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Fr. Victor Mosele on his way to freedom after being held captive for three months by the Rebels |
n Sierra Leone, West Africa, the bloody and terrible civil war in which thousands of children, boys and girls, were forced to take part, is over. Kidnapped from their villages by guerrilla rebels, branded as animals, drugged with cocaine, and reduced to being little 'war-machines', they were the child-soldiers who perpetrated unheard of savageries.
The war has been over for almost two years, but the scars it has left on the land and the structures, on the bodies and the souls of the population, especially of the children, will take much longer to heal.
The civil government is trying to reorganize itself, and the international community is responding with help.
Missionaries and social workers, however, are the ones most involved in the day-by-day, one-by-one, process of healing and recuperation.
The Xaverian Missionaries, Fathers, Brothers and Sisters, led by Bishop George
Biguzzi, SX, of Makeni, are in the forefront of that process with the rebuilding of schools and dispensaries, with the re-education of the once child-soldiers, with the revitalizing of the Christian communities, many of which, dearly tried by horrors and fears, proved themselves faithful. They are helping build up a new society and a livelier church, by their witness to Christ's Good News and by a thousand and one 'works of love'.
Fr. Victor Mosele, 68, who is now in the USA sees his present missionary ministry in colleges and universities of the Midwest as a means to "lead young people to think" and, maybe, commit their talents to the worthwhile cause of Christ's Good News that we, called to be God's one family on earth.
I was captured by children. I was more afraid to face a child-soldier than an adult-soldier. With an adult you can try to reason; with children, 'out of their minds', it was an unpredictable
risk.
Fr. Victor Mosele
Fr. Victor spent 30 years in Sierra Leone where, during the civil war, he was twice held captive by the rebels for a total of five months, and both times managed to escape from their grasp.
Before these experiences, Fr. Victor was in charge of 33 primary schools with a total of 6,000 children. Many of the children from those schools, most of them ages 6 to 15, were among the thousands who were abducted, indoctrinated, drugged and subjugated into the rebel army.
Some of the same child-soldiers later kidnapped Fr. Victor. Says he: "I was captured by children. I was more afraid to face a child-soldier than an adult-soldier. With an adult you can try to reason; with children, 'out of their minds', it was an unpredictable risk." Even so, the second time Fr. Victor was captured, it was child-soldiers who recognized him an helped him escape. He chuckles as he says, 'I knew they still loved because I still have my hands and feet!'
Fr. Victor now calls Xavier Knoll in Franklin, WI, his home base, but there is no doubt where his heart lies: "If it were up to me, I wouldn't be here. I would go back to Sierra Leone," he says. 'That's my home now. After 30 years there, those are my people and I have there many friends."
Sierra Leone's population of about 5 millions, divided in 14 tribes and 40 percent Moslem, and the majority is animist, followers of indigenous beliefs. “The conflict, however, was not one of tribes or of religions. We missionaries are generally accepted by all and are in good terms with mostly all. The decade-long war in the country has a complicated explanation, but, in a nut shell, we can say that it was foreign in origin: it came from Liberia and it was goaded on and financed by Libya's Muammar al-Qaddafi, whose goal is to set up Islamic socialism in West Africa."
In Sierra Leone, the end of the nightmare has dawned, thank God. About the missionaries one may ask, "What keeps them going?" Were it not for the relationship they have with Christ, the world would run them down in no time. It's too big for them to stand up to, to be good and to find good in. Missionaries often go where freedom brotherhood, compassion are not and say they are for it. Certainly, they'll never find the level of compassion Christ carried, but trying to learn that compassion is enough to carry them through. After all, peace is a one-thousand-and-one-gestures-of-love-put-together thing.
(From Xaverian Mission Newsletter)