October 2, 2009

Bishop Suffragan David Jones of the Episcopal Diocese of Virginia and Alexander Baumgarten, interim director of government relations for the Episcopal Church, joined faith leaders from Christian, Muslim, and Jewish traditions for a meeting at the White House October 2 to present a copy of a letter on comprehensive peace in the Sudan signed by more than 1,400 clergy from across the United States.

The letter, organized by the Sudan Interfaith Working Group, of which the Episcopal Church is a member, urges President Barack Obama to prioritize "efforts that will bring peace to millions that live in violence and fear while lacking the basic services essential for survival."

Noting that the United States government played a leadership role in bringing about Sudan's 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement between the northern government and southern rebel leaders, the letter says that "it is clear that peace between the north and south remains extremely fragile, and fears of renewed civil war are on the rise."

Meanwhile, the intervening years have brought increased conflict in Darfur in the western portion of the Sudan, where "after more than five years of violence, displacement, and rampant insecurity, millions of people now depend on humanitarian aid and are forced to live in makeshift camps," the letter says. (The full text is available at http://www.savedarfur.org/page/s/movedbyfaith/.)

The group of faith leaders presented the letter to the Rev. Joshua Dubois, director of the White House's Office for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, and Mara Vanderslice, the office's liaison to the President's Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships.

"As a Christian, this is a personal issue to me," Jones told Dubois and Vanderslice as he shared an email from Bishop John Zawo of Ezo in southwest Sudan that recounted the death of 418 people last Christmas Eve when the Lord's Resistance Army, a Uganda-based rebel group, attacked worshipping congregations.

Jones recounted a week he spent in Sudan in retreat with the House of Bishops of the 4-million-member Episcopal Church of Sudan. He noted that the Comprehensive Peace Agreement was discussed repeatedly, and each of the church's bishops expressed a feeling that the Sudanese government in the north wants to keep the south destabilized.

Other participants in the White House meeting shared similar perspectives related to both Sudan's north-south conflict and to the ongoing violence in Darfur.

In addition to Jones and Baumgarten, faith leaders present at the meeting included Archbishop Vicken Aykazian of the Armenian Orthodox Church in America and president of the National Council of Churches USA; Ruth Messinger, president of American Jewish World Service; Steven Colecchi, director of international policy for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops; Imam Mohamed Magid, leader of the All-Dulles Area Muslim Society and vice president of the Islamic Society of North America; Alissa Karg, Africa regional director for Lutheran World Relief; the Rev. Gloria White-Hammond, co-founder and pastor of Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Boston; and Galen Carey, director of government affairs for the National Association of Evangelicals.

"For us, Sudan is a major priority," Colecchi said during a press conference conducted by the faith leaders following the meeting, "and we're looking for the U.S. administration to treat it as a priority so that the U.S. can be major player now, as it was in brokering the north-south peace agreement."

Dubois conveyed to the group that Obama believes comprehensive peace in the Sudan is a priority despite other challenges, foreign and domestic, currently on the agenda. Obama frequently stressed the importance of U.S. leadership on peace in the Sudan during his 2008 presidential campaign. As a senator in early 2006 he served as keynote speaker at a major Washington march for peace in the Sudan organized by the Save Darfur coalition.

"We've seen time and again with respect to both the north-south conflict in the Sudan and to the violence in Darfur that American leadership plays a catalytic role in moving toward peace," said Baumgarten. "As we hear renewed frustration from partners in the Sudan that peace efforts are close to faltering, we have an increased urgency in our advocacy for the United States to reinvigorate its leadership."

Sudan's 20-year civil war, which claimed more than 2 million lives and displaced about 7 million people, came to an end in January 2005 when the CPA was signed by the two warring parties – the Government of Sudan in the north and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement in the south.

Despite initial hopes for the success of the peace agreement, southern Sudanese leaders have been frustrated by the northern government's refusal to live into its major terms, including sharing oil revenues and drawing fair borders. Additionally, the conflict in western Sudan's Darfur region, which the United States government has called genocide, has claimed hundreds of thousands of lives and displaced millions of people since early 2004, further complicating efforts for a comprehensive peace.

Sudan is scheduled to hold its first democratic elections in 24 years in February 2010, and a 2011 referendum will give southerners the opportunity to determine whether to secede from the north or remain a unified country. In July, Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori and Sudanese Archbishop Daniel Deng Bul submitted a joint statement to the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee emphasizing the need for a fair and transparent election and for resources to support an infrastructure and oversight capacity to ensure that this happens.

Increased violence in southern Sudan in recent months has heightened concerns in the international community that full-scale fighting between north and south could emerge in the lead-up to, or aftermath of, the 2010 national election and 2011 referendum on southern independence. Deng addressed the escalation in violence last month in a statement in which he called on the Government of Southern Sudan and the international community "to act swiftly" to prevent further attacks such as those that left more than 40 dead and many more wounded in Twic East County, Jonglei State, on August 28.

Among those killed in that attack was the Venerable Joseph Mabior Garang, "who was shot at the altar of the church in Wernyol during a service of Morning Prayer," according to Deng's statement.

Deng cited similar violence in a letter to Jefferts Schori and the Episcopal Church ahead of its 76th General Convention. He also underscored the importance of partnerships between ECS and the U.S.-based Episcopal Church.

The General Convention addressed the fragile situation in Sudan with Resolution A033, urging "renewed international commitment to the successful political implementation" of the CPA and "increased and better-coordinated economic-development and investment efforts ... in southern Sudan."

"Episcopalians in the United States are deeply committed to solidarity with our brothers and sisters in the Sudan," said Baumgarten. "Today's meeting at the White House was a reminder that we stand united with millions of other Americans, from a variety of faith traditions, who believe that our own government must act now to help secure a peaceful future for people who have suffered as much or more than anyone in the world over the past four decades."

Episcopal News Service