This week I went to Baltimore. I have no fondness for Baltimore. In fact, BWI has a history of disturbing me, one of the few places in America where I actually feel like a minority and where I could likely get a fix of anything at multiple street corners. But I overcame my rational distaste and went down to Catholic Relief Services to join up with an ecumenical delegation of bishops from Sudan. My connection? Well, most global nomads will recognize that anywhere outside the West, family is central. Not just your family, but you're whole clan. And because the entire delegation knows most of my family, I was very welcome.
The delegation is touring DC, BWI and NYC promoting peace and policy awareness before 9 January 2011 when Southern Sudan will formally have a referendum and secede from Sudan, becoming their own sovereign state. Northern Sudan has oppressed, explored, repressed and warred with the South almost continuously from 1956 to 2005 when the Comprehensive Peace Agreement was signed, essentially a ceasefire which granted the South the right to hold a referendum in 2011 to stay united or separate. Scarcely 90 days from now, and without a doubt in any one's mind that separation is a foregone conclusion, everyone worries...will it be peaceful? Or is this a return to war?
The bishops are touring the East Coast promoting peace with the US Government, the Catholic Church, and the United Nations Security Council. The church is the only remaining structures in Southern Sudan that didn't collapse during the war as well as the only institution that wasn't enveloped in the Islamization of the North. As a result, it's moral authority and credibility are well established. Africa is a religious and a holistic continent. People don't separate church and state, and the church is seen as a place for education, health services, and spiritual guidance as well as a champion for peace and justice. The Sudan Ecumenical Forum is vocal and active promoting a peaceful succession because...everyone knows that Southerners want independence. And yet, what will happen to the Christians left in the North after the split who are doomed for persecution?
And so we discuss policy options, and seneros for the vote, and even if the vote will happen on time. Who will react and how. Will Southerners be relocated back from the North? What will happen to the oil? What about the three disputed boarder territories? What about border demarkation? There are millions of details outside the church and the humanitarian world's control that have to be decided. Yet the sole thing the bishops requested from the US Catholic Church? Prayer; prayer that Southern Sudan's oppression will finally come with the referendum, and that it will come peacefully.
It was worth enduring the Baltimore creepiness and the short flights down from Upstate New York because this is peacebuilding on a massive scale. These are champions of peace, justice, and even joy, and finally, on January 9, 2011 several million people will declare their desire for a new nation state.
Bishop Daniel made a statement in a meeting that resounded with me. He said that his people don't have the luxury of hopelessness. These are their lives, their futures and they are moving forward with hope because they need hope to survive. Such courage from the fearless leader of the Northern Sudanese Catholic Church...and I worry that being a global nomad is an affliction. If he can have hope, then all of us should.
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