| Subject: Sudan Surprise: Christians Help Persecuted Muslims |
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Date Posted: 21:01:15 04/17/05 Sun
Sudan Surprise: Christians Help Persecuted Muslims
By Gary Lane
CWNews
April 8 , 2005
CWNews.com – War in Sudan's Darfur state has now killed an estimated 180,000 people, and has left nearly 2 million homeless.
Muslims are killing Muslims now.
But for more than 20 years, some of the Muslims now under attack had previously persecuted Christians.
Yet those Christians are reaching out to bring help to their former persecutors.
“Apalling” is what United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan calls the situation in Darfur. The U.S.. State Department says ongoing attacks in Darfur during the past two years have amounted to nothing short of genocide: Muslim Arabs are killing black African Muslims.
The international community has been slow to respond. But help is now getting through to the needy. Some refugees have left Darfur and set up make-shift houses out of sticks and straw.
Persecution Project Dr. Samuel Ani explained that "They are not well-covered against the elements—rain or wind. They are practically lying outside."
Food is scarce in the desolate Sudanese bush - the Darfurees are forced to eat nothing but leaves. They boil them to make a spinach-like porridge.
Clan Leader Ahmed also pleaded, "Water. Water, we need water. People, please are dying on the way because of the water."
Dr. Ani affirmed that, "They dig in the waterbeds of dried-out streams trying to get any kind of water, and what they come up with is just muddy water. This is making many of the kids and adults have diarrhea—all types of diarrhea and water-born diseases are common in the camp."
Most of the children are orphans. Pastor James Lual Atak is from the Dinka tribe, one of the former ‘lost boys of Sudan’. Pastor Atak said "All of them – have no parents. no mother, no father. They stay with caretakers and they move from house to house..."
One child was found alone, wandering through the bush nearly two days after his camp was burned to the ground by members of the government-backed Janjaweed, a military force.
Africa leadership is helping the Sudanese establish a school for 153 orphaned refugees near Nyamlel, Sudan.
The U.S. Discipleship Ministry recently teamed up with the Persecution Project Foundation and The Voice of the Martyrs to help Sudanese Christians reach out to the Darfuree refugees. They have provided them with more than 19 metric tons of food, clothing, tarps for shelters, Bibles and life packs.
Larry Warren is Director of Africa Leadership. He said, " Just two hours north of here in southern Darfur, there are 25,000 refugees—Darfurians, Muslims—who for the past 20 years have been persecuting the Christians.”
“But,” he went on, ‘now, they're being persecuted by fellow Muslims.”
So, he added, “They've come here [to a refugee camp]. We're so thankful for the Dinka people—Christian people—here in southern Sudan who are now meeting the needs of those who persecuted them.” He explained why, “ Jesus said love even your enemies, and it's such an encouragement to see the people here living out the words of Jesus.”
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