A Christmas gift for suffering South Sudan

by Tony Magliano · December 5, 2014

The world�s newest nation is in big trouble.�After more than 20 years of civil war between the southern and northern areas of Sudan, the southern part of that country on July 9, 2011, became the independent nation of the Republic of South Sudan.

Malnourished children lie next to their mothers at the Medecins Sans Frontieres Hospital in Leer, Sudan. The trauma of the current ethnic conflict “has affected its people to their bones and it will be a long time before healing can take place,” said Bishop Richard Pates of Des Moines, Iowa, who visited conflict-ridden neighbours South Sudan and the Central African Republic this year. (CNS photo/Andreea Campeanu, Reuters)

But the situation on the ground soon looked like South Sudan had not been born, but instead was still suffering intense labour pains.

The many years of war brought not only much death, but also drained South Sudan of valuable resources leaving it an extremely poor nation.

According to South Sudan�s National Bureau of Statistics 51% of the population lives below the poverty line, 73% are illiterate and 45% do not have access to improved sources of drinking water.

But if conditions weren�t bad enough, last year � ten days before Christmas � civil war broke out in South Sudan amid a struggle for power between President Salva Kiir and former vice-president Riek Machar, who had been dismissed months earlier by Kiir.

According to the International Crisis Group the civil war has claimed over 10,000 lives, and more than 1 million have been displaced. And it warns that the current humanitarian crisis threatens many more.

According to �The Sudd Institute: Research for a peaceful, just and prosperous South Sudan�, 4 million people are facing a serious risk of famine and starvation.� And approximately 100,000 people are already experiencing desperate, humiliating circumstances in UN camps.

The United Nations Children�s Fund warns that without greatly increased emergency international assistance, more than 50,000 children under the age of five will soon die of starvation.

But long-term development aid is also indispensible.

John Ashworth, who serves as an advisor to the Catholic bishops of South Sudan and for many years worked with the bishops of South Africa in the assisting the region in its bid for independence, wrote in an e-mail to me that many international donors are reducing their development aid to South Sudan due to a lack of progress in the peace talks among the warring parties.

Ashworth said that seven of the ten states in South Sudan are not directly affected by the conflict, and it is both unfair and counter-productive to deny development aid to those people.

The heroic Bishop Emeritus Paride Taban often says that development is peace, and there is thus a fear that reducing development aid will create the conditions for insecurity to spread.

We can help. Ashworth said: �I would highly recommend making a donation to Catholic Relief Services (CRS) which is very active in South Sudan. I work closely with them.� To send a Christmas donation to suffering South Sudan please go to Give to CRS South Sudan.

During this Advent season, as we prepare to celebrate the birth of our savior, Christ the Lord, let us also remember the birth and infancy of the world�s youngest nation.

As the wise men brought gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh to Jesus, let us bring Christmas gifts of prayer, money and advocacy to suffering South Sudan.

And let�s not forget, that by giving gifts to the South Sudanese, we are ultimately giving Christmas gifts to Jesus who said: �Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.� (Matthew 25:45)