Vatican City, Mar 13, 2017 / 03:02 am (CNA/EWTN News).- She begged and scrounged for food in the forest; she drank water from a stream with dead bodies in it; she wrapped grass on her feet in order to walk long distances in the hot sun in order to survive, facing starvation and malnourishment, all before the age of six.
Now, Mirreille Twayigira is a licensed medical doctor hoping not just to save lives, but to inspire young women worldwide – particularly those in her same situation – by showing them there’s hope, and that life is more than the tragedies they face.
While some might label her life “a tragic story” due to the suffering and loss she faced as a young child, Twayigira said others might choose to call it “a story of courage and perseverance.”
However, “I choose to call it a story of hope, a story of God…from ashes to beauty, (like) a beautiful stained glass window.”
Twayigira was among several speakers at the March 8 Voices of Faith women’s gathering in the Vatican, marking International Women’s Day.
First held in 2014, the VoF conference was established in response to Pope Francis’ call to “broaden the space within the Church for a more incisive feminine presence.”
Gathering women from around the world, this year’s VoF took place at the Vatican’s Casina Pio IV, headquarters of the Pontifical Academy for Sciences, and featured testimonies of women from around the world, including Syria and Burundi, who shared their stories of perseverance, highlighting the importance of building peace in a world filled with conflict.
In her testimony, Twayigira noted that when war broke out between Tutsis and members of the Hutu majority the government, leading to mass killings of the Tutsi tribe, she was just three years-old.
Although she doesn’t remember much about the war itself when it started, she remembers the day she got the news that her father had been killed.
“I remember being told that my father had been killed, his body being brought home wrapped in this blue tent,” she said, noting that she was too young to fully understand what was happening on the day of his burial.
Before the war, “we were a big, happy family. Our house was next to our grandparent’s house, so my sister and I used to spend our days with uncles and aunts…so it was a beautiful and happy childhood,” she said.
After her father’s death, however, this changed dramatically.
“My family knew that it was no longer safe for us, so they had to pack and leave,” she said, explaining that at first, they fled to another district of Rwanda, thinking they would be safe.
However, after just a short time her younger sister, who was just one-year-old at the time, got sick and, because her family didn’t have access to medicine or proper nourishment due to the war, she passed away.
After her sister’s death – which marked the second time she had lost a sibling, since an older sister had died before Twayigira was born – the family fled through Burundi to a refugee camp in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
“In the camp I was a very happy kid,” she said, “but this all ended when I encountered more loss.”
While in the camp, her mother fell ill and “one night she was gone.” However, Twayigira said that despite the tragic death of her mother, “life had to go move on,” so she and her grandparents continued to move forward.
But just two years later, in 1996, they had to leave because of war in the DRC, which is when “I began to experience a life that is unimaginable,” she said, recalling how she had her grandparents fled the camp with bullets flying over their heads, and took refuge in the forest.
“We only survived by begging for food,” she said. Her grandparents begged from locals in nearby villages, and at times were given moldy bread to eat. When begging wasn’t enough, “we even had to eat roots from the forest.”
“I remember sometimes we had to drink water from rivers with dead bodies floating in it,” she said, noting that their situation had become one of the “survival of the fittest.”
They had long distances to walk going from village to village and in search of another camp, many times walking on rough terrain. When the weather was too hot for their bare feet, they bunched up grass and tied it to their feet in order to be able to walk.
“We escaped death from so many things: from hunger, bullets, drowning, wild animals, you name it. No child should go through what I went through. In fact, nobody should go through what I went through,” she said.
Eventually the family made their way to another refugee camp, “but life would not be better there,” she said. While there were some soldiers protecting them, they would take young boys and train them to fight, and would take girls either as companions for the night or, at times, as wives.
Most of the boys leave refugee camps “with some sort of trauma,” she said, noting that when it came to the girls, some got pregnant, and others were made to be servants.
“The only reason I survived this is because I was very little,” Twayigira said. Due to the ongoing war, she and her grandparents traveled to nearby Angola before eventually ending up back in the DRC for a period of time.
However, with no improvement to the situation and no end to the war in sight, they again made their way to Angola for the second time. But when they arrived, “my grandma was very tired, and as for me, I was very malnourished.”
“You can imagine a big tummy and thin brown hair, and swollen cheeks and feet,” she said, describing herself as a young girl.
Twayigira recalled that her grandmother died shortly before they reached the refugee camp in Angola, and that had they not arrived when they did, “I was also almost gone.”
With just the two of them left, Twayigira explained that her grandfather eventually decided to travel to a different refugee camp in Zambia, because he heard they had a better school.
Despite such a long journey and so much loss, her grandfather moved again for no other reason “than to give his granddaughter a better education,” Twayigira said. She recalled that her grandfather “really believed in me so much. He never once said, ‘she’s just a girl, let me not waste my time on her.’”
After spending a few years in Zambia, the pair decided to make yet one more move, this time heading to a camp in Malawi that had better living conditions and even better schools. They arrived in September 2000.
Twayigira immediately enrolled in school once she arrived, making several new friends and, for the first time since they had left, was happy to have adequate food and shelter.
Being able to do well in her classes “would give me joy. Because at least I got to make some people proud, and I was very happy,” she said. Twayigira was eventually selected to join a Jesuit-run school, with all fees paid for by the Jesuit Refugee Service.
When she finished school in 2007, Twayigira’s grandfather fell ill, passing away just a few days after.
“I cried uncontrollably, badly, but life had to go on, and although I was in so much pain with the loss of my loved ones, it did not stop me from working hard,” she said, “because I knew that my future, it was not certain, I did not know what my future had, but I knew that my hard work would pay off.”
In 2009 she studied for the national final exam in Malawi, and finished among the top 6 students in the country. At the awards ceremony, the Chinese embassy offered a number of full-ride scholarships to study in China for the top students.
Twayigira was one of the students selected and, despite being a refugee with no citizenship status or passport, was able to get her paperwork in order with the help of the Jesuits at her school, a Catholic radio station and even the Malawian parliament.
She then moved to China and studied the language for a year before officially beginning classes in Chinese. She has since graduated and is currently working as a medical intern in Malawi.
While there were many times she wanted to give up along the way, Twayigira said she persisted, because at a certain point she realized that “God spared my life” not to keep it for herself, but because “there are people that I was meant to serve.”
“Before I went to China, I used to think I was just this girl with a tragic past…but when I got to China I realized that I’ve got a story to tell; a story of God and his love, a story that can change somebody’s life.”
As a doctor, Twayigira said she feels she can give even more. But in addition to her medical duties, she also looks for opportunities to speak in schools to try and “raise hope among the youth, especially refugee youth.”
She said that in the future, she hopes to work more directly with refugees, “because I believe I have a lot to share, having gone through what they’ve gone through.”
“Now this is my story…but unfortunately for many, theirs is just in the tragedy part,” she said, explaining that many refugee children don’t even have access to adequate housing let alone higher education.
Even those who do get a good education don’t necessarily have the same opportunities, Twayigira said, so “their hopes are just crushed.”
In order to change the situation, she said war itself has to end: “why not end all this violence, and I’m not talking about people from other countries coming in to invade our own countries, I mean why wait for an outsider to come to stop hurting, and killing?”
“Is the money or power at the expense of their blood really worth it? I don’t think so,” she said, adding that the only way to really resolve conflict is with “forgiveness, mercy and love.”
“Is there such humanity in us, or have we become robots?” she asked. “What is happening to innocent kids is completely unfair, and it needs to stop and I believe it starts from within us: from love, forgiveness and mercy.”
People in situations similar to hers need to know “that they are loved by God and people around them. They need to know that they matter, that there is hope for them, that they have a purpose in life,” she said, noting that this stems not only from having the basic needs met, but above all from education.
In an interview with CNA after her talk, Twayigira stressed the importance of education, saying it’s “really the key to everything, because if not educated, many girls don’t even know their value.”
However, with a good education women learn that “okay, I’m not worthless and someone can’t just come and step on my foot. I am somebody,” she said, adding that a proper education helps women to step into decision making positions where they can change things.
“I believe that once a girl is educated, that means you’re actually educating the whole family. Because a woman, you raise your children, they’re with you all the time, you know that whatever they get is what you teach them,” she said.
“So if a woman is educated that means the whole family will get quality advice from their mothers. So educating a girl is actually educating the whole country.”
Twayigira said she was happy to be able to speak at the Vatican, since the event was streamed live. She voiced her hope that people can hear her story “and not just feel sorry for me, but also see ways they can help other people like me to get a better education or a safe place, or open their homes to refugees like me.”
She said she also hopes other young women and girls from around the world will be able to see and hear her story, and to know that “it’s all possible…I believe that I’m a pillar of hope for them.”
She said one of her hopes coming out of the conference is not only to encourage young women in her situation to have hope, but also that the people who have the power and resources to change things will see that they “can actually do something under-privileged people like I was.”
“Their actions can change somebody’s life for the better, never to be the same,” she said.
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Synod on Synodality…what nonsense.
Not an open issue, although with condition, at this time. Perhaps, further, “from an official point of view”. Nonetheless, a not uncommon diplomatic response weighing possibles v realities that can’t be criticized.
Sr Nathalie correctly lays priesthood aside. She doesn’t mention the diaconate, an ordained order of ecclesial authority in conjunction with the bishop and presbyter. Realistically, it is the diaconate that has been seriously considered since Amazonia. She had previously expressed her views on this more realistic possibility [realistic simply due to proposals for acceptance by some bishops] as shown here when asked.
“It’s still in discernment. It’s rather clear that during the early church we had the experience of the female diaconate. What is very obvious today is that it can’t only be men who can be in ministry. But there are many different ways to be in ministry” (RNS 12.8.21).
It may seem feasible for some as it did for me as a young layman teaching in Africa, knowledgeable of sisters including African who did the priest’s missionary work deep into remote, dangerous areas alone except with Christ. Teaching the Gospels, lecturing [preaching], carrying the Eucharist dispensed during a communion service. In places where there were no priests available.
Since then and ordination the unique specificity of holy orders, female ordination a more pronounced difficulty. Female deacons at the start assisted Paul, the great Apostle himself highly restrictive regarding women in Church, to be silent, heads covered. The women deacons [we don’t have records I’m aware of defining their exact role] whose assistance he happily accepted seems an anomaly. Cardinals Müller, Burke, and others believe holy orders must remain a male institution, as instituted by Christ The favorable response to that position is that Christ did not ordain women.
Nevertheless we’ve arrived at a time when women have received greater, and just recognition for their capacity to contribute to the mission of the Church.
The apostles called for seven MEN of good repute to be ordained deacons and to share in the ministry along with presbyters and episcopoi. I’m certain that if the apostles wanted to include women among their ranks they could have easily found one to include among the seven. But they didn’t.
Let’s face it, we live in a culture that attempts to create its own realities: men can call themselves women; women can call themselves men; men can attempt a marriage of another man and women do likewise. All sorts of permutations of weird notions get promulgated and the populace are easily hoodwinked into normalizing them.
Some of us just happen to subscribe to objective truths and realities.
Atheism is not merely a conscious rejection of an abstract disbelief in the concept of God. Since truth, not some, not a lot, not most, all truth is a reflection of the perfect mind of God, believing that truth changes is to be an atheist.
As a mere layman (sorry, I’m backward) it’s my understanding that the female
“Deacons” rather, assisted women in preparing for Baptism or Confirmation. It’s
so obvious that it would be an offense against modesty for men to do that. It’s so simple, so logical. And the Deacon’s job seems to have been to make sure all
the “dependents” (widows etc, who had no husbands or sons to protect them) were treated equally. When will we put aside all of this nonsense and end this need to satisfy the feminist passion for power. Women have been serving the Church for 2000 years; indeed, while our Lord was still among us. Apparently they were inferior because they didn’t demand parity. It’s time to bring back a bit of humility, and that includes many, many of the prelates (especially in Germany) and clergy too! Our dear Lord, King of kings, did not find serving demeaning.
Dear Father, with all due respect. You say in defense of the Church’s position… “Paul, the great Apostle himself highly restrictive regarding women in Church, to be silent, heads covered.” Without trying to be rude, that utterance by Paul is tantamount to Mafia men when they say of their women… “keep them barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen”.
Women suffered through history as objects, not as equal participants in God’s plan. My Mother not only wore a hat at Mass, rather a veiled hat. Moreover, As a MALE altar server, I was allowed on the altar, but she was not, except when she retrieved the altar linens to be laundered. As I think of those days I find it hard to sleep.
If it comes from paul it must be gospel.
Pray to the Blessed Mother that she will intervene and provide us with a united path to the future.
“For the Catholic Church at this moment, from an official point of view, it’s not an open question,”
.
Sooo, maybe at some future point then? This just doesn’t seem like a “No, that is not possible. Women cannot be priests,” kind of answer.
A woman cannot be, in essence, a Father.
I am sorry I wasted my time reading such a hodgepodge of gibberish. We can all sleep well tonight knowing that the question of women priests has been answered definitively by the French nun who so inspires the BBC and the overfed prelate in the background of the photo. “For the Catholic Church at this moment, from an official point of view, it’s not an open question.” What a ringing endorsement of Church teaching! Why is the question even being raised again when the answer has been given countless times since the crackpot idea first emerged out of the 1960s? Because Francis and his co-conspirators want to keep the issue alive.
Then the piece ends by quoting more inanities from Francis. Women do “better” in politics and management. Female economists “are renewing the economy in a constructive way.” Asking for evidence to support any of these grand assertions is presumably disrespectful. These are the people who run the Church.
I might revise you last sentence to read instead, “These are the people run the Church INTO THE GROUND.”
Janet Yellen is an economist; need I say more?
Isn’t there enough real work to do instead of spending all this time and energy (and money) on what exactly?
What Sr. Natalie (and Pope Francis) miss is that the Spirit calls Christians to sacred ordination, not the Institutional Church. The Church continues to live in its sin of exclusion, in contradiction to the Spirit’s call to women to ordination. To cite two centuries of this sinfulness as proof of its truth is convoluted. Most biblical scholars acknowledge that Paul’s diminishment of women in the Church were words added by later disciples afraid of rocking the boat of first century cultural norms.
There is agreement that he DID write, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” Does the Church believe this?
Faithful Catholic women join the Spirit in groaning at the tragic doctrines expressed in this article.
Of course, you are here not thinking with the mind of the Church.
All this talk of ordaining women to the Order of Deacon is a ruse. Deacons are configured to Christ as servant Who came to serve and not to be served. These progressive feminists in the Church have spent their lifetime exorcising the demon of servitude. Rather, they lust for power in the Church and won’t be satisfied until they can get ordained as priests. And then, that lofty position in the hierarchy will not be enough to satisfy their lust for power and they will insist on being ordained bishop. But they won’t stop until one of them can get elected Pope. Of course, it wouldn’t be long before even that didn’t satisfy. No, the only path to salvation is: sacrifice, servitude, death to self, humility, piety, fear of the Lord, etc. These would not appeal to the feminist types.
One should remember. We don’t pick this profession. Speaking for myself I do believe I speak for the disciples as well….we don’t choose persecution and ministry. The calling comes from He that sent for us. I have no choice when it comes to following Jesus. He created me. Shaped me. I am obedient because I am. I am here. Awake. A servant to the calling. You don’t mess with the creator. Walking to the beat of His/Her/Their drum. I could speak about pronouns here and now. As teachers we might want to consider the value of “going there” so one can appreciate the pull we have at demonstrating the Importance of questioning our identity. If we are all God’s children, we should consider it was Jesus himself that told us to listen understand and obey the HS. If we are told to leave, go West, use OUR talents. If the HS leads us into the desert….we go!. I don’t say “no I’m a lady”. Jesus loved his ladies. Jesus calls ladies into healing the sick. The ladies might be called into service to Minister to another lady.
For that matter….we might also be lead into not revealing our sex so as to walk in obedience. God wants relationship with all of us. All the time. Yes, we might make mistakes. We are human. No crime. Pick up the cross ✝️ and experience all we were meant to experience. The disciples were told to bring their swords.
Keep your eyes up. Not back. Stand. Witness. And praise God we are here!
Maybe it was BECAUSE “Jesus loved his ladies” that HE (the fully Divine nature! and fully human nature, both) did NOT call them to be his apostles? And, most of all, he loved His mother (as if mothers still matter): because she was most like Himself—in her “fiat.”
But, there is a good side point about the use of “talents”….We are reminded, for example, of the legendary and female amazon archers who cut off their right breasts, such that their arrows could more sharply find their targets. But now females are signaled cut off both breasts, in order to transition more completely! Do we see a pattern here?…
Yes, the answer to actively homosexual priests (not the cover-story “pedophiles”) buggering young men has been a huge disaster, but now to lesbianize the Church (reducing it from sacramental incorporation into Christ, now simplistically to a lady “called in service to Minister to another lady”?) doesn’t cut it, either.
The “pattern”? Must everything be unisexualized under cover of the disordering pronoun thingy? “Keep your eyes up. Not back. Stand. Witness. And praise God we are here!”
“Here?” The new gospel: Entropy is God!
Finally, women can shed their burkas! Well, maybe not.
If rthe church is the bride of Christ then only men can be a priest.
If the current trajectory of societal convolution continues undisturbed per Newton’s laws of motion, we men, who’s roles have all been replaced and/or made completely redundant, have lost our place altogether.
It is interesting that the word “satan” (the accuser), in Latin, is satana, with a feminine suffix.