UNITED KINGDOM: Events highlight need for solidarity

By John Newton

(l-r): Father Paul Morton, trustee of Aid to the Church in Need, Bishop Eduardo Hiiboro Kussala of Tombura-Yambio in Sudan, and Father Michael Shields of Magadan in Russia

Aid to the Church in Need events in England and Scotland have highlighted the need to stand shoulder to shoulder with the persecuted Church.

The Hope Without Fear events in London and Edinburgh were led by keynote speaker Bishop Eduardo Hiiboro Kussala of Tombura-Yambio in Sudan, who warned of renewed conflict in his country.

Speaking at Aid to the Church in Need’s annual Westminster event on Saturday, 16^th October, Bishop Hiiboro underlined growing tensions in the run-up to the referendum on possible secession of South Sudan from the north.

Saying that the country had been marked by conflict and instability since gaining independence from the UK in 1956, he asked for the support of people in Britain – and other nations – in what he described as “a delicate moment, an historic moment”.

He said: “We call again for your friendship – the land is still in need of peace.”

Bishop Hiiboro went on to thank Aid to the Church in Need for its work helping the Church in Sudan, saying how his own seminary training and doctorate had been partly funded by the charity.

He said: “I want to pay tribute in a very special way to the friends and benefactors of Aid to the Church in Need, so many of whom have come here today.

“When I think about Aid to the Church in Need I think about the Good Samaritan, the one – the only one – who helped the person that had been left abandoned and forgotten.”

About 400 people attending the Aid to the Church in Need event in Westminster Cathedral Hall heard the speech by the bishop, who went on to reiterate his call for peace at a second Aid to the Church in Need gathering held the next day (Sunday) in Saint Mary’s Cathedral Hall in Edinburgh.

Bishop Hiiboro asked the charity’s benefactors to join in a prayer crusade for peace being organised in Sudan in the run-up to next January’s referendum.

At Westminster, Bishop Hiiboro addressed Sudanese people who had fled during the country’s violent civil war.

He compared them to the Old Testament Jewish people in exile in Babylon and called on them to return home to vote.

Also addressing both events was American priest Father Michael Shields, who for 16 years has worked in Magadan, a former gulag town in Siberia.

Father Shields spoke of “the inner conversion of the heart” which had taken place in Magadan. He explained how the Church had helped rehabilitate gulag survivors, who had previously been marked with a social stigma.

Describing his first meeting with the survivors, he said: “I expected no one to turn up because of the stigma – not only for them but for their families.”

But a number did come and now, thanks to Father Shields’s pioneering work, those who were seen as enemies of the state are hailed as heroes and survivors of fierce oppression.

Explaining how his work was making a real difference in the town, he described how one woman knelt before him and received the Sacrament of Confession for the first time in 20 years.

Leading both Scotland and England events was Aid to the Church in Need’s UK Director, Neville Kyrke-Smith.

In Westminster, Mr Kyrke-Smith gave a first-hand report about the Church in Ukraine, while the charity’s UK Head of Press and Information, John Pontifex, spoke about the growing difficulties Christians in Pakistan face to practise their faith.

The day began with Mass in Westminster Cathedral at which Bishop Hiiboro presided and Father Shields preached.

This evening (Monday), Aid to the Church in Need’s events continue with talks at Saint Simon’s Church, Partick, Glasgow.

Tagged with

• Archdiocese of Glasgow
• Archdiocese of Saint Andrews and Edinburgh
• Archdiocese of Westminster
• Priests
• Refugees
• Russia
• Sudan
• United Kingdom

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