---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: "John Ashworth" <[email protected]> Date: 6 Aug 2016 14:26 Subject: [sudans-john-ashworth] Bishop Paride Taban: "May our children become old, not die when they're young" To: "Group" <[email protected]> Cc:
1. Video of Bishop Paride Taban's message http://www.sctimes.com/story/news/local/2016/08/05/south- sudan-bishop-wants-see-children-become-old/88068162/ END1 2. South Sudan bishop wants to see 'children become old' Stephanie Dickrell, SCTimes 5:59 p.m. CDT August 5, 2016 SAUK RAPIDS — The message of Bishop Paride Taban could not come at a more opportune time. The retired Catholic bishop from South Sudan preaches peace and love in a world where fear and war can seem to be winning. Although he's lived through decades of war in his native country, he's not hopeless. "We are giving a message of peace and hope. I have never, I've never been and will never be pessimistic. I am optimistic," he said. Taban worked in the church through two civil wars and other unrest. "I will retire only when peace will be signed in South Sudan. I have to be a shepherd up to the end," he said. "I was never a refugee. … I always tell (that) I've been a refugee from heaven. … I will return from Sudan to my home in heaven, but never to leave the people." Taban has been in the U.S. for several weeks, meeting with church officials and people in religious orders, including Benedictine sisters, Franciscan sisters and Crosier fathers and brothers. His message will be spread to various parishes in Minnesota, as well as some in Ohio. He'll also meet with people from Sudan. Minnesota has about 5,000 people who are natives of northern Africa, which includes Sudan and South Sudan. The Sudanese make up roughly half of that population, according to the American Community Survey five-year estimates from 2014. Some reside in the St. Cloud area. Taban was connected with Central Minnesota through volunteers through the Diocese of St. Cloud and former Bishop John Kinney. It's a tradition to return a visit with a visit yourself. This is his now his sixth visit to St. Cloud. Taban is internationally known for his efforts to bring peace and reconciliation to Sudan. He has participated in various reconciliation processes, including some in Sudan, and various peacemaking initiatives. In 2013, he was awarded the United Nation's Sergio Vieira de Mello Prize in recognition of his efforts in promoting peace in communities in South Sudan. The award recognizes individuals or groups that have done something unique to reconcile people and parties in conflict. He took an hour from his busy schedule Friday to visit with the St. Cloud Times at Trinity Lutheran Church in Sauk Rapids. Taban asked to retire early from his position as bishop in 2004 in order to form a peace village near the borders of Sudan, Ethiopia and Kenya. His goal was for all tribes, all religions, all people to learn they can live together in peace. He grew up in a small town founded during British colonization. It was a melting pot, where he was exposed to all kinds of people and religions. "They brought families from all over Sudan. My parents were among those. We who grew up there, didn't know anything about tribalism — not even on religious issues," he said. "We live all together, and we love each other. ... So, I wanted to found another village like this," he said. He was inspired by similar communities he saw in Israel, where Israelis and Palestinians — where Christians, Muslims and Jews — all lived together. He founded the South Sudan peace village in a remote area and attempted to bring the locals together. "These people (that are) neighbors, they call themselves enemies, they never call themselves friends. They never met except in conflict. ... We created a situation in the peace village, bringing their youth, their elders together, holding meetings together ... Now they call themselves friends," he said. The village brought youth and elders together, finding a common purpose. "Now that there is conflict, even now, … this is one of the safest areas in South Sudan. It is a safe haven," he said. At the village, people are creating a peace academy, where they bring people from all over South Sudan, leaders and pastors, to learn the sense of being peaceful and carry that feeling and message to their homes. "You need a lot of humility. You need a lot of patience. You need a lot of compassion," he said. The peace village is governed by 28 words and phrases. "Every morning I get up at 5, to do my exercises for one hour. And I repeat it," he said. "If everybody had these words deep in their heart, they could be a peacemaker, not only for their country, but for the whole world." They range from love and peace, to I am sorry and I forgive. Over those decades of death and trauma, Taban refused to live in fear. "Fear is what people should fear. If you have to fear anything in this world, you have to fear fear itself," he said. "If I was afraid, I would be a refugee and leave my flock alone to suffer." He approaches the world with love. "I have no enemies. Somebody may call me an enemy, but I'm not an enemy to anybody. I have no reason to be an enemy. They are all my children," he said. "I think the only thing we have to have is forgiveness and mercy. And that is why Pope Francis put this year as the Year of Mercy, of reconciliation. … That's the message I give," he said. At one point, Taban got a message that one of the country's commanders wanted to kill him. "I just put some fuel in my truck … and drive two days through Uganda and arrive at the home of the commander very early in the morning," he said. He finds the commander's wife in the yard, while their children play, and Taban asks for the commander. Instead of being greeted with violence, he was met with a hug and hospitality. "The commander comes, 'Oh bishop how are you?' He hugged me," he said. They had coffee, tea and breakfast. People asked why he took the risk of going to that area, when he heard the commander wanted him dead. They were shocked to hear his story of breakfast. "You can disarm a person by love, not by gun, not by violence. Love is the best way of disarming a human being," he said. Unrest and conflict has started again in recent months in South Sudan's capital Juba. South Sudan has been split by ethnic violence almost since it was founded in 2011, with civil war breaking out in 2013. A peace agreement was signed in 2015, but fighting continues. In all, almost 900,000 South Sudanese have left their country since civil war broke out in December 2013, according to the U.N. The country had about 11 million residents at the time. People have fled South Sudan and hundreds were killed when opposing factions clashed in July in the capital. As Taban speaks to groups of Americans, he asks for help, for people who are dying from war, famine, poverty and disease. "We don't need guns. We need tractors. We need plows, we need schools. We need all this," he said. "When you see people who are in difficulty, they feel happy that they are not forgotten. … Because many people think even God has forgotten them." There are ways people can donate directly to his peace village through the Diocese of St. Cloud. But the most important help is given for free, Taban said. "The most important one is prayer. … You are a messenger now. You are the voice of the voiceless. … There are people dying, they have no voice. I am their voice. I would like to increase the number of the voice of the voiceless," he said. What does he hope to see when, as he says, he returns to his home in heaven? "God knows. I put it in his hands. … I'm asking God that I want permanent peace," he said. He spoke once to a Norwegian ambassador. "I say, could you make South Sudan to be like Norway, because in Norway, I heard it is a country where people become old. Here we don't know if our children will become old. May our country, our future children become old, not to die when they're young." 28 words to make peace Bishop Paride Taban has a mantra he repeats every morning, as he does his exercises, destresses and prepares for the day. They are the 28 principles he hopes to see in the peace village. He said they should make each one of us a peacemaker. Love, joy, peace, patience, compassion, sympathy, kindness, truthfulness, gentleness, self-control, humility, poverty, forgiveness, mercy, friendship, trust, unity, purity, faith and hope. These are 20. Add to that these eight phrases: I love you. I miss you. Thank you. I forgive. We forget. Together. I am wrong. I am sorry. "Truly, I tell you, living among ourselves in the spirit of these 28 words, we can bring lasting peace to the whole world," Taban writes. The Associated Press contributed to this report. http://www.sctimes.com/story/news/local/2016/08/05/south- sudan-bishop-wants-see-children-become-old/88068162/ END2 3. African bishop brings message of peace to St. Cloud Diocese August 5, 2016 Kristi Anderson, The Visitor Bishop Emeritus Paride Taban from the Diocese of Torit, South Sudan, and a longtime friend of St. Cloud Bishop Emeritus John Kinney, made a recent visit to the U.S. that began July 16 and extends through Aug. 16. This is his sixth trip to the Diocese of St. Cloud. “One day there was a great hunger in India,” Bishop Taban told a group of diocesan staff Aug. 3 at the Pastoral Center in St. Cloud. “Mother Teresa was going around giving rice with some of the sisters. They came upon an old man who was weak and dying. Mother Teresa, instead of giving rice, held the hand of the man. The man began crying, crying, crying. She said to him, ‘Why do you cry? I have more rice.’ The man said, ‘I am not crying for rice. After many years, I have felt a warm hand.’” Bishop Taban said this is the feeling he gets from the people of the Diocese of St. Cloud, who have not only contributed financially through Mass stipends via the St. Cloud Mission Office, but also have come to visit his people. “The warm hand was more important than the rice. The presence of seeing the face of someone coming to visit, showing compassion, says, ‘I am recognized.’ That is more important than money. Money comes from warm hearts, warm hands,” he said. Bishop Taban is the founder of the Holy Trinity Peace Village in Kuron, South Sudan — a dream, he said, for a “forgotten people.” His mission is to spread a message of Good News, one of nonviolence, forgiveness and peace through the development of health clinics, schools and agriculture. Soccer, which he says is a “sport for peace,” is also a method he uses among the youth to help heal the trauma of decades of war that plagued the region. “Many of the neighbors … called themselves ‘enemies,’” he said. “They tried to steal cows from each other. We wanted to make them become friends. We bring the youth who are rustling cattle to play soccer together. We started training members of the community to ‘self-police,’ so that if anyone collects an animal from the community, community members who have received some training collect the animal and bring it back. We started also to sensitize them about education. You don’t need to steal cattle. Go to school. Afterward, you will learn and train yourselves so you can buy your cows.” Development is peace; peace is development According to Bishop Taban, Kuron was “untouched” by outside influences until about 20 years ago when he stumbled across the natives who were living as “Adam and Eve,” he said. In 1999, he helped bring a road to Kuron, enabling him more freedom to work toward the goal of building an oasis of peace where people from all tribes can come together to build relationships, find forgiveness and work together to provide basic needs for the community. The United States played a key role in the Comprehensive Peace Agreement signed in 2005 — the same year the Peace Village officially began — after 40 years of struggle and civil war between Northern and Southern Sudan. In 2011, South Sudan gained its independence from Sudan, becoming the world’s newest country. Despite the peace agreement, the country remains a place of ethnically motivated unrest and escalating violence. Pope Francis recently sent Cardinal Peter Turkson, president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, to South Sudan to urge a peaceful end to the escalating violence in the country. For nearly a year, South Sudan has been trying to emerge from a civil war caused by political rivalry between President Salva Kiir and Vice President Riek Machar, who represent different ethnic groups. Violent clashes spread across the city and left tens of thousands of people dead since the beginning of their rivalry in December 2013. “I feel Bishop Taban’s message is not just a message for Sudan and South Sudan,” said Rosanne Fischer, former director of the St. Cloud Mission Office and a supporter of the Peace Village. “I feel his message is for all of us, especially as we look at what has happened in our own country over the past months: the division, the violence. This message and what the people in the Peace Village are doing is really a message that helps us all to live out our catholicity, our Christian faith and to take that stand for nonviolence and peace, which is really the example we have from Christ.” Fischer, who has known Bishop Taban for 16 years, has been accompanying him on his travels throughout the U.S. For her, getting more actively involved in promoting the Peace Village was a “stirring of the Holy Spirit.” Last year, Fischer, who visited Kuron in 2013 with her husband Mark Trainor, presented information about the Peace Village through a mission presentation at the St. Cloud parishes of St. John Cantius, St. Anthony and Holy Spirit. “That just started a whole calling. The Spirit kept nudging me and telling me to do more,” she said. Last summer, Fischer resigned a position at Christ Our Light Parish in Princeton and Zimmerman and began reaching out to dioceses around the country. Through her efforts, Bishop Taban received invitations to speak in two parishes in the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, Ohio, as well as two parishes in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis. Once word spread that he was going to be in the country, Fischer said she was flooded with requests. “The whole trip has been a movement of the Holy Spirit,” she said. “I never could have planned for all of the things to happen the way they did.” His agenda included a visit with Cincinnati’s Archbishop Dennis Schnurr and U.S. Rep. Steve Chabot of Ohio, an evening with Catholic Relief Services president and CEO Carolyn Woo, an impromptu trip to CRS headquarters in Baltimore, Maryland, and visits with the Comboni Missionaries in Cincinnati and Chicago and the Franciscan Sisters of Perpetual Adoration in La Crosse, Wisconsin. Among his Minnesota activities are meetings with Bishop Donald Kettler; the St. Cloud Ecumenical Commission and Minnesota’s sixth district U.S. Rep. Tom Emmer; addresses to parish and church groups, diocesan priests and area religious communities; a visit to Wellsprings Farm in Annandale and some relaxation time in the northwoods of Minnesota before heading back to South Sudan. 28 words to becoming a peacemaker Each day, Bishop Taban, who is 80 years old, rises to perform a vigorous exercise routine that includes 100 repetitions of several different motions. As part of his regimen, he recites a series of 28 words and phrases. “If these words enter our hearts, we can each become peacemakers and bring peace to the whole world,” he said. The words and phrases are: Love, joy, peace, patience, compassion, sympathy, kindness, truthfulness, gentleness, self-control, humility, poverty, forgiveness, mercy, friendship, trust, unity, purity, faith, hope and the other are eight phrases: I love you, I miss you, thank you, I forgive, we forget, together, I am wrong, I am sorry. Though he will return to an uncertain future in South Sudan, he has definite plans for the Peace Village, including the implementation of a Peace Academy. The initiative allows the principles of the village to be shared with others from outside its boundaries. Bishop Taban has been instrumental in inviting pastors, chiefs and other leaders from across the 28 South Sudanese states to witness firsthand his model for peace. His hope is that they will take back their stories of the Peace Village and establish peace villages in their own communities. He said his message of peace can begin here, too. “I am very grateful for the Diocese of St. Cloud,” Bishop Taban said. “In the community where I live, we have a small spring for water there which never dries. The big river dries but not this small spring. St. Cloud is for us like that.” “It is so important that the people of South Sudan know that they are not forgotten, that they are not alone,” Fischer said. “To have that sense of accompaniment that the church in the U.S. has not forgotten them. And we may be just that small stream … but with our funds also come our love, our connection, our relationship and that means as much.” This story contains information from Catholic News Service. http://stcloudvisitor.org/2016/08/05/african-bishop- brings-message-peace-st-cloud-diocese/ END3 ______________________ John Ashworth [email protected] +254 725 926 297 (Kenya mobile) +211 919 695 362 (South Sudan mobile) +44 787 976 8030 (UK mobile) +88 216 4334 0735 (Thuraya satphone) Skype: jashworth1 PO Box 52002 - 00200, Nairobi, Kenya This is a personal e-mail address and the contents do not necessarily reflect the views of any organisation -- -- The content of this message does not necessarily reflect John Ashworth's views. 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