| IT’S the women who are most strongly articulating the challenges of the contexts they come from. Linda Andrea Apaya Amidi, wife of the Bishop of Lainya, and Daburah Abuk Atem Mading, wife of the Archbishop of Sudan, speak with determination and without self-pity. Their voices:
“Women of Sudan are suffering from many aspects of war. Many, many of them lost their husbands. . . They do whatever work they can: when the time comes for school fees, they sell what they can and pay for their children.
“In any diocese in Sudan, women are the backbone of the Church. They are doing very well in spite of the difficulties they are in. They are very faithful; they always commit themselves to the Lord. Many of them are traumatised and stressed. We have this local grassroots trauma counselling for them; so they are just coping. . .
“We train young girls who are out of school as result of rape, early marriages — she is too young: she cannot manage the house. We train them in tailoring, gender awareness, HIV/AIDS, and adult education. We don’t have to wait for outside people to come and help us. We are just developing ourselves.”
“What happens in our country is not like in Europe. We have more young people in the church than older people. We have 100 youth just in the choir. Half the church is children. We don’t have a hall; so we are under the trees — one service is 2000 people. Can you imagine? The world of the Mothers’ Union is very strong. Because of that, women are now accepted to be priests. We are expecting a bishop to come from that.”
“Our country is very large; our problem is transport. Many of us don’t have cars but we like to move. You can walk three hours to reach another parish. It’s a big problem: women are suffering.”
You don’t grumble, you never complain, I observe. They say: “We complain to God. Nobody can hear, only God. The women are praying. The war is going on, and we are asking God to bring peace. Hostilities are stopping now in Southern Sudan, and we are happy.”
“We pray. God will do it.” |
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