Two hours ago I finished my final exams, signaling the close of my sophomore year at Wheaton. For the past few weeks, Uganda has been a strange shadow or a fuzzy future that I cannot really flesh out. It has been more of a concept than a reality.
Right now I am catching up on the reading we are completing to prepare ourselves for the trip. We have been assigned "Girl Soldier" which is a split testimonial by former child soldier, Grace Akallo, and American activist, Faith McDonnell.
The passages in this book reveal a sobering reality. Published in 2007, it is not completely up to date on the strides peace and hope have made in Uganda, but it paints a painful picture of the horrors these child soldiers faced.
I am going to completely misquote Gary Haugen of the International Justice Mission, but he alludes to social justice work and its message needing to include roughly 30% facts and 70% hope in order to motivate people to help. I think that's pretty accurate.
The graphic descriptions of murder and rape in this book are so hard to stomach. I am sitting here in the Admissions office for my final shift getting sick to my stomach, feeling a distant echo of the wounds I am reading about.
Come to think of it, now is probably not the best time to be reading this, when I am expected to answer the phones in a chipper and professional way...
All that to just be reminded that Uganda has had an intense past. I want to do all that it is in my power, through God, to prevent any more of the children of northern Uganda from going through such despicable tortures.
Please join me in prayer today for the current and future leaders of Uganda, that they might find peaceful ways to avoid the violence that has shed blood on its past.
Friday, May 14, 2010
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