Sudan Council of Churches plans inter-faith workshop

Report from Radio Tamazuj Juba, South Sudan
Dated Thursday, 15 February 2024 - here is a copy in full:

Sudan Council of Churches plans inter-faith workshop

The Sudanese Council of Churches has announced its intention to organize a workshop focusing on the clergy’s role in fostering peace in Sudan.

The workshop is scheduled to commence in March in Juba, the capital of South Sudan, and will involve the participation of clergy members from both Muslim and Christian faiths.

Reverend Izz al-Din al-Tayeb Ali, the head of the Sudanese Council of Churches, highlighted in a recent interview with Radio Tamazuj that the upcoming workshop aims to engage Imams from mosques and priests from churches in efforts to promote peace within Sudanese communities.

Al-Tayeb urged the African and International Council of Churches to lend their support to the Sudanese Council of Churches, enabling it to carry out its mission effectively.

Additionally, he appealed to church organizations to extend humanitarian assistance to all Christians in Sudan following the conflict, emphasizing the significant damage inflicted upon churches during the ten months of strife.

“It’s crucial to recognize that the impact of the war extends beyond Christians to encompass all Sudanese people. Therefore, we urge Christian organizations to assist all Sudanese citizens,” Al-Tayeb emphasized.

Sudan has been mired by fighting between the army, led by Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, head of the country’s ruling Sovereign Council, and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) paramilitary group since April 2023.

More than 13,000 people have been killed and 26,000 others injured in the ongoing conflict in Sudan since last year, according to UN figures.

Sudan is now the world's largest displacement crisis. Within Sudan, over 9 million people have been displaced, 1.7 million people have fled to other countries surrounding Sudan.

Original: https://radiotamazuj.org/en/news/article/sudan-council-of-churches-plans-inter-faith-workshop

END

Sudan: Sniper sparks a fire at Dar Mariam Daughters of Mary Help of Christians (FMA) house in Khartoum

On April 30, 2023 Archbishop Michael Didi Adgum Mangoria of Khartoum confirmed that "many people, including priests and nuns, have fled the most contested areas" of Sudan since April 15. Read more.

Report from ANS 
Dated 04 January 2024 - here is a copy in full:

Sudan – Sniper sparks a fire at the FMA house in Karthoum

(ANS – Karthoum) – The Dar Mariam house of the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians (FMA) in Karthoum, Sudan, was again affected by the war. In the early afternoon of Tuesday, 2 January, at around 2 pm, a sniper from one of the rebel groups involved in the war set fire to the second floor of the house. The rooms and the hall on the affected side of the floor were badly damaged. But the great help offered by the neighbours and some soldiers made it possible to put out the fire in two hours.

“No one was injured in the accident! Thank God! And may his will and his glory always prevail!" Fr Jacob Thelekkadan, an Indian Salesian missionary in the country, who has been living in the Dar Mariam house of the FMA since shortly after the outbreak of the war, commented on the matter.

Although largely forgotten by the outside world, the war in Sudan continues, involving several paramilitary factions in addition to the national army, and has already reached the 265th day of fighting, death, and destruction. With official data at a standstill last October, there are still about 10,000 victims and almost 12,000 injured, while according to information released by the United Nations International Office for Migration at the end of 2023, the conflict had caused almost 6 million internally displaced people and over 1.5 million refugees in other countries.

The Dar Mariam house of the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians – which in addition to the Sisters and Fr Jacob also houses several mothers and children and a group of men, some of them elderly and sick – had already been affected by the war not even two months before this last episode: on the morning of 3 November 2023, in fact, it had been hit by a large bomb. Also in that case, serious damage resulted for several classrooms and structures of the work, but providentially only a few minor injuries.

View original: https://www.infoans.org/en/

h/t with thanks to Sudan Tribune - January 23, 2024 

Sudan: Salesian sisters’ home damaged in ongoing war

https://sudantribune.com/article281617/

ENDS

___

Related

Sudan Watch - January 20, 2024 

Sudan: Christian man killed by RSF militia. 

Baraka Parish church at Hajj Yusuf near Khartoum set on fire 

- Christian Buildings Targeted in Military Conflict in Sudan

- Sudan: Unidentified arsonists raze the Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Wad Madani, Aj Jazirah State

https://sudanwatch.blogspot.com/2024/01/sudan-christian-man-killed-by-rsf.html

Sudan Watch - November 13, 2023

Missile hits Salesian Sisters' house in Khartoum Sudan

Damage at Dar Mariam Mission in Khartoum (© ACN).

https://sudanwatch.blogspot.com/2023/11/missile-hits-salesian-sisters-house-in.html

Sudan Watch - July 04, 2023

Sudan: Salesian Sisters care for wounded & displaced

Over the years, a strong community of international Catholic sisters and other religious has been active in Sudan. According to Roszkowska, there have been many Catholic sisters from as far as India, El Salvador, Vietnam, South Sudan and Poland.

However, after the latest war erupted in April, only four Salesian Sisters of Don Bosco remain in Sudan. Global Sisters Report recently reported on Sr. Angelina Ebrahim Trilly Koko of the Congregation of Our Lady of Charity of the Good Shepherd saying that her congregation had already shut down several schools and hospitals serving thousands of residents and stopped pastoral work. 

On April 30, Archbishop Michael Didi Adgum Mangoria of Khartoum confirmed that "many people, including priests and nuns, have fled the most contested areas" of Sudan since April 15.

https://sudanwatch.blogspot.com/2023/06/sudan-salesian-sisters-care-for-wounded.html

ENDS

Sudan: Christian man killed by RSF militia. Baraka Parish church at Hajj Yusuf near Khartoum set on fire

CHRISTIANS in Sudan fear they are being increasingly targeted. “There are radical Muslims among RSF,” the pastor said in an online post. “I met some of them in Khartoum and Medani who badly harassed me when they learned that I was a pastor.” In Open Doors’ 2024 World Watch List of the countries where it is most difficult to be a Christian, Sudan was ranked No. 8, up from No. 10 the previous year. The Christian population of Sudan is estimated at 2 million, or 4.5% of the total population of more than 43 million. Read more.

From Morning Star News
By Morning Star News
Dated Friday, 19 January 2024 - here is a copy in full:

Christian man killed by militants in Sudan; church set on fire

Baraka Parish church at Hajj Yusuf, on the outskirts of Khartoum, Sudan, February 10, 2013. | Reuters/Mohamed Nureldin Abdallah

JUBA, South Sudan — A Sudanese Christian 85 miles southeast of Khartoum has succumbed to his injuries after militants from the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) assaulted him, sources said.

Personnel from the RSF, which has been fighting the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) since April 15, severely assaulted Karbino Bla in Wad Medani, capital of Al Jazirah state on Jan. 1, following the militants’ takeover of the city on Dec. 18. The motives for the assault were unclear.

Bla, a member of the Sudan Presbyterian Evangelical Church (SPEC), died on Jan. 5 as a result of the injuries, area sources said. He is survived by his wife and an infant daughter.

“This a great lost to the Evangelical church in Medani,” a relative said.

Rights organizations and area residents report the RSF has killed civilians, raped women and girls and looted homes and shops since taking control of the state in December.

Last Friday, Muslim extremists from the RSF set a church building on fire in Wad Medani, said area sources, including a SPEC pastor. The blaze destroyed Bibles, hymnbooks, important documents and chairs in the building, he said.

Christians in Sudan fear they are being increasingly targeted, the pastor said.

“There are radical Muslims among RSF,” the pastor said in an online post. “I met some of them in Khartoum and Medani who badly harassed me when they learned that I was a pastor.”

In Open Doors’ 2024 World Watch List of the countries where it is most difficult to be a Christian, Sudan was ranked No. 8, up from No. 10 the previous year.

Sudan had dropped out of the top 10 for the first time in six years when it first ranked No. 13 in the 2021 World Watch List.

Fighting between the RSF and the SAF, which had shared military rule in Sudan following an October 2021 coup, has terrorized civilians in Khartoum and elsewhere, leaving more than 12,000 people dead and displacing an estimated 5.8 million others.

Christian sites have been targeted since the conflict began.

The SAF’s Gen. Abdelfattah al-Burhan and his then-vice president, RSF leader Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, were in power when civilian parties in March agreed on a framework to re-establish a democratic transition in April, but disagreements over military structure torpedoed final approval.

Burhan sought to place the RSF — a paramilitary outfit with roots in the Janjaweed militias that had helped former strongman Omar al-Bashir put down rebels — under the regular army’s control within two years, while Dagolo would accept integration within nothing fewer than 10 years. The conflict burst into military fighting on April 15.

Both military leaders have Islamist backgrounds while trying to portray themselves to the international community as pro-democracy advocates of religious freedom.

Following two years of advances in religious freedom in Sudan after the end of the Islamist dictatorship under Bashir in 2019, the specter of state-sponsored persecution returned with the military coup of Oct. 25, 2021.

After Bashir was ousted from 30 years of power in April 2019, the transitional civilian-military government managed to undo some Sharia (Islamic law) provisions. It outlawed the labeling of any religious group “infidels” and thus effectively rescinded apostasy laws that made leaving Islam punishable by death.

With the Oct. 25, 2021 coup, Christians in Sudan feared the return of the most repressive and harsh aspects of Islamic law. Abdalla Hamdok, who had led a transitional government as prime minister starting in September 2019, was detained under house arrest for nearly a month before he was released and reinstated in a tenuous power-sharing agreement in November 2021.

Hamdock had been faced with rooting out longstanding corruption and an Islamist “deep state” from Bashir’s regime — the same deep state that is suspected of rooting out the transitional government in the Oct. 25, 2021 coup.

Persecution of Christians by non-state actors continued before and after the coup.

The U.S. State Department in 2019 removed Sudan from the list of Countries of Particular Concern (CPC) that engage in or tolerate “systematic, ongoing and egregious violations of religious freedom” and upgraded it to a watch list. Sudan had previously been designated as a CPC from 1999 to 2018.

In December 2020, the State Department removed Sudan from its Special Watch List.

The Christian population of Sudan is estimated at 2 million, or 4.5% of the total population of more than 43 million.

Morning Star News is the only independent news service focusing exclusively on the persecution of Christians. The nonprofit's mission is to provide complete, reliable, even-handed news in order to empower those in the free world to help persecuted Christians, and to encourage persecuted Christians by informing them that they are not alone in their suffering.

View original: https://www.christianpost.com/news/christian-man-killed-by-militants-in-sudan-church-set-on-fire.html

Related

Sudan Presbyterian Evangelical Church (SPEC) building in ruins after shelling on Wednesday (Nov. 1, 2023) in Omdurman, Sudan. 

(Morning Star News)

Morning Star News - November 6, 2023

Christian Buildings Targeted in Military Conflict in Sudan

Sudan Presbyterian Evangelical Church (SPEC) structure in Omdurman left in ruins.

If you would like to help persecuted Christians, visit https://morningstarnews.org/resources/aid-agencies/ for a list of organizations that can orient you on how to get involved.  

Full story: https://morningstarnews.org/2023/11/christian-buildings-targeted-in-military-conflict-in-sudan/

___

Sudan Watch - January 14, 2024

Sudan: Unidentified arsonists raze the Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Wad Madani, Aj Jazirah State

According to this very sad report, unidentified arsonists razed the Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Wad Madani, Aj Jazirah State, Sudan. The fire, based on the information gathered, was deliberate and aimed to destroy the Christian community’s religious facilities and obliterate the church’s history, which spans over a century.

Full story: https://sudanwatch.blogspot.com/2024/01/sudan-unidentified-arsonists-raze.html

ENDS

Sudan: Unidentified arsonists raze the Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Wad Madani, Aj Jazirah State

ACCORDING to this very sad report, unidentified arsonists razed the Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Wad Madani, Aj Jazirah State, Sudan. The fire, based on the information gathered, was deliberate and aimed to destroy the Christian community’s religious facilities and obliterate the church’s history, which spans over a century. The flames consumed the main library, housing historical documents, and ravaged the grand hall. Has Hemeti lost control of his RSF Janjaweed militia? Why are IGAD and the African Union allowing Sudan and her people and history to be destroyed?

Read more in report from Sudan Tribune
Dated Friday, 12 January 2024 - here is a copy in full:

Unidentified arsonists raze Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Wad Madani

Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Wad Medani

January 12, 2024 (WAD MADANI) – The main headquarters of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Wad Medani, the capital of Al Jazirah State, was intentionally set ablaze, causing extensive damage to the building and destroying official documents.

Church leaders have held the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) morally and legally responsible for the incident, citing their control over the city.

Rev. Youssif Matar, Secretary-General of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church, told Sudan Tribune, “We were informed that parties deliberately burned the church located in the first section neighbourhood in the middle of Wad Madani, causing severe damage.”

Matar explained that the fire, based on the information gathered, was deliberate and aimed to destroy the Christian community’s religious facilities and obliterate the church’s history, which spans over a century. The flames consumed the main library, housing historical documents, and ravaged the grand hall.

He did not rule out the possibility that this incident was an attempt to sow seeds of religious hatred and incite sectarian strife.

While Pastor Matar refrained from directly implicating the RSF in the incident, he expressed concern that “Islamic extremists or extremists within the Rapid Support Forces may be behind the incident.”

He emphasized the RSF’s “moral and criminal responsibility for the incident” owing to their absolute control over the area, stating that no unauthorized party could have entered the church headquarters without their knowledge.

On May 14, 2023, gunmen wearing RSF uniforms attacked the Mar Girgis (St. George) Church in Khartoum, one of the oldest Coptic churches in Sudan. They threatened the workers to reveal the whereabouts of money and gold, shot three individuals, and beat the bishop’s assistant with sticks, causing fractures.

The RSF has maintained control of Al-Jazirah State, with its capital Wad Madani, since December 18, 2023, following the sudden withdrawal of the army from its positions.

This takeover has been accompanied by widespread abuses affecting thousands of civilians, including killings, arrests, forced displacement, the looting of private vehicles, and the plundering of government institutions. (ST)

View original: https://sudantribune.com/article281239/

ENDS