Nyamlell: Father Michael Barton's Sudan mission: Greetings at Eastertide, 2009

Monday, May 25, 2009

Greetings at Eastertide, 2009

Saint Teresa Parish Nyamlell P.O. Box 21102 Nairobi, Kenya 00505
May 4, 2009.

One and All,
I join with the Risen Lord in wishing you his peace in this Eastertide of 2009.
Let me tell you a little bit about the last four months which corresponds to the first quarter of the already 25% gone year. By the first of the year we had closed the four schools and given the last of the certificates and did the last celebration of the Pauline year in the centers.

I started to visit the chapels up to January 4th and on the fifth flew to Juba and the Indonesian Sisters to Nairobi and one of them was going on to Jakarta for home leave. When I got off in Juba I was told the retreat that I was coming for had been canceled and I became more than a little upset. I stayed only four days and did no retreat but did visit my old mission where I had been parish priest for nine years from '78 to '87 and met many people who knew me and had forgotten the arguments and remembered the good times and I was very happy to see so much time started in my time still standing. Only what surprised me was that so many of the then youth now had the bodies and even some of them the faces of their then fathers.

I went in the evening hours to the Leper colony which is now surrounded by a big military complex. I spent many hours there with the now quite old catechist who cried for happiness in my arms and it was very emotional for me too. I did not leave until it was very dark. I saw and became even more convinced of the importance of education in formal schools as the right arm of evangelization, which lasts, and I know this view is not shared by everyone, not even my confreres. Yet I saw it clearly to continue in these efforts. I was visited by many young priests who I had gotten them into the Seminary. Some are doing very well and others not that well. NGOs and high paying government jobs are strong temptations to leave the priesthood plus all the usual problems with conflicts with bishops and parish communities and women an alcohol and what not.

I got back to Nyamlell of the 9th and three stores were broken into that night but I woke up and the thieves got away emptied handed but I spent the whole of Saturday fixing doors and getting a new watchman and new locks. The rest of January and February and March I was out visiting chapel baptizing and the rest to the Catholic communities that make up our parish.

A tropical ulcer decided to settle on my right leg and set off high fever and took me for a loop for a day or two. I got medical help and had to nurse the leg for six weeks but I recovered and didn’t miss a day of work or visits.

This year our grade eights had to sit for the South Sudan PRIMARY STATE EXAMINATION for the first time ever and I was not sure things would be done in an honest way but the diocese of Rumbek said it had to done like that. So they sat and I was not around. The results came out in late March. Our school got the highest marks of all the schools in our county and in all the five counties of the State and of the whole state of Northern Bahr el Gazhal. Out of 1,569 who sat for the exam numbers one, four, and eight and ten were our pupils of Comboni School Nyamlell. The second rank school in all the state was our DOR School in Gordhim which is run by three Apostles of Jesus priests and four Sacred Heart Sisters all of whom are African religious. I am glad the government was honest enough about it. Our worst pupil came in 99th out the 1,569 candidates. He would have had to repeat class 8 from our internal exams and so he went to sit for the test to become a policeman in Aweil and got a hundred per cent and topped all the others and so the worst became the best.

I am happy with the good results and I hope no one expects this to happen every year. All I can do is to work hard and try our best and let everything fall where it will.

I did go to visit Raga where there is another Comboni community who do all their work in Arabic. I got some work done on the car and had some long conversations and after three days came back to visit more chapels.

We had two visits of the bishop of Wau who is also the President of the Sudan Bishops conference during the month of April. He just came for a few hours each time.

I came back to the mission of the 30th of March so I could be here for the first anniversary of Father Raymond Pax’s birthday into eternal life. We had all our prayers on his graveside on the last day of March , I also had meetings with the Sisters and then with the catechists the entire day.

On April First we started a new school year in all of the Comboni schools and have good enrollments in all of them with still few girls. We had one of our girls join the Loreto Girls High School in Rumbek . One boy went as a third year student in the seminary section of Mapourdit. We have another who has gone to Khartoum to study Philosophy in the national seminary.

I was here in the parish center for Palm Sunday and again for Easter. On Good Friday the Governor of the state came and with us and his entourage for the Stations of the Cross and I told him that this was the second mission established in all Dinka Land and the first in his state. He gave a good donation for the anniversary celebration in October.

I got the last of the High school buildings roofed and finished in the rough way that I do things here in the South Sudan and was given money to buy some lab equipment for the Science Lab.

My big project is the Saint Catherine Activities Center which will be a Church in honor of Saint Joseph in Marial Baai and almost has its roof on it but still… has a lot to do to get it all finished maybe two more months or so. Most of the construction workers we have working are women. I t will be the first Catholic chapel in any center in any of the three parishes in the entire state. Even the parish church in Gordhim is in very bad shape but ours and that of Aweil look good but are small for big occasions. Next year there are plans to do another in Gok Macar…..if God willing!

I still have problems of land grabbers and no one helping to solve the problem.

A lot of thought is in the planning stages for the Diamond Jubilee of the Parish which is 75 years in October 1, 2009 (1934-2009). Thanks for all your help of every type and species. Blessings and Peace to one and all!

Michael D. Barton, MCCJ.

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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.