The following is a presentation given by Marcela Szymanski, head of Aid to the Church in Need’s EU advocacy office in Brussels, at today’s publication of Pope Francis’ 2021 Message of Lent. Szymanski shares moving testimonies of those who have suffered persecution for the faith and urges the faithful not to forget the persecuted but talk about them during Lent this year.
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On behalf of those persecuted for their faith, I want to thank you very much for this opportunity to share their testimony, linking them to the important message of Pope Francis for Lent this year. To those who suffer the ordeal of persecution, the pandemic has represented a moment of communion in pain and loss, regrettably taking place all over the world.
Pain brings us closer to one another, and through faith we receive the “living water” described by the Holy Father. A recently published poll by the Pew Research Center shows that, in most Western countries, religious feeling has increased during the pandemic. We should not close our eyes to that.
And, therefore, here I am today, with my hat of Editor-in-Chief of the report “Religious Freedom in the World”, published by Aid to the Church in Need. The report will be presented to you here on April 20th, but in the meantime I get to hear and read stories of faith, love and hope under various degrees of persecution. The example of those who would rather die than renounce their faith is unforgettable and hard to comprehend; it is like a dialogue where one of the parties seems to be fully charged with hatred and the other one appears fully protected by a strong layer of Love.
When I hear the stories of those oppressed and my eyes cannot get any bigger, they tell me “But Marcela, please, when you speak about us, ask them to pray for us! We want to be like you, to be able to read the Bible whenever we want, to go to temples that are open all day, to celebrate Christmas like you do!” Then comes to me the vision of dusty Bibles on shelves, the closed Churches, the strange Christmas that we lived recently… And I have to answer to them: “No, I will not pray for you to be like us, but for us to be like you! I and my neighbors would like to have your strong faith and hope in the future, and the strength to keep giving to others”.
The Pope’s message today tells us exactly that, but I wanted to show you a picture to their stories, I have so many photographs! But I chose a portrait of a family, because the family is where we learn to live the virtues the Holy Father explains to us. This image I chose is a Christian family of Aleppo. This is a drawing by the 11 year-old daughter. The teacher asked her to show us what she had survived in September 2016, when the Islamic terrorists of Al-Nusra were imposing their rule in the city. Please take a good look. This is a family under severe persecution because of the faith of their tormentors.
The artist is here, this is her mother, her sister and her brother, already dead on the floor, and with signs of torture. Three Al-Nusra terrorists, clad in black as they do. There are torture instruments including electric shock equipment, guns, grenades, knives. The terrorists were looking to take all the men and boys with them. The women, were expected to renounce their faith and become Muslim.
They only survived because the army arrived in time, and the terrorists fled. This family were generous to share with us their experience, because they firmly believe that God was with them there, or else… they would have all died. The family today is back to a “normal” life by Aleppo standards, working at the kindergarden.
This “family portrait”, ladies and gentlemen, was drawn only 2200 km from Rome, the same distance by car to the south of Spain. That is how close Aleppo is to Rome.
What can we learn for Lent, from such a family, who went through a cruel Calvary but consider themselves “resurrected” in Christ? What would we tell them, if we met them today?
We have heard it often from the Holy Father that, “with the power of love, with meekness, one can fight against arrogance, violence and war, and one can bring about peace” for the entire Church.
The persecuted are the elite of the Church, and to serve them is not a duty but an honor.
The horrible image that I just showed you is proof that the road to Heaven through martyrdom is not like a film by Zeffirelli, and those witnesses, like the girl who draw it, remain in need of psychological support. But others, too, survived to tell of the fruits of their faith and prayer. Those fruits are pardon and love.
Not far from Aleppo, in Qaratin, near Palmyra, Father Jacques Mourad, whom many of you met in Rome, was kidnapped together with 250 Christians by militants of the Islamic State. After three months of torture and demands to renounce their faith, much to their surprise, they were allowed to return to their homes. The reason they were given by the ISIS men was that “Christians had not taken weapons against the Muslims, and they did so because of their faith”. To Father Mourad, and to us too, this was a miracle!
Then follows the long road to reconciliation, to obtain an enduring new relationship in peace and harmony, with that neighbor that caused you so much pain. It begins by feeling surrounded by the Love of God. That is the only fuel that moves to pardon the pain of losing children, mothers, all their possessions, their health, their plans… To this will to pardon, we must add the testimony of the “good people”, who accompany you in this road to forgiveness.
My friend Silwanos was “good people”. He never wanted to be an archbishop. He became one and brilliantly so, in the Syriac Orthodox Church. He died two months ago in Homs, Syria, the city that bears witness to his love of God and the others. He was 52 years old, died of cancer for lack of treatment. An orphan from a very young age, Silwanos was raised by religious Sisters, where he came to find his religious call, together with his brother. He worked tirelessly for the orphans of the region. Many remember his dark silhouette in the streets during the bombings, when he was looking for the children to bring them to safety. One of those bombs killed his brother in 2014, in the Cathedral. With or without bombings he never stopped providing foster care for them, and as soon as the bullets stopped, he reopened schools and new kindergardens. Right in the middle of the war, in 2017, he came to Brussels carrying large suitcases full of drawings by the children of Aleppo, Homs, and Damascus. The drawings were intended as letters to the politicians, asking them to increase humanitarian aid, and to show them what was their daily life. So… you know where this drawing came from. In another occasion, I could tell you of the insults and humiliations Silwanos received from some European politicians. I was furious, but he had seen worse things in life. He promised to pray for them. He returned to Homs, where he served the poor until his very last breath.
Sacrifice goes together with deeply rooted love, the one that makes you reach out to your fellow brothers and sisters. During the first COVID lockdown in India, millions of workers were stranded without jobs or shelter for days, waiting for a little space in the train to go back home. A group called the “Small Christian Communities” network in India, which includes lay people and religious men and women, took it upon themselves to distribute food and water, as well as masks and disinfecting gel to those along the tracks. The members of these Small Christian Communities are as poor as the ones needing help, but they fully trust in the power of prayer and Providence. They organized prayers from home, but using megaphones to recite the litanies from the roof, so that those along the tracks could join them. We have to remember this: Hell trembles at the sound of the prayers of the poor!
And to deprive oneself of something! fasting, self-denial, says the Holy Father. Consider the many kidnapped priests and sisters in Africa, who are held for ransom by militias. They want the money to buy more weapons and continue kidnapping! So, the decision taken by the Nigerian bishops last week, together with the families of the victims, is not to pay ANY ransom for ANY of them. In a clear message to the terrorists, Archbishop Kaigama said: “Our children are NOT for sale!”. Assuming that responsibility of not paying is a very heavy Cross. Our brothers in Nigeria are fasting of life, in the hope for another miracle like that of Father Mourad.
We have much to learn from them.
Are we helping them, or maybe sitting on their Cross? We have to know they are ready to help us carry our Cross! With their life, prayer and death. Remember the family picture from Syria, let us not forget them, let us talk about them, let us bring their story to the Synod of Bishops; so that we can tell them one day that their long Calvary toward Resurrection was not in vain!
Thank you for your attention.
Marcela Szymanski is Editor-in-Chief of the report “Religious Freedom in the World”
and Head of the EU office and Advocacy for Aid to the Church in Need in Brussels
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