sudan, it is fitting to remember the toll taken by the civil war in Sudan, which has entered its fourth year.  The Council on Foreign Relations in its “Global Conflict Tracker” reminds us that the estimated death toll ranges for 61,000 to 200,000; nine million are displaced – the worst displacement crisis in the world; four million have fled to other countries – most also very unstable, like Chad, Ethiopia, and South Sudan; and more than 33 million are enduring “the world’s largest hunger crisis.”

The Iran war has once more taken the spotlight off Sudan.  The Trump Administration is focused on bringing that conflict –now almost 11 weeks old – to an end.  Iran’s attacks on the UAE, perhaps the country that has most fueled the Sudan war with arms, has pushed it into closer alliance with the U.S. and Israel.  There could be an opportunity to press the UAE to halt its arms sales to the RSF, but no attention is being paid.

Executive Director