Articles by CNA Daily News

Juba, South Sudan, Apr 11, 2017 / 12:29 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The president of the Sudanese Catholic Bishops’ Conference called on leaders in South Sudan’s Bahr El Ghazal region to fight segregation and division, uniting to work for peace in the violence-ridden country.

Achieving peace, said Bishop Barani Eduardo Hiiboro Kussala of Tombura-Yambio, “demands of all of us that we act with real respect for human life. It demands that those who still sponsor anger, hate, segregation and violence against one another end such meaningless projects or ideas.”

On April 6, Bishop Kussala published “An Open Letter of Hope and Peace to the Elders of Greater Bahr El Ghazal.”

His letter marked one month since the death of Bishop Rudolf Deng Majak of the Catholic diocese of Wau, which is part of the Bahr El Ghazal region of South Sudan. The 76-year-old bishop died March 6 at a relative’s house in Siegburg, Germany, where he was awaiting an operation that had been scheduled for the following week.

“The wound inflicted by his death remains deep and raw and so, as we pray for him, we carry in prayer those for whom his death has left a painful void,” Bishop Kussala said.

He appealed to the elders of the greater Bahr El Ghazal area to work for peace and alleviate suffering in Bishop Deng’s memory.

“The best gift we can give him forever is being part of the reconstruction, reconciliation, and reintegration, regeneration of our country, ravaged by the war waged by us and against ourselves.”

Working to change the spiral of suffering, revenge killings, hatred and displacement is a difficult task, Bishop Kussala acknowledged.

“It demands new initiatives to move Greater Bahr El Ghazal and our country forward to freedom as quickly as possible. With this letter I am indeed consulting leaders of civil society, religious leaders, community organizations, business, cultural and other leaders in Greater Bahr El Ghazal to seize an opportunity on such initiatives.”

South Sudan has been embroiled in civil war since December 2013, when South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir accused his former deputy, Riek Machar, of attempting a coup. The war has been fought between their supporters, largely along ethnic lines, and peace agreements have been short-lived.

The conflict has created more than 2.5 million refugees. At present some 4.5 million people face severe food insecurity, a number expected to rise one million by July.

“At the core of the crisis within South Sudan’s war-affected communities and regions is the desire to acquire power and secure resources for one group of elites or one ethno-national group at the expense of others,” Bishop Kussala said.

This has created tension and division, and “has undermined the social fabric of our society or nation,” even affecting neighboring countries as refugees seeking the escape the conflict flee to other nations.

“In all of these cases, violence has led to the breakdown of our beloved homes,” Bishop Kussala continued. “Human lives have been lost. Infrastructure has been destroyed, education and health services have suffered, and the environment has been damaged. The ties that link people together…have been broken, social solidarity has collapsed and political tension has been highly generated.”

These conflicts arise from self-interested elites who take advantage of past divisions, the bishop said. However, peace is possible, as evidence by the “relative peace, development and economic growth after our national independence shortly in 2011.”

In an efforts to restore this stability, Bishop Kussala called on the elders of Greater Bahr El Ghazal to “engage all stakeholders” in seeking peace, allowing for dialogue and supporting genuine efforts aimed at reconciliation and healing.

He urged the elders to publically and unequivocally condemn revenge killings, violence against civilians and the use of hate speech which fosters tribal division.

In addition, he said, they should “call urgently for immediate robust humanitarian intervention for the starving people in and outside Wau,” pushing for roads to be opened to aid workers delivering food for the hungry population.

Efforts are needed both to prevent further killings and to foster reconciliation and healing in society, the bishop said. He also recommended an independent investigation into atrocities against the community, in order to hold perpetrators accountable.

In solving these problems, it is important to remember the role of culture, Bishop Kussala said.

“People derive their sense of meaning from their culture…Cultural attitudes and values…provide the foundation for the social norms by which you as a people exist and live,” he noted. “Through internalizing and sharing these cultural attitudes and values with fellow community members, and by handing them down to future generations, societies can – and do – re-construct themselves on the basis of a particular cultural image.”

Achieving peace in Wau State will require an acknowledgement of wrongdoing, repentance and an offering of forgiveness, the bishop said. It will also require “a way for members of these communities to ‘re-inform’ themselves of their rich history of co-existence with a cultural logic that emphasizes sharing and equitable resource distribution.”

“The people of Greater Bahr El Ghazal should draw their strength from each other as one people,” he emphasized. “You have common humanity, heritage, history and you are socially interwoven.”

“For Wau State to live and prosper, we must come together!”

[…]

Washington D.C., Apr 10, 2017 / 11:38 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Following the murder of Christians in Egypt through two bombings during Palm Sunday liturgies, bishops around the world joined Pope Francis in prayer.

“We also pray for our Coptic Orthodox sisters and brothers who continue to be resilient in the face of ongoing and escalating attacks, and who resist the urge to react vengefully or reciprocally,” said Bishop Angaelos, general bishop of the Coptic Orthodox Church in the United Kingdom.

Two Egyptian Coptic Orthodox churches in Alexandria and Tanta, in the north of the country, were bombed during their Palm Sunday services. The attacks killed at least 44 and injured more than 100, Reuters reported. ISIS has claimed responsibility for the bombings.

In Tanta, an explosion rocked Mar Gerges Coptic Orthodox church during the Palm Sunday liturgy. A state investigation said it was a suicide bombing. A bomb had been found and disabled at the church a week before, a police official told Reuters.

Shortly afterward, a suicide bomber rushed the outside of the Coptic Orthodox Cathedral in Alexandria where Tawadros II, Patriarch of the See of St. Mark, was celebrating the liturgy, and detonated his explosives. Security details had reportedly been placed outside of both churches.

The attacks came only weeks before Pope Francis plans to visit Egypt to promote peace and dialogue between Christians and Muslims in the country. Pope Francis, after celebrating Palm Sunday Mass at St. Peter’s Square, decried the violence and asked God to “convert the hearts of those who sow fear, violence and death, and those who make and traffic arms.” He also expressed solidarity with Tawardos II.

Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi declared a state of emergency in Egypt following the attacks. Sunday’s atrocities follow a months-long spike in anti-Christian violence in Egypt, particularly in the country’s Sinai region.

In December, 29 died in a bombing of a chapel next to St. Mark’s Coptic Orthodox cathedral in Cairo, where ISIS took credit for the attack.

Then several Christians were attacked and killed in their homes and villages by ISIS affiliates in the Sinai region in the following months. Hundreds fled their homes as a result of the violence. In total, 40 were reported killed in the bombing and in the ensuing three months.

The advocacy group In Defense of Christians voiced their “solidarity with Egypt, particularly Egypt’s Christian community,” and senior advisor Andrew Doran stated that “we call on Egypt’s government to use all necessary means to make places of worship in Egypt safe, especially those systematically targeted by terrorists.”

Bishops in the U.S. also condemned the bombings and declared their solidarity with Christians in Egypt.

“They were at Church. They were praying. And in the midst of what should be peace, horrible violence yet again,” Cardinal Daniel DiNardo of Houston-Galveston, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said Sunday.

“Our Holy Father has pointed out – and it’s something that the statisticians have pointed out in recent years – that there are more Christians dying for the faith today than ever happened under the Roman authorities at the time of the pagan empire,” Cardinal Donald Wuerl of Washington, D.C. said at the end of Palm Sunday Mass at St. Matthew’s Cathedral in Washington.

Ultimately, the greatest thing Christians can do for their brothers and sisters in Egypt is pray, especially during Holy Week, the bishops said.

“May Our Lady, Queen of Peace, intercede for us as we pray for an end to all violence,” Bishop Michael Burbidge of Arlington reflected on Sunday.

“So I would ask you today, and during this Holy Week when you are lifting up your hearts in prayer, to remember them [the Coptic Christians],” Cardinal Wuerl emphasized.

“They have no voice. They have no one to speak for them. They have no one to stand up for them. But we can at least remember them as part of the Body of Christ being crucified in our day today. We pray for them.”

Cardinal DiNardo joined in Pope Francis’s prayers for the victims, the perpetrators, and those trafficking in weapons.

“I also pray for the nation of Egypt, that it may seek justice, find healing, and strengthen protection for Coptic Christians and other religious minorities who wish only to live in peace,” he said.

Bishop Angaelos viewed the suffering of Egypt’s Christians through the mysteries of Holy Week and Easter Sunday

“As we celebrate Palm Sunday today and Christ’s entry into Jerusalem, we now also mark the entry of those who have passed today into the heavenly Jerusalem,” he said of the bombings. “As we continue into the Holy Week of our Savior, we share in the pain and heartbreak of their families and of all those affected by today’s incidents.”

“As we celebrate the Feast of the glorious Resurrection at the end of this week, we are reminded that our life here on earth is a journey often filled with pain, at the end of which is a promised glorious and eternal life void of such suffering and evil.”

[…]

Pretoria, South Africa, Apr 10, 2017 / 10:39 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The bishops of South Africa have called on the country’s embattled president, Jacob Zuma, to consider stepping down as part of an effort to fight corruption.

Marches protesting Zuma have been held across cities in South Africa after he reshuffled his cabinet, replacing a respected finance minister at the end of March, which resulted in the country’s credit rating being cut to junk status by S&P.

The sacked minister, Pravin Gordhan, is regarded as an opponent of government corruption.

“We respectfully remind President Zuma that he has been elected to serve all South Africans,” read the April 4 letter from the South African bishops’ conference, signed by Archbishop Stephen Brislin of Cape Town.

“It appears that he has lost the confidence of many of his own closest colleagues, as well as that of numerous civil society organisations. He should earnestly reconsider his position, and not be afraid to act with courage and humility in the nation’s best interests.”

However, the bishops’ letter also noted that while they “noted and respect” the calls for Zuma to resign, “such as step would not in itself be a complete solution, as corruption at every level must to be rooted out.”

Zuma has been South Africa’s president since 2009, and his term of office is not due to end until 2019. He is also leader of the African National Congress, which has ruled the country since 1994.

Though some elements in the ANC, as well as several of its allied parties, are calling on Zuma to resign, the party’s National Working Committee has reiterated its support for him.

In their April 4 statement, the bishops wrote that “the leadership of the ANC must make serious and strenuous efforts to end corruption and patronage at all levels of governance.”

“In the present state of anxiety and uncertainty it is of utmost importance that Parliament be reconvened urgently. There is an enormous obligation on our public representatives … to exercise their duty of holding the Executive arm of government to account.”

“We hope that Membersof Parliament will be guided by the welfare of our country and its people, and not by narrow loyalties or factional interests,” they added.

The bishops concluded by stating: “We have confidence in the leaders of the two noble institutions, Parliament and the ANC, and we trust that they will rise to the occasion and give decisive, fearless and honest leadership.”

[…]