Profile: Cardinal Zubeir Wako
Hope and forgiveness in Sudan
Throughout more than two decades of conflict, Cardinal Gabriel Zubeir Wako has been a constant voice of reason, calling for peace, mercy, and forgiveness in a land scared by war.
It is difficult to imagine the scale of the trials and tribulations borne by the leader of the Catholic Church in Sudan.
Nearly three million lost their lives as Sudan ricocheted from one war to another.
Yet Cardinal Wako’s consistent message has been one of reconciliation.
Growing up amid violence
The future Cardinal Archbishop of Khartoum, was born in Mboro, a small town in the Bahr el Ghazal region of southern Sudan.
The district he grew up in was to become one of the bloodiest theatres of war. One million people died there.
Few signs of the conflict to come were apparent on 27th February 1941, when Gabriel Zubeir Wako was born.
His parents, Placido Wako, senior catechist in Wau diocese, and his wife, Bulunda, were devout Catholics and the Faith was crucial to his upbringing.
Attracted to the Church from a young age, Zubeir would wait for Father Angelo Arpe to pass their family home.
They would walk to a nearby pond, where they would sit on two large rocks, praying the Breviary together.
But their regular prayer times came to an abrupt halt when Father Angelo was assassinated. The murder came just hours after the priest gave the young Zubeir his first Holy Communion.
From the age of 10, when he entered the Minor Seminary, he was drawn to the priesthood and was finally ordained on 23rd July 1963.
Completing his studies at just 22, Zubeir required a special dispensation from Rome to be ordained because of his youth. He would need all the vigour of youth for the years ahead.
Early years of priesthood
The 1962 Missionary Society Act was wreaking havoc across the Church in Sudan. In Wau diocese, clergy numbers fell to just six in a few short years.
Initially appointed assistant priest in the town of Kuajok, Father Zubeir soon had to run the parish alone, when the parish priest was expelled from the country.
Soon he became district inspector of Christian Religious Education. When the junior seminary, Saint Anthony’s, faced closure because of a shortage of priests, he stepped in as rector.
Years later, he recalled: “After my ordination, things became difficult. I found myself practically alone.
“We were only a handful of priests in the diocese, but we tried to keep things going despite our small number.”
Life became tougher when Wau fell into the grip of Sudan’s first civil war.
Cardinal Zubeir said: “We were confined to Wau. One of our priests was killed. There were massacres and house arrests and some of us were on the hit list.
“We spent a number of nights under our beds. The morning after the shoot-out was our first chance to see who was still alive.”
These were years of tough pastoral experience. Such experiences would mean he could look his priests in the eye when, as archbishop, he called them to remain steadfast in faith in spite of all the odds against them.
Bishop at 34
In 1975, Gabriel Zubeir Wako was named Bishop of Wau, at just 34 years old.
War had ravaged his people and morale was poor. The seminary he had worked so hard to build up was struggling – only six students were there. The continuing war severely hampered outreach to the people.
One hope remained – catechists, who provided the backbone of many parishes and mission centres.
The youthful bishop set to work improving the catechists’ understanding of Scripture and Liturgy.
But before he could see the task through, Bishop Zubeir Wako had to bid farewell to his home region.
In 1979, he was appointed Archbishop of Khartoum. Still not yet 40, he had been handed what to many was a poisoned chalice.
The 1972 Addis Ababa Peace Agreement, which ended Sudan’s first civil war (1964-1972), was already under threat.
Civil war returns
By the time Zubeir Wako took over as Archbishop in 1981, President Jafaar Nimeiri was desperate for support to bolster his crumbling power base.
He brokered a deal with Islamist hard-liners – and in September 1983 the much-feared Shari‘a law was introduced.
Tensions were compounded by the discovery of oil in southern Sudan. Relations between the Government and the south broke down with both sides claiming rights to the oil.
The second civil war, in which so many were to lose their lives, had begun.
The archbishop later recalled: “With the outbreak of civil war, the stream of internal refugees heading north to Khartoum and beyond soon became a flood.
“They were people who had lost everything.”
Founding Save the Saveable schools
Archbishop Zubeir Wako had to watch with shock and dismay as poverty-stricken Christian families desperately struggled to give their children a little education in the misery of the displacement camps.
He started to organise Church schools – and so the Save the Saveable schools programme was born.
At first, only a few pre-school children took part in the scheme. But Save the Saveable soon spread throughout the displacement camps around Khartoum and further out into the neighbouring towns and villages.
Central to the scheme was the provision of free food for the children and social support for families. Parents did not pay a penny – the diocese footed the bill, heavily reliant on help from agencies such as Aid to the Church in Need.
The initiative aroused the deepest suspicions of the government. Undaunted, Archbishop Zubeir Wako insisted upon the Church’s right to its own education system, separate from government schools, where the heavy emphasis on Islamic doctrine discriminated against non-Muslims.
The programme now covers the spectrum from nursery to 8th class involving 34 schools across Khartoum. It continues to be one of Aid to the Church in Need’s key projects.
The dawning of hope
In autumn 2003 two rays of hope illuminated the Church in Sudan.
First came news of the long-awaited canonisation of Daniel Comboni, the nineteenth-century missionary regarded as the leading figure in the evangelisation of the region.
Comboni’s canonisation coincided with the elevation of Archbishop Zubeir to the position of cardinal.
The news caused amazement throughout the Sudanese Church – never before had Sudan been honoured with its own cardinal.
Both events sent out a signal that the Church in Sudan was far from vanquished.
They demonstrated that the people’s rock-like faith had stood firm through the most tempestuous of times to emerge as a beacon of hope.
Their hope was to bear fruit and in 2005 the Comprehensive Peace Agreement was signed by the Government of Sudan and the rebel Sudanese People’s Liberation Army/Movement.
It was the closest the country has come to drawing a line under a 20-year civil war, which Cardinal Zubeir Wako so desperately sought to end.
Preaching for peace
Cardinal Zubeir’s response to the slaughter of millions of innocents has not been one of self-righteous outrage. Rather, he has always advocated reconciliation and forgiveness.
In his 2006 Easter message, he described how many Sudanese still bore the scars of civil war.
Cardinal Zubeir asked Christians to fix their gaze on the risen Jesus who stands before them with the marks of the crucifixion – the marks of the nail and the lance – still on his body.
The cardinal said that within that torn and lacerated body, Jesus had a heart which none of his torturers could touch.
“That heart remained what it had always been: a heart full of infinite goodness, compassion, mercy and love.”
He went on to urge all his hearers to forgiveness, despite all they had endured.
Cardinal Zubeir said: “From that heart he asks us to relay to all who have done us wrong the prayer he offered for those who were crucifying him: ‘Father, forgive them, they know not what they do.’”