Photos of the Jonglei area in Bor Diocese and the Marc Nikkel School, taken by Bol Deng during the summer of 2005

School is held in the shade, weather permitting.

A woman pumps water near the school.

Church services are lengthy and are held in the shade, weather permitting.

Three Marc Nikkel School students

Please report broken links to Lynn Robertson (Lrobertson@dioswva.org).

A Recently Discharged Patient Needs a Home Nurse

Your help is highly needed in different fields of development as we are heading back for reconstruction of our destroyed part of the country. I can already see a team of nurses coming up. Bp. Neff Powell and the party and Bp. David James and the party. Our hands are in the air, open to receive you.

Back to Suffering in the Dark

Please report broken links to Lynn Robertson (Lrobertson@dioswva.org).

The Post-War Period (Focus on Bor Diocese)

There are lots of challenges that will face our Church in the Sudan after war. I will use Bor Diocese as an example of the whole.

1. Evangelical Revival

Historical Perspective

Christianity in Dinkaland sprouted from the selfless-service of early Missionaries who came to Bor and Malek by the fall of 19th century. At the same time, Christianity was building inroads into various parts of Southern Sudan.

Efforts to convert the Dinka and particularly the Bor Dinka went through fits and starts until 1980s through 1990s. The revival began in earnest under able evangelism of His Lordship, Rt. Rev. Nathaniel Garang Anyieth at the time when the whole community was faced with grim prospects of survival in midst of unprecedented disaster.

Please report broken links to Lynn Robertson (Lrobertson@dioswva.org).

Religion in the Sudanese History

There is no possible reason against a mission station, but it is a most deadly country and very few could possibly stand the climate--it is only fit for a man who is sick of life, has no ties, and longs and yearns for death. Now these men are not common.

--General Charles Gordon, 1877

Although the Gospel message reached Sudan as early as AD 350, South Sudan was untouched by the Gospel until the beginning of 1900s. Christianity became the official religion of the Nubian Kingdom in AD 580 till it was finally defeated by Islam in AD 1504. Both secular and ecclesiastical powers were vested in kings of Sudanese Christian Kingdoms. Therefore, their best title would be priest-kings. Acts 8:27-40, talks about Ethiopian Eunuch. He is a Sudanese, not Ethiopian. Many researchers have shown that Sudanese have been part of the Bible, as John Garang De Mabior put it:

Please report broken links to Lynn Robertson (Lrobertson@dioswva.org).

The Factors Behind the War

There are several factors behind the war in the Sudan. However, I will deal with two major factors in this paper: historical and religious factors. I will start by laying out historical events, which resulted in mutual mistrust and suspicion. Confidence has been fundamentally shaken between Africans and Arabs in the Sudan due to experience rooted in history.

North and South Sudan were not one country and knew nothing or little about each other even when Mohammed Ali invaded North Sudan in 1821. When Turko-Egyptian officials arrived in the 19th century, they were joined by Arab traders inside Sudan, and began the slave trade among other things. Slavery flourished in African areas of the Southern Blue Nile, Nuba Mountains and South Sudan between 1821 and the end of the first quarter of the 20th century. This activity slowed down when British arrived. The take over of Anglo-Egyptian Condominium mark different turn on the situation. The British came in to stop the slavery, which subsided into a small scale business. South Sudan was declared as “Closed District” in 1920s. Though it continued (with some isolated cases today), it could not be compare to those days when about 12,000 slaves could be sold in Egypt annually.

Please report broken links to Lynn Robertson (Lrobertson@dioswva.org).

The Rev. B. Bol Deng presented this paper at Council 2005:

Suffering in the Dark
By The Rev. B. Bol Deng

General Overview

Sudan is the largest country in Africa; its size is as big as the U. S. east of the Mississippi. It is about one million square miles, with the South Sudan occupying more than one quarter of the whole. Sudan borders nine countries: Egypt, Libya, Chad, Central Africa Republic, D. R. Congo, Uganda, Kenya, Ethiopia and Eritrea. Sudan is vast and varied in territory and demography.