Bob Walters of Friendly Planet Missiology has been writing about the outbreak of violence and the work of the church in the North Katanga area of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
As always, Bob helps break up the simplistic pictures we in the USA often have about the church in Africa. These are well worth your time to read. They also call for prayer.
And lest you think this is just about church work and has nothing to do with you, allow me to quote from the end of Bob’s third dispatch about the corruption and poverty facing a mining community:
I could appeal to your compassion for a suffering people. I could appeal to your sense of justice. This just isn’t right. But we are not just observing a people in need, or an unjust system that needs challenged. We are a part of this web.
The minerals that come out of these mines become our cell phones and lap tops. The mineral coltan is the coolant in every piece of consumer electronics. Without coltan, our cell phones would heat up and explode in our ears. No coltan, no electronics industry; and the world’s supply of cotan is in the mountains of eastern Congo.
The issues that fuel this war have not been settled. It is clear from recent events that when UN troops are removed, the country will fall back into open warfare. This is not a civil war for freedom or regime change. This is a grab for trillions of dollars worth of minerals that are essential to the global economy. Uganda wants it. Rwanda wants it. The government in Kinshasa wants it. The governor in Lubumbashi wants it. Local war lords want it.
The poor people of Mitwaba want safe drinking water, schools, health care, and a simple, descent life. and a roof for their church.
So, what do we DO? It infuriates me that innocent people have to suffer, and I long to help. But I also know that my influence and money (I’m a grad student) is limited. There are days when I’m bombarded with the pain and needs of so many, and I can do so little….is there a way of helping? Is there a real way of stopping those who are hurting these people? Or is it just another day where I’m forced to watch agony from a distance?
Darcy, of course we cannot stop the war by our actions. We can pray, and I think we dismiss that too easily as “just praying.” We can also seek to learn how our lives here create conditions there and do our best within our circle of influence (family, friends, colleagues) to reduce our contributions to the injustice. We can support and encourage those who are working to improve the situation. Write letters. Donate $5 if that is all you have. Fast.
If we ask “How can I stop this?” we are destined to become jaded and cynical. If we say to ourselves: “That is evil. As a baptized Christian I have vowed to resist evil and oppression in whatever way I can. What can I do where I am? What is a single positive step I can take?” then we are beginning to do something.
Run the race and persevere, Paul once said. Hope in God. Have faith. Love your neighbor.
If you are anything like my daughter, and your comment sounds like something she would say, my response may be frustrating or it may seem like too little. My only response to that is that your holy frustration is a good thing. Pray for the strength, patience, and humility to use it well.
That is my response. If the Holy Spirit is using this situation to stir up something else in you, please forgive my weakness and ignorance.
In peace,
John
Hi, the blogger’s daughter here. Obviously from my dad’s reply, he’s forgotten a post by a Stanley Hauerwas that he emailed me in my freshman year that’s still in my inbox. It was about the calling of the student (http://www.firstthings.com/article/2010/10/go-with-god). To paraphrase the Stan Man, God has called us to be students because God needs our minds to be shaped and challenged in new ways, to discover Him in everything from French film theory to organic chemistry. We are blessed with the opportunity on this crazy planet to study and question and explore.
I definitely understand your struggle, Darcy. I’m the president of my college’s Amnesty International chapter so I hear every day about the most evil, sinful crimes against God’s children. I too find myself wondering why I’m reading Melville when I could be over there -or right around the corner- fighting the good fight. What I have to remind myself of is that God is always working amongst His suffering peoples. I am called to do what I can now from afar and I may be called later to be a vessel of His grace. But He will keep remaking the world with or without me – I just may one day be blessed to be a part of that work.
For now, though, I am called to be a student. I think you are too. And it’s an important calling. It may one day be that because you were a student, you can bring God’s Light into the world.
Blessings.