South Sudan Peace
A resilient woman
I’ve often used the word resilient to describe the people I met in South Sudan. None of them are untouched by hardship in one form or another, but they seem to get up the next day and get on with it. I’m fortunate to have a rather sunny disposition, inherited from God knows where, so…
New book on Solidarity with South Sudan examines a ‘communal journey’ of religious
NEW YORK — On the eve of the 11th anniversary of South Sudan’s independence, a new book traces the history of Solidarity with South Sudan, noting that the collaborative 14-year-old ministry formed and run by female and male religious has been a model in humanitarian efforts across congregational lines. Sr. Patricia Murray writes in the…
Dancing for peace in Malakal
Peacemaking has a distinctly African rhythm in the camp for displaced persons in the United Nations base in Malakal, South Sudan. Inside the camp’s crowded Catholic Church, young people are dancing. In a country at war, they say they’re dancing for peace. “I like to dance,” said Vivian James, a teenager in the sprawling camp…
Resilient South Sudanese women deserve peace, respect, dignity
There was a growing sense of anticipation in South Sudan about the visit of Pope Francis to this country, originally scheduled for July, but now postponed. We are all so disappointed and are praying for the pope to be on his feet soon and to be able to come to South Sudan and the Democratic…
Solidarity expands trauma healing workshops
Joyce Charles is blind because of war. She was a young girl in 1992, when Sudan’s civil war swept through her home town of Juba. Her mother, fearing for the family’s safety, fled with Joyce to the sparsely-populated countryside. That meant Joyce missed getting vaccinated for measles, a common problem for displaced populations. “So when…
Midwife helps make peace in South Sudan
Although Alia Beatrice Peter lives in a country at war, she works in an oasis of peace. As a midwife, she struggles every day to make that peace a lasting reality. Peter lives and works in the Holy Trinity Peace Village in Kuron, a collection of pastoralist communities in South Sudan’s Eastern Equatoria State. It’s…