Peace high on agenda of interfaith meetings
FEATURE STORY: Gillian Sandford/ACT-Caritas
PUBLISHED: January 25, 2006
NYALA, SOUTH DARFUR, SUDAN -- They whooped in joy as their battered buses swept into a dusty sports pitch. Then they clambered out to hear a prominent church leader who had come to visit this troubled region to pray for peace and to meet with local religious leaders.
In the sun in Nyala, the regional capital of South Darfur, Cardinal Keith O’Brien, head of Scotland’s Roman Catholics, lead an ecumenical prayer for peace in Darfur on Sunday evening (January 22) in the presence of more than 2,000 people -- women in brightly coloured toubs, men in pressed shirts, and children.
The first day of the cardinal’s first trip to the province was marked by a series of events in which he stressed the theme of peace through talks with church delegations in Nyala, through his public meeting with Muslim leaders, and through his address at the ecumenical prayer for peace.
The cardinal is on a four-day tour of Darfur as part of a ten-day visit to Sudan, accompanied by Paul Chitnis, head of the Catholic Church’s aid organization in Scotland (SCIAF/Caritas Scotland).
The visit is to see for himself the situation in Sudan on behalf of the Catholic Church and to learn more about the projects that people in Scotland have funded.
Over the coming days, he will be visiting the projects run by the ACT-Caritas relief operation in the south and west of Darfur and by its church-based partner agencies.
ACT-Caritas is a grouping of Protestant, Catholic, and Orthodox relief agencies from across the globe that have come together to work in Darfur.
After meeting church leaders, many of whom hold key positions in ACT-Caritas partner agencies - Sudan Council of Churches (SCC), the Sudan Social Development Organisation (SUDO), and Sudanaid -- the cardinal met dozens of leading imams.
The general secretary of imams, Abdullah Adam Noman, welcomed the cardinal and spoke of how both Islam and Christianity speak of respect for other faiths.
He described how people in Sudan -- whether Christian or Muslim -- lived together.
“We share breakfast. We have Christmas. We eat with them. We share with them. We are living together.”
And he spoke of the troubles in Darfur: “You know very well that in this nation there are killings and differences and a lot of things.”
“The imams and sheiks are also suffering,” he said. “Their houses were also burned. Their property destroyed. Their children are also without education.”
In response, the cardinal told the leaders that when he and Chitnis visited camps for displaced people in Juba, South Sudan and Khartoum, they did not distinguish between Christians in need and Muslims in need.
He said they simply saw: “A human being, created by Almighty God, who will receive our help.”
The meeting ended with an embrace between the cardinal and the general secretary of imams – a symbolic union of their respective faiths.
Other imams and other church leaders then embraced on the floor of the hall.
At sunset, the cardinal was standing at the open-air prayer service, and in part of his speech he spoke about the G8 summit that took place in the Scottish capital and the Make Poverty History campaign.
He then urged those at the Darfur meeting to stand and repeat the words after him -- until they could chant: “Make poverty history. Make poverty history.”
Then leaders from five churches -- Coptic, Pentecostal, Ecumenical Church of Sudan, Evangelical, and the Catholic Church -- said a prayer for various aspects of peace in Darfur.
After a blessing, the crowd dispersed -- among them, Mariam Makwage, 40, who had danced in praise during the meeting and held her hands up with joy.
“I thank God,” she said. “I’ve never seen a cardinal before, and his coming may bring some hope to my people at this time of crisis.”
Cardinal Keith O’Brien, head of Scotland’s Roman Catholics, and Abdullah Adam Noman, general secretary of imams, embrace at a meeting in Darfur.
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