De La Salle Brothers Blog

African Child

Br Bill Firman — Tue, 16 Oct 2012 21:48:18 +0000

I recall reading somewhere before I came to Africa ‘that half the population of Africa is under the age of fifteen.’ I have not really visited many African countries other than South Sudan, except during brief airport transits, but certainly it appears to me that the South Sudanese are keeping up the African average. Mother with child is simply a most common sight in South Sudan – and a very beautiful one.

A Sister asked the student teachers that she was teaching how many children they had. She tallied the results: There were 80 women in one sample and they had 460 children. That is an average of just on 5.8 per woman. In another class of 26 women, the same Sister asked how many girls and how many boys. The 26 women were mothers of 70 boys and 85 girls, a total of 135. The average here was only 5.2 per woman. Maybe the women in this class were younger! One thing is for sure, as the women age and have more children, the average will increase. So I guess six children is quite normal.

In our big house we catch rain water off the roof and have rejoiced this week with heavy rain filling our tanks; but for the local people they feel the cold and my guess is that quite a few struggle to stay dry in their grass-roofed tukuls. What real concern is the leak in our bathroom or the drip on my foot when I am driving. Here we regularly see people washing their clothes in river water. For drinking water they depend largely on bore holes – if the pumps are working. I often muse that the African child grows up thinking this is normal. They seem very content in their mother’s arms. They appreciate simple food and celebrate with joyful singing and dancing. For much of human history people have lived like this. How far have we come? It is good that we live longer but do we live better? A tin roof is a big help but maybe not all such ‘advances’ have really improved our lifestyle. Br Bill

Lucky to live long

Br Bill Firman — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 23:08:15 +0000

Looking at these frail, weary, weather-beaten people, I found myself thinking, ‘You are among the lucky ones who survived 39 years of war (1955 to 1972 and 1983 to 2005) and the recurring fear of attacks by the LRA (Lords Resistance Army). How many nights have you spent in the bush in quiet fear of the enemy, snakes and other dangers? They have survived when the average life expectancy in South Sudan was only 43 and 183 children per thousand, in this part of the country, die before the age of five. But few of us in our comfortable first world existence would think of them as lucky!

THE LONELY, THE FRAIL, THE FORGOTTEN

They are lucky now to receive the gift of care from those who have more – us. The theory of good social work is that we should empower persons to take their place as full citizens in their society; we should not patronize them with hand-outs. Yet this theory can be blind to the human misery of the old, the lonely, the frail and forgotten. On this day they were remembered and clearly rejoiced. In his homily, Fr Morris reflected on the feelings the old once had of importance in their community: people came to them for advice and wisdom. But now they experience the loneliness of seeming useless, a burden, a consumer rather than a contributor.

WASTING TIME WITH OTHERS

Again my thoughts turn to another favourite quote from Le Petit Prince by Saint Exuperien: ‘It is the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important.’ In practical terms there was a lot of time wasted for this gathering but for once some withered roses felt very important. Pastoral work is like that. I could have used this time with the old people for other things, important to me in getting my work done. I feel good when I am up-to-date and efficient. But it is also salutary to be prepared to waste time: the dad who watches his son play football, the mother who does the scoring, the businessman who has time for a family outing. If we want to create a bed of roses, we must have time for the God and people that matter. The elderly remind of us our destiny. They are always important in our journey to God. Br Bill

The Land of the Unexpected

Br Mark McKeon — Mon, 10 Sep 2012 06:03:40 +0000

It is always good to go back to a place where you have a connection. Papua New Guinea is one such place. Almost 30 years ago I taught there for three years soon after completing my training to become a De La salle Brother. Since leaving Papua New Guinea at the end of 1986 I have probably made about a dozen trips back there. There are currently 13 Brothers working in Papua New Guinea.

BROTHERS WITHOUT BORDERS

It is an international group living out the ideal of “brothers without borders”. There are four Indian Brothers, four Papua New Guinea Brothers and six Australia brothers. On my first night I stayed overnight in the brothers community at Hohola, one of the poorer suburbs in the national capital. After my sleep interrupted night becasue of barking dogs I headed back out to the airport for my trip to Mt Hagen in the Highlands. I was met at the Mt Hagen airport by Brother Ignatius who I had taught with back in 1985 at Bomana. Ignatius has been in Papua New Guinea for 27 years. The climate in Mt Hagen is much more pleasant than on the coast. The Brothers here are involved in a Holy Trinity Teachers College which trains primary school teachers.

SUPPORTING TEACHERS IN REMOTE AREAS

I had the opportunity to meet with Lambert and Louisa, two young Papua New Guinean teachers who support teachers scattered throughout the country. They coordinate training programs for teachers and send out regular newsletters to keep teachers informed and connected with one another. While there I met with Thomas Warburi, a young man who has commenced his training to become a De La Salle Brother. Thomas is 33 and has spent the past 15 years working as a catechist is a remote area of the Highlands. After two nights sleeping under blankets I returned to the warmth of the coast.

Central Province Village the floods regularly

On arrival I was informed that I would be taken out to Bereina in Central Province the following morning. The departure time of 5.00am necessitated setting the alarm for 4.30 to allow for a caffeine fix before the journey out there. Being dry season the trip out there took just over two and a half hours. In the wet season the road floods and bridges are often washed away cutting off our school at Mainohana. My time in Mainohana was brief but it allowed me the opportunity to catch up with the five Brothers who work in the school there.

On the final two days of my trip I visited De La Salle College Bomana. The school is located across the road from the National War Cemetery where many Australian soldiers are buried. Here I also met with the lecturers at Sacred Heart Teachers College. This College prepares teachers who return to remote areas of the country that find it extremely difficult to attract teachers.

During my eight days in Papua New Guinea I was able to meet and listen to a lot of people. I came away with a better sense of the needs that are there. While we can’t meet all the needs we can do our best to ensure that we make a difference in the lives of the young people who are entrusted to our care.

Returning to the Journey

Br Bill Firman — Mon, 13 Aug 2012 03:05:40 +0000

Two days ago, I returned to South Sudan after a refreshing vacation in Australia. After 26 hours of travel I stepped off the plane in Juba, at 5pm local time, with the temperature at 31 degrees Celsius – quite a change from the cold and blustery weather I had left behind in Melbourne. One personal journey was over but I am conscious of rejoining the longer journey of this new country, South Sudan, as it seeks to develop a stable and peaceful infrastructure.

It is good to return to a country where there are now signs of peaceful agreement with Sudan in the north. We are told an agreement has been reached on sharing of revenue from oil and on some of the matters relating to debt. No doubt international pressure has helped, and will continue to be applied, as agreement is sort on the major remaining issue of border demarcation. Selling oil brings in dollars, the accepted international currency for purchasing the many things, especially food, required from other countries. South Sudan has the potential capacity to produce its own food and, indeed, to export but currently the skills and infrastructure for that to happen are not yet in place.

Not so good news is that there have been occasional break-ins to some religious houses as people desperate for food take desperate measures; but no-one has been hurt and with the exchange rate seeming to stabilize, there are grounds for hoping this is just a blip on the radar. Generally, Church personnel are held in very high esteem by the people of South Sudan as it was the Church that stood by and supported the people during the long years of war. If goods become more widely available and affordable, then the society will be more stable.

Keep the Faith: Let it Show

Br Mark McKeon — Sun, 22 Jul 2012 05:06:23 +0000

“Keep the faith-Let it show” was the theme for a gathering of 175 Lasallian Young people, teachers and Brothers held at Rotorua in New Zealand during the first week of July. The group included 120 who travelled from Australia for the event. Amazingly, over 110 travelled on the same Air New Zealand flight to Rotorua. Students and former students from De La Salle Colleges throughout Australia and New Zealand participated in the gathering. John Paul College Rotorua provided the venue for most of the activities. The youth gathering commenced with a traditional Maori welcome (pōwhiri) at one of the Rotorua maraes.

One of the key note addresses was given by Br Mark McKeon, Director of Vocations. Br Mark challenged those present to find time in their busy schedules and reflect on their lives in light of the values of the Gospel. Karina Anthony who works as a youth minister at De La Salle Ashfield said, “It was great to be there. Being Lasallian is about looking at our individual situations in the light of the Gospel and then making a response with others.” The gathering included time for morning and evening prayer and reflection.

Brother Ambrose Payne, the provincial of the De La Salle Brothers, reminded the young people to “let their light shine” in whatever situation they found themselves. He affirmed their commitment to seeking new ways to respond in faith in the reality of their lives. We live our spiritual life every minute through our actions, what we say and what we do.

Simone McGill works as a youth minister at De La Salle Colleges Cronulla and Caringbah and had this to say, “One of the important challenges in my life is responding to the call to share my faith with others. Being here with all these people who want to find ways to put their faith into action has been great.”

The youth gathering was a great opportunity to discover new ways to be of service, reflects on the benefits of belonging to a supportive community and grow in awareness of the presence of God in our lives.

Overcoming Obstacles

Br Bill Firman — Tue, 05 Jun 2012 21:51:41 +0000

Bush Kids

There was reason to rejoice in Malakal where I was last week: every night we enjoyed the blessing of power supplied by the city. It is almost a year since we have experienced that in Malakal or anywhere in South Sudan, even in Juba. In Juba, there have been a couple of nights when the diesel-driven generators have supplied power but diesel continues to be in very short supply everywhere. Food prices have greatly increased.

We do see an increasing number of very prosperous looking South Sudanese spending a lot of money in shops but the ability of the ordinary person to purchase goods is greatly diminished. I surmise this may be a sign of a widening gap between the families of the big men and the general populace.

In Malakal there is still no gas available. Sr NInet, the Principal of our Solidarity Teacher Training College in Malakal, has done great work in forward-purchasing supplies of charcoal, sorghum, flour, rice, beans, onions and the like but there are few fresh vegetables on sale. Water also has to be purchased as the generator that pumps water from the Nile has been inoperable. The required parts have arrived and the generator is now working again, ‘al hamdu lilah’, but meanwhile trucks have driven near our pipes and cables at the river, forming deep wheel furrows and forcing out pipes out of the ground!

Br Denis with fans

Teachers at Inservice

Ensuring there is water and food for our tutors is a small challenge compared with obtaining an adequate supply for students in residence. Wage increases don’t keep pace with inflation here! There are no students graduating from secondary school yet in Malakal who have been taught using English as the language of instruction. So the first class for pre-service students is older and smaller than one would expect long term. Two teachers dropped out to go back teaching saying they found they could not feed their families unless they teach full-time. I taught Maths last week but the real problem was not the Maths but the students’ ability in English. The student teachers are determined, show great good will and express real satisfaction at the programme they are following. We know, however, their progress will be slow. I imagine how capable I would be if trying to learn Maths using Arabic! Br Bill

A Multitude of Mothers

Br Bill Firman — Sun, 27 May 2012 22:10:58 +0000

Br Bill with friends

‘What makes you really happy?’

I asked a class. One student replied: ‘It was the day I married my wife. Being married to her is wonderful’. So far so good! It was the next comment coming from an unexpected perspective that surprised me. ‘Yes’ he said, ‘I like it so much I can’t wait to get another one!’

In South Sudan, it is expected that a man marrying a woman will pay a substantial ‘bride price’ to the parents of his bride. So accumulating many wives can be a sign of wealth, status and prestige in this society. In Dinka culture, as in some other tribal cultures, the bride price is paid in cows. One woman, who did not seem very happy in her marriage, told the person to whom she was talking: ‘But my father got 300 cows for me,’ as if that was the most important aspect of her marriage. Three hundred cows, by the way, is a very high bride price. This is a very different way of looking at marriage.

Mother with her children

I can imagine many people thinking such practices are very demeaning to women, particularly in an era where equality of the sexes and affirmative action are well established. All I can say is that to many people here such practices seem quite natural, the familiar social order, but I suspect polygamy is beginning to decline. Certainly, when I asked a class of Dinka teacher trainees in which the majority in the class had graduated from the Loreto Secondary College in Rumbek, ‘Are there any cultural practices you think should be changed’ one girl immediately responded, ‘Yes, we should be able to pick our own husbands’. One of the three men in the class reacted saying. ‘No, that should not happen!’ Change will come, as it should, but it would be wrong to imagine this is a society of depressed and downtrodden women.

The Sisters with whom I live in community in Riimenze do great pastoral work with women, not only in Riimenze but in many of the scattered communities of this region of South Sudan. They do find women who are hurting, who welcome a chance to tell their stories and who wish to see some transformation of cultural practices. But the dominant impression is always of women looking after their children and families and enjoying motherhood greatly. The children here are very well mothered not only by their mothers but by grandparents and aunts – and the occasional uncle!

Grandma's looking after me

All adults seem to take care of all kids. This is not repressive. In fact little children wander freely in all sorts of places without obvious supervision. There seems to me to be a healthy confidence that children are safe. Different, but definitely not dissolute! Br Bill

Hold My Heart

Br Bill Firman — Mon, 21 May 2012 02:57:38 +0000

Two Spanish visitors and I, guided by Sr Dorothy from New Zealand, Director of our Catholic Health Training Institute in Wau, recently visited the wards of the Wau Teaching Hospital as well as the St Daniel Comboni Catholic Hospital where our registered nurse students are on clinical placement. I had visited these facilities before. I found it simply wonderful to observe the dramatic improvement in the buildings but especially, also, the greater confidence of the staff, and nurse trainees, that is now evident. Standards of care have risen dramatically with great benefit to the people of South Sudan.

Working in the hospitals as trainee nurses were the students to whom I had taught English last year as part of a Foundation programme in preparation for the formal registered nurse training. What a joy to see the assertive ‘presence’ they have developed and the belief and pride in what they are now doing! For me personally, their warm greetings were very reaffirming. For our Spanish visitors, it was extremely gratifying that their seemingly endless toil over fundraising applications has born such fruit.

In the great freedom seeking movements of the sixties, they used to sing: ‘All we are saying, is give peace a chance’. What I hear the young people of South Sudan saying today, now that there is peace, is: ‘All we are saying is give us a chance.’ Give us a chance to help our people with better health care, better education and better attitude.

Trauma in this country runs deep – in prisons, homes, schools, hospitals, wherever the people are. Our SSS pastoral team has already delivered a Capacitar workshop on trauma healing in the Wau prison. I often recall asking a Wau class about their families. Only 12 out of 32 still had fathers living. The mothers of 26 of this class were still living but in most of their families some siblings had died. The guns of war were directly responsible for the death of many people but, indirectly, many more died from starvation, poor health care and harsh living conditions.

Here people do not ask for much. They are grateful for the gift of life and celebrate it daily with family and friends. I find myself moved by young people who approach me, not for their own advantage, but with questions such as ‘Can you assist my sister, my brother, my friend?’ Can you help the baby in the Wau Hospital, cradled in his mothers arms, a child with hideously swollen lips who has the highly contagious disease of anthrax? I listened to a doctor say he could not place this child in a ward with other patients and put all of them at risk. The hospital says it cannot afford an extra nurse to care for this child in an isolation ward. Such is the dilemma, and sometimes the despair, of South Sudan.

Here in South Sudan we are bringing professional care into the silence and the sorrow. Our Health Training Institute is healing and holding hearts to a waking tomorrow. Br Bill

Loved by God

Br Bill Firman — Sun, 06 May 2012 18:59:31 +0000

Outisde for the Sunday Eucharist

It is easy enough to accept that the poor deserve our special care and concern. That is quite straight-forward and not so threatening: we share the bounty we have received with those less fortunate. It is, however, an altogether greater leap in faith to accept that we should be happy and continue to praise God in wretched circumstances; but, in Agok, that is what the people do!

“They are living under trees with no food and little water”

An energetic man intent on helping his people, the local priest, Fr Biong, has found donors to pay for many truckloads of rough hewn timber, bamboo and matting to be brought to Agok. The people will make themselves tukuls – mud and stick walled houses with grass roofs. Fr Biong had arranged this for 6,400 households but just as he was getting ready to distribute the building materials, he found further displaced people had arrived. They are living under trees with no food and little water – more than 400 families, mostly women and children, who have fled from recent fighting. With the aid of the Governor of Abyei, Fr Biong managed to get 200 bags of sorghum for these recent arrivals but I am not sure how they will cook it as they have no pots or pans!

“Not once did I hear a teacher complain about their” We were in Agok to teach English to more than a hundred teachers. Some walked two hours each way to get to our classes. Attendance was very good. The parish provided a chair for each teacher but none had desks to use, even when they were sitting for tests. Not once did I hear a teacher complain about their situation – although two did complain that they thought I had given them one mark less out of a hundred than they deserved!

“I am very fine thank you

Where's my seat?

There are kids almost everywhere. Many are crowded into whatever classrooms are available while others are simplytaught in the open or under a tree. I don’t know how the schools will cope when rain arrives. The friendly children love to shake a Kawadja’s hand and call out, ’How are you?’ with a heavy accent on each of the words. The most common response when this question is asked is, ‘I am very fine thank you!’ One does indeed get the impression they do feel very fine thank you in this dry, dusty, desolate district. Perhaps, more than help with English, we bring them hope that they are not forgotten. We, as part of the Church, are walking with them in their search for a future that offers greater opportunity. Br Bill

Ominous Rumblings

Br Bill Firman — Sun, 22 Apr 2012 21:02:04 +0000

Br Bill with friends

It seems almost unbelievable to me that sensible men who know one another and usually seem to respect one another, even with their ideological differences, can be so belligerent towards one another. Surely they have a common goal of peace for their peoples. The northern leadership is now spruiking the ridiculous line that they are going to liberate the south from the SPLM, that is to say, to free the southerners from their own government. I guess there are many in the north who may believe this political line but it is not the reality!

What is more disappointing to me is that there are many in the South who seem to be cheering on and encouraging the provocative actions of their leaders. I was surprised to find in Yambio last Tuesday that all the shops were shut. The police had enforced closure because there was a rally in support of the taking of Heglig by the South. Yes, Heglig was part of the south in the 1950s but an international court did declare it part of the north a few years ago and that verdict seem to be accepted by the south – until very recently when the southern forces attacked and reclaimed it. So, for a change, moral right seems to reside more on the side of the north but strength on the ground lies with the south.

Why has the south done this? Perhaps because the north has been bombing targets in the south and some retaliation is seen as justified. The south is smaller but boasts many more citizens from it population genuinely willing to fight for their country. Here, well south in Yambio, there has been a call for young people to join militias and trucks have been seen heading off with soldiers/police to towards the north. The southern soldiers, as I write, are still in Heglig – maybe because the north lacks the strength on the ground to evict them. The north still has superior air power but on the ground it is probably a very different story.

We're here to learn

So what is going to happen? Hopefully, reason will prevail on both sides and, with international pressure being applied, both sides will begin to edge out of the corner into which they are pressing. The media has already reported declarations of war. The conflict is very localized at present and likely to remain so – at the northern borders of South Sudan – for quite some time. In spite of all the aggressive rhetoric, it may actually be a ‘phony war’ where neither side wants to give in nor does either side want it to get too serious! Among our Solidarity with South Sudan members there is no panic. We need Christians and Muslims to unite as believers in the one true God, common sons and daughters of Abraham – not crusading enemies! I continue to be optimistic – fundamentally because the leaders of both sides have too much to lose and the people want peace. Both countries require courageous leadership with a genuine vision for lasting peace. No-one really knows if that is what we have. – Br Bill