Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
FMA
by Antonella Prenna
Rome (Agenzia Fides) – “On the day the war began in Khartoum, on April 15, 2023, we had the last exams of the school year. Around 11 am, we noticed that there were many people at the school gate who had come to pick up their children. Panic reigned. We knew nothing of what had happened a few hours earlier. We quickly collected the class work and the children were taken away immediately, without even having breakfast as usual. But many others stayed behind because none of their families came to pick them up. So our 2 teachers (the school headmaster and his deputy) took them home in their cars. That day marked the end of the 2023 school year and, to this day, no school has been able to reopen. The children are scattered everywhere, unfortunately some of them have died, others are injured. The fighting has stopped everything.”
Sister Teresa Roszkowska is one of the five Daughters of Mary Help of Christians (FMA) who was blocked for a year and four months, together with a Salesian priest of Don Bosco and twenty South Sudanese citizens, in the Dar Mariam mission in Khartoum, in an area under the control of the Sudanese Armed Forces, surrounded by the RSF-Rapid Support Forces since April 15, 2023, the day of the coup d'état (see Fides, 17/4/2023). The group was brought to safety by the Sudanese Armed Forces on August 5, 2024, the same day of the anniversary of the founding of the FMA Institute.
The missionary, passing through Italy before returning to Poland, her homeland, shared with Fides this long period of suffering that still continues in Khartoum.
“When the war began, we did not think that we would have to leave our mission. There were five of us, four from India and myself from Poland. At the end of May, a Salesian priest from India, the director of our Sudanese school, joined us. “The fighting was getting closer and closer,” says Sr. Teresa. Because of the constant RSF raids, many people were injured, many died. Many poor people, homeless people and mothers with small children began to arrive at our school in Dar Mariam. We still had school food, bags of beans, lentils, rice, so we managed to feed everyone who came, regardless of their religious affiliation. Many children stayed with us day and night, and we organized classes for all together.
“The age of the children who were with us was not older than 15 years, the youngest was 5 days old. I want to clarify that we work as a community, not as individuals, and this reality has deeply touched all of us without distinction,” Sister Teresa stresses. “It is difficult to be able to describe the anguish we have in our hearts, but we have never lost heart and we have continued to move forward all together.”
“Then, on November 3, 2023, a bomb hit our house destroying it and two days later, on November 5, another bomb fell on our school, destroying it as well. Thank God, no one died, only a few of us were injured, but not seriously. God and Our Lady protected us and saved us. We cannot even imagine the damage this explosion could have caused. We are so grateful to this day that our SAF army protected us and took care of us. Very often, the generals visited us, bringing food, medicine, and those among us who were very sick were taken to their hospital in Omdurman.”
“In these long months we have remained isolated from everyone and everything. All around us, only destruction. Until one day, Army General Nazruddin and his team gave us Wi-Fi so we could use it while we were here. However, since May 2023, we have no electricity anymore. We had a generator and we turned it on every other day to pump water for ourselves and for all the needy people living around us. The diesel had run out, and the help from the army allowed us to keep going. The situation was becoming more and more difficult and fortunately, we were provided with solar panels. I want to clarify – the missionary stresses – that no RSF member has ever entered our compound, we have been well protected by the SAF army. The soldiers often brought food for our children and for all of us. We know that RSF soldiers, in other places in Khartoum, have destroyed churches and carried out looting. They destroyed large statues of the Virgin and Jesus looking for money and gold inside. They took the Church's cars, laptops, computers, medicines... destroying everything they could not take with them.”
“When the situation was getting worse, our superiors insisted that we leave the country, but it was impossible. The roads were blocked by the rebels. We were safe in the mission and decided that we would not move if our people were not evacuated with us. They agreed and the process began. First an agreement had been made with the International Red Cross to evacuate our 112 members on December 10, 2023, but it did not materialize. Then the SAF leaders, General Nuzrudin and General Omer al Noaman (who passed away in early September), visited us and told us to be ready because they would only give us 2 hours notice before the evacuation. On July 27, 2024, the news came that around nine o'clock in the evening we would be evacuated, first only us, the nuns and the priests, as we were foreigners. The next day the others, but only a few people were ready to be evacuated. The others, more than 50, stayed in Dar Mariam. It was a terrible moment when we had to leave without saying goodbye because our children were already asleep, our poor people with whom we had lived for 16 months. Only a few mothers noticed that we were leaving. We were driven by car in the dark to the river bank. Many soldiers were with us to help us. Everything was done in secret. There was a big boat on which we lay down so as not to be seen. It took us about 50 minutes to reach Omdurman. When we arrived, in the early morning, we found cars ready to take us to the house of Mother Teresa's nuns. In Omdurman, a soldier responsible for our safety bought food for everyone, took some of us to the hospital for check-ups, provided medicines and everything we needed. Then, on August 6, he took us to Port Sudan, where they prepared the documents we needed.”
“For our evacuation, the Comboni missionaries in Sudan were also fundamental. And even now they are working with us to help our poor people who remained in Dar Mariam Mission in Shajara, Khartoum; they are about 70-80 adults and almost 20 children.”
“We have recently learned that our people who remained in Dar Mariam, Shajara, are no longer so many and that General Nazrudin and others visit them regularly, bringing mosquito nets and food for them. Please continue to pray for Sudan so that this senseless and tragic war may come to an end and that God may grant the gift of lasting peace to the whole nation!” concludes Sister Teresa.
The FMA arrived in Sudan on January 24, 1989, sent by the Superiors of the Congregation of the Salesian Sisters of Don Bosco to help the sisters who had already been in Sudan since 1983, but at that time they were in southern Sudan. In Shajara they had a kindergarten and a primary school. In total, 850 students from poor families, a group of almost 100 children who, due to war or other circumstances, never went to school, boys and girls, Muslims and Christians. (Agenzia Fides, 5/12/2024)
FMA
