The war began on 15 April but has spread to many other cities in Sudan. However, little is known about the conflict “because of the limited movement of people,” explains a Salesian missionary. “In most areas the current has been interrupted for several weeks and temperatures are always above 40 degrees. In addition, running water has become a luxury in most areas of Khartoum, and the supply has also been drastically reduced: some shops have been looted and many others have run out of supplies ”explains the Salesian.
The Salesians in Sudan have two presences in the city of Khartoum – the vocational school and the parish of St Joseph – and another in the city of El Obeid, 500 kilometres from Khartoum. “All three have been closed due to insecurity and the dangers that lie ahead” he says. The Salesians from these communities have left the country, with the exception of the Director of the vocational school, who has moved to the FMA residence in Shajara, where he collaborates in the initiatives that are carried out to help the needy.
FMAs living in Shajara opened their presence in 1989. There are five Sisters who run an elementary school for poor children and also have a centre for the promotion of women. They are currently the only representatives of the Catholic Church in the vicinity of the Sudanese capital. The Salesian Sisters residence is surrounded by poor families living in iron shacks. Because of the insecurity caused by the war, the FMA closed the elementary school and the women's centre, but focused their service on supporting hundreds of poor people.
The Sisters opened their classrooms and their residence for the poor and transformed the space into a house of prayer. The work has become a playground for poor children where they can play during the day and a safe haven where they can sleep at night. Every day about 80 poor children of different ages, together with their mothers, live in the Sisters' complex, a number that rises to more than 150 people a night. The Sisters provide food during the day to all those who are hosted by them, and offer breakfast daily to about 300 poor children and people who live around their residence.
The Sisters gather the children in a classroom during the day and teach them English and mathematics, give drama lessons, singing, encouraging the children with board games, offering religious meetings... And because stray bullets injure many people living around Shajara every day, and most hospitals in Khartoum have no medicine or doctors to turn to, the FMA have also begun an apostolate with the sick and injured. “Every day, between 15 and 20 injured patients come to the Sisters' residence for medical help” they say from the home.
For the poor of Shajara, the house and the FMA complex have become an oasis for finding spiritual and material nourishment and hoping for some medical assistance. With faith and hope, the religious and all the staff who animate them ask to pray for peace to come to Sudan, “while in the meantime we try to keep life more or less normal, they explain.
