Array
Khartoum is wracked by violence, and my mind goes back over two decades to a couple of trips I took to that city, which is positioned dramatically at the confluence of the muddy White Nile and the dark Blue Nile. We were there to meet with believers in a region not particularly congenial to the faith, where Christian assembly was allowed, but you’d better keep what flows from it under strict control.
Now and then, I’ve spoken of the challenges that Christ’s people faced in that land — of their demographic, geographical, political, and theological situation. Along the way, I’ve made comparisons, both explicit and implicit, between the two countries, and the contrast has typically favored our fair nation. But now, I’m struck by the similarities. Here are 12:
1. Sudan is racially and ideologically tribal (as with the Arab, Fur, Beja, Kababish, Dinka, Nuer, and Nuba peoples), as are we increasingly so. Thanks to critical theory and its iterations/avatars, we are becoming “systemic racialists.” Thanks to the LGBTQ movement, we are discovering and fortifying a vast divide between traditionalists and political nihilists. (Witness the recent party-line vote on H.R. 735, the Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act.)
2. Sudan used to be the largest country in Africa, whose southern border would have reached into central Texas had its northern border been aligned with Canada’s southern boundary. Then came the split. And there’s been talk of it here, not between North and South (1861), but rather Red and Blue.
3. Over there, we talked with a convert whose departure from Islam brought police abuse — and with the family’s assent. Before conversion, he’d had nightmares featuring a “boogie man” who’d chase him through the village. One night in a dream, the harried young man ran across a neighboring stream for cover on the other side. Just then, Issa (the name for Jesus in the Quran) stepped out of the brush, and the monster ran off. When our friend awoke, he hurried to discover more about his rescuer, and, sure enough, he encountered the real Christ and accepted his gift of salvation. And this landed him in the police station.
In the midst of a harsh interrogation, a cop slugged him in the stomach, and the pained grunt sounded a little like the Arabic word for “better.” So, the abuser exclaimed, “Oh! You think you’re better than me?!” and hit him in the jaw, toppling the chair, and slamming his head against the wall. When we met him several years later, he told us that story with a smile on his face, instantiating Matthew 5:10 as a blessed persecutee.
We Americans aren’t there yet, but when casinos rather than churches get special treatment by the COVID czars, we can make out trouble on the horizon. And what’s this about spies in Catholic churches and a million-dollar fine for Calvary Chapel in San Jose?
4. On one trip, I ventured to ask a cab driver if he’d show me the Al-Shifa pharmaceutical factory, which, under suspicion of poisonous-weapon manufacture, had been wrecked by some U.S. cruise missiles. To my surprise, he was quite happy to take my wife and me out to the rubble, where a lone, disheveled soldier guarded the gate. He let us right in, and we walked around the ruins, picking up aspirin bottles and missile fragments. Instead of muttering about the Great Satan’s attack on his country, the driver expressed admiration for the pinpoint accuracy of our weapons (which left surrounding factories and homes untouched) and the decency of our timing (with the strike coming at night on a weekend when only a few guards were on site).
