Nyamlell: Father Michael Barton's Sudan mission: Hello from Nyamlell: Letter from Father Michael Barton

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Hello from Nyamlell: Letter from Father Michael Barton

Saint Teresa Parish

Comboni Missionaries-Nyamlell

P.O. Box 21102

Nairobi, Kenya 00505

June 17^th, 2008.

Hello from Nyamlell (Aweil West) in the state Northern Barh el Ghazal State in the South Sudan.

I want to let you know that I am well and happy and alive all at the same time in the month of June of the year of the Lord 2008.

Everywhere I go there are many more people around and they have come mostly from Northern Sudan and have come with many other churches that were not in this area before and have attracted many of ours to them. I don’t fight with any of them nor them with me. There are many more NGO s all doing their own thing. There are many cars and motorcycles and lorries where before there were very few and prices have gone wild and there is more Arabic than before and videos and generators and people building with baked bricks and all with what seems to me as with little planning and lots more of stealing and breaking and entering and crime which has affected us as well.

Right after the death of Father Pax we started the four Catholic schools in the parish and teachers are always the big problem and because of this the enrollment has not grown. The building of the classrooms is at a standstill due to lack of material and builders and a NGO not fulfilling their contract. Yet we are already in the 11^th week of the school year and we are in the second term. Whereas the government schools are just opening up this month and will close before ours. We go on as we can with girls being married off while they are still in class one, two and three and five and six and now we have only one girl left in class eight and in class six. It makes me very sick to my very core and no one listens. One older man married a girl from class six and then a month later another girl in class four. I only hear about it after a big number of absent days that they are never coming back to school. For me it is a terrible cultural weakness.

The bishop came on April 30^th to celebrate Mass for the first anniversary of Ray’s death. I t was to have him. And then on May 9^th came Father Colombo came with his team to give a workshop for the catechists for four days and brought a beautiful new translation of the new testament in Dinka. He also came with the vicar general of Wau diocese who came just for a few hours to pray for Father Raymond on his tomb. I appreciated it very much. The course and the catechists' participation were quite good and the team was happy with them. It was short and sweet.

For me what was even sweeter was that Father Colombo found the problem with our lighting system which went down in May 2007. He found it was the inverter and he took it from the Sisters convent as our batteries were good and theirs were dead as a doornail and so now I have light again for a short time at night. Father Pax would have been so happy. As he was the one pushing to get it in the first place, but he did not push to get it fixed. Father Colombo is just a gem and is coming back in December for another workshop and to help me during Christmas so that will be just great.

The Sisters are a great help in the school and in the parish we celebrate prayer twice daily and birthdays etc. One is going to South Africa for a two-month workshop in August and all three are going for a few days to Mapuordit for the 60^th anniversary of Sr. Mary. I would go if it were not for the school and parish work.

I continue to have lots of visits to the chapels of the parish and have lots of Masses and confessions and baptisms and still I have a good number of marriages and I am sure that I have more than any other parish in the diocese of Rumbek or even that of Wau but I have yet to have one in the parish center of Nyamlell. So there is still a lot of work to do.

My plan is to do more of the same. We had a lector’s course with poor attendance in mid May and will have an extraordinary Eucharistic ministers course in July.

Maybe in September I shall go to Nairobi for a dentist to check a tooth I broke way back in Jerusalem.

Lots of love and prayers to all of you.

Sincerely yours in the Sacred Heart,

Michael D. Barton.

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Saint Teresa Parish

Comboni School

Nyamlell (Aweil West)

Northern Bahr el Ghazal State

South Sudan

The permanent school and the Activity Center that serves as the Saint Joseph Church, as well as a block of four classrooms in the Comboni School in Marial Baai in Aweil West in Northern Bahr el Ghazal, were completed and the Church is used for two classes of Comboni School there. Until further plans or possibilities present themselves, the Marial Baai Community will have to maintain two locally built classrooms. However, in 2009, six classrooms were built – two of them in the first permanent Church built in the entire state since the 1950s.

The Science Laboratory and two more classrooms were roofed and completed in Nyamlell, also in 2009

We celebrated the 75 years of foundation and of existence of the Catholic Church in Nyamlell, which is the second mission built by the Comboni Missionaries among the Dinka. It began in 1934 for the first evangelization of the Dinka Malual so there have been 75 years of the gospel and the sacraments in our state. It was a very big celebration and many thousands of people came and so much preparation went into it.

There was a drive to get donations from the local Christians especially by the youth, and to my amazement the youth and the elders responded marvelously and most of the costs was covered by the Catholics of the parish; the OLSH sisters helped so much in organizing so many details. It was a Christ-centered celebration of Saint Teresa of the Child Jesus and a strengthening of the Church for continued preaching of the gospel in this parish, state and country of the South Sudan.

Our school did very well and got first place in the whole state of Northern Bahr el Ghazal in the state-run class eight leavers certificate examination in 2009. Our best was first in the state and our worst was 99^th out of 1,568 class eight leavers. The best went on to high school and the worst became a policeman. The class eight in 2010 should be sitting soon for theirs and we shall see how they will do.

A non-governmental organization (NGO) in Juba had promised $50,000 when the Activity Center was being built in Marial Baai, but when finished they said that it looked like a church to them and in the end did not give a red cent or piaster of any kind. So all this was done by money that had been donated by people like you.

There are NGOs who have built classrooms but they will only do it for the South Sudan Government and not for the Church even though our results are far superior than those of the government. All these took great effort.

In 2009 the Christmas collection all over the parish in all its centers and chapels was dedicated to building of the first permanent Church in the entire County of Aweil North. This building will be for two purposes. It will serve as a Church and as an Activity Center. It will be called Saint William Church and Saint Julia Activity Center and is being built in Gok Macar, the county seat of Aweil North.

We started the construction as of December 2009 and it is much too early to say when we shall finish but it will be done some time in 2010. I am thinking that U.S. $80,000 will be the cost and one thousand will come from the local community in the form of Sudanese pounds of items.

Next we would like to build a smaller chapel in Ariath, another important center in Aweil North with a good population and many Catholics in both Gok Macar and Ariath.

We have another Comboni school in Makuei, also in Aweil North, which is up to class five. Not far is a large church that has only local grass structures. I would like to build a block of four classrooms that will cost close to U.S. $100,000, which will only be started when we have the money. So I am looking for that too. I hope to get something from some organization. Much cheaper will the repair and finishing of our last classrooms if we can by 2012. I shall move one step at a time.

In 2010 there will be two schools that are up to class eight. They are Nyamlell and Marial Baai, both in Aweil West. As I have said Makuei is our smallest school and has class five this year.

Sacred Heart High School had a great year and in 2010 we shall have Form One and Form Two and growing but also struggling as students coming from other schools like the government ones are very difficult to find as to fit the poorly taught and the well taught who have the basics in place.

We all need help, so that something can get done and that what is up and running stays that way.

Sincerely yours in the Lord of all,
Father Michael Barton, MCCJ.
Comboni Missionaries-Nyamlell,South Sudan.
Post Office Box 21102
Nairobi, Kenya 00505.

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Hello from Nyamlell: Letter from Father Michael Barton

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Nyamlell: Father Michael Barton's Sudan mission

Message from Father Michael Barton

Saint Teresa Parish

Comboni School

Nyamlell (Aweil West)

Northern Bahr el Ghazal State

South Sudan

The Science Laboratory and two more classrooms were roofed and completed in Nyamlell, also in 2009

There are NGOs who have built classrooms but they will only do it for the South Sudan Government and not for the Church even though our results are far superior than those of the government. All these took great effort.

We started the construction as of December 2009 and it is much too early to say when we shall finish but it will be done some time in 2010. I am thinking that U.S. $80,000 will be the cost and one thousand will come from the local community in the form of Sudanese pounds of items.

Next we would like to build a smaller chapel in Ariath, another important center in Aweil North with a good population and many Catholics in both Gok Macar and Ariath.

In 2010 there will be two schools that are up to class eight. They are Nyamlell and Marial Baai, both in Aweil West. As I have said Makuei is our smallest school and has class five this year.

Sacred Heart High School had a great year and in 2010 we shall have Form One and Form Two and growing but also struggling as students coming from other schools like the government ones are very difficult to find as to fit the poorly taught and the well taught who have the basics in place.

We all need help, so that something can get done and that what is up and running stays that way.

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