Nyawer Majok lost two of her three sons as well as a brother to the conflict in her home country.

Malok Mading, a tall, sinewy man who is totally blind now, still vividly remembers both of the civil wars that ravaged his homeland.

“We lost so many,” Mading, 72, said in fragile but still energetic voice during a community dinner at St. Michael’s and All Angels Episcopal Church in Stone Mountain on New Year’s Day. “I was always thinking about how and when we were going to end this long suffering.”

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They walked in their best clothes past villages and down dirt roads until they came to the church to fold away the pain of war and redraw the map of Africa in a referendum that began Sunday for an independent southern Sudan.

They carried walking sticks and memories of those lost in decades of bloodshed to a polling station to mark a moment in history and begin a chance for reinvention in one of the poorest corners of the continent. They cast their ballots as a children’s choir sang from a radio and a goat- skin drum thumped in the distance.

“This ends our slavery at the hands of the Arabs,” said Kasimiro Mogga Joseph, a priest at the All Saints Roman Catholic Church. “The Arabs considered us animals. They wanted this land but not its people. Being a priest, you feel the difficulties of your parishioners. They came to us crying and suffering during the war. We took them to hospitals and gave them hope.”

Read it all and please join me in praying this week for the Sudan–KSH.

On Sunday, after decades of war and more than two million lives lost, southern Sudan will get the moment it has been yearning for, a referendum on independence. All signs point to the people here voting overwhelmingly for secession, and the largest country on the continent will then begin the delicate process of splitting in two.

The United States government has played a pivotal role in bringing this moment to fruition, pushing the northern and southern Sudanese to sign a peace treaty in 2005 that set the referendum in motion. A proud, new African country is about to be born, but it will step onto the world stage with shaky legs. As it stands now, southern Sudan is one of the poorest places on earth.

Most people here scrape by on less than 75 cents a day. More than three-quarters of adults cannot read. Decades of civil war and marginalization have left the economy so crushed that just about everything is imported, down to eggs. According to Oxfam, a teenage girl has a higher chance of dying in childbirth than finishing elementary school.

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Southern Sudanese leader Salva Kiir says there is no alternative to peaceful co-existence with the north, on the eve of an independence vote.

Mr Kiir was speaking after meeting US Senator John Kerry, one of several international figures who have arrived for the vote beginning on Sunday.

The south Sudanese are expected endorse setting up the world’s newest country.

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People across the Communion have stepped up to support of the people of Sudan as the country prepares for its historic referendum on Sunday (9th).

Online demonstrations of concern for the state of the country and for its pending vote include prayer walls, a Facebook campaign, videos and blogs.

The Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams issued a statement on Friday calling the 9th January “an immensely important day for Sudan.” He urged everyone to stand with the Sudanese people “to ensure that the referendum takes place peacefully and that the process and the results are fully respected.”

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The Dean of the Anglican Church in Nigeria said the attitude of sit down and look is not going to work urging everybody to be involved. In his opinion, members of the national assembly should be able to contribute their quota in serving this country sacrificially, and plough back from the huge sum of money they are earning for the development of this nation.

He urged them to use their constituency allowance for the utilisation of the purpose for which it is earmarked. He made a prophetic declaration concerning this country that it is well with her.
He however urged the president to intensify efforts at sorting out the problem of electricity adding that once that is sorted out every other thing would be put in place.

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In many respects, the problems faced by Malakal’s Anglican cathedral are those faced by southern Sudan as a whole.

On Sunday, voters in the south will vote in a referendum that will decide if the region becomes the world’s newest state.

However, they will also be choosing to create one of its poorest and least developed.

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On October 23, I was one of 32 people crowded into the temporary office of the World Evangelical Alliance at Cape Town 2010. Twenty-eight of the people were representing the evangelical community of Sudan at what has been hailed as the most diverse gathering of the church ever. The rest of us were there to hear our Sudanese brothers and sisters’ hopes and apprehensions as they approached the January 9 referendum on separate statehood for southern Sudan.

The Sudanese representatives said, “Pray, pray, pray.” Pray for a fair and free election, without violent incidents or intimidation. As they took turns speaking, almost everyone earnestly repeated that phrase. They meant it.

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As I write this piece, preparations are on for Referendum in Southern Sudan which is to take place from the 9th to 15th January 2011. Due to lack of infrastructure and remote distance too many villages of Southern Sudan coupled with a very high rate of illiteracy necessitates a long period of voting. Many parts of Sudan lack good roads. To give you an idea, I am based in Kajo-Keji. During the rainy season, it takes me 10 to 12 hours to travel 260 kilometers from Kajo-Keji to Juba….

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If the south does split, what are the dangers?

The main rebel force in the south, the Sudan People’s Liberation Army has dominated politics in the south since the fighting ended in 2005. But the area is still awash with weapons, militias and mistrust. The whole process is precarious. Experts say a fresh conflict is a real possibility.

Alex Vines, of London-based think tank Chatham House, said: “The referendum is a risky affair. If it’s managed wisely by leaderships of the south and north then maybe an amicable separation can take place. There’s a lot of danger it could backfire spectacularly — we could see a renewed civil war, which is nothing new for Sudan.”

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The Archbishop Metropolitan and Primate of All Nigeria Anglican Communion, Most Reverend Nicholas Okoh, yesterday described the series of bomb attacks in the country as an attempt to derail peaceful transition of power in May.

He said those behind the explosions are trying to instigate the military to come back to power.

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When Anglicans worship, we affirm our faith by saying the Creed together. As we come to the point when we say, “we believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church,” we remember that we are part of the one Church of Christ since it was started on the day of Pentecost and before all the divisions that have taken place over the centuries. It also reminds us of our responsibilities to strive for unity, in order to fulfill the desire of Jesus’ heart: “that they may be one” (cf. John 17).

This also reminds us of our failure to take seriously our responsibility towards the unity of the Church of Christ. We not only have failed, but many of the reformed and evangelical churches have contributed in widening the gap between them and the traditional churches.

This “widening of the gap” happened as a result of rejecting many ideas and practices, simply because they belonged to the traditional churches. The main focus of our reformed churches was directed towards the study of the Scriptures, mission and evangelism….

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Church leaders in Kenya have called for calm in the wake of an International Criminal Court prosecutor’s call for the indictment on charges of “crimes against humanity” of six Kenyan political leaders.

On Dec 15, Luis Moreno Ocampo asked the court in The Hague to charge former higher education minister William Ruto, Minister for Industrialization Henry Kosgey and radio broadcaster Joshua Sang with planning a campaign of murder and ethnic cleansing in the Rift Valley against supporters of President Mwai Kibaki.

In a separate indictment Moreno Ocampo charged Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta””son of Kenya’s first president Jomo Kenyatta””Cabinet secretary Francis Muthaura and former police commissioner Maj. Gen. Mohammed Hussein Ali with murder, deportation, persecution, rape and crimes against humanity committed against supporters of Prime Minister Raila Odinga.

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One of those responsible for leading the younger leaders movement within Lausanne, Michael Oh, wrote this afterward:

During the reception for younger leaders, where we had close to 1,000 in attendance, I mentioned that many had been asking about the future of Lausanne and the future of the global Church. So I asked the young people gathered there to look around the room and into each other’s eyes. And I said to them, “Welcome to the future.”

Jesus showed up with a message. My job at the congress, which nobody envied but everybody was keen to encourage, was to chair the Statement Working Group.

We were tasked to listen for the voice of the Lord coming through the deluge of voices in all the plenaries and groups, and a deluge it was. It was like trying to catch Niagara Falls in a bucket. We hope to release the full Cape Town Commitment, Parts 1 and 2, in January 2011.

But what struck me towards the end was how often we had heard two themes coming through again and again ”” the same voice, saying the same things: “Make disciples” (don’t just count decisions to believe in me) and “Love one another” (and stop chopping up my body among you with your brands and labels, your ignorance and arrogance). And I thought to myself: “Two thousand years ago an Ethiopian met Jesus and brought him to the top end of Africa, through the scroll of Isaiah interpreted by Philip. How wonderful that two thousand years later our Lord is meeting us at the bottom end of Africa and giving us the same fundamental message.”

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A group founded by American actor George Clooney said Tuesday it has teamed up with Google, a U.N. agency and anti-genocide organizations to launch satellite surveillance of the border between north and south Sudan to try to prevent a new civil war after the south votes in a secession referendum next month.

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Renk is a town in the southern part of the country, and it couldn’t be any sadder. Not a single street is paved, and there are no hotels or cinemas. Instead, there is a lot of dust, sand and stray dogs. On the edge of town live refugees who have made it all the way here from Ethiopia.

In recent weeks, Renk has managed to become even a bit more miserable. Hundreds of inhabitants have abandoned the town, and thousands of them are all packed up and ready to go. At a nearby military base, tanks stand ready for action. It is possible that Renk will soon find its way into international headlines.

These are tense times in Sudan, Africa’s largest country. On January 9, the Southern Sudanese will decide in a referendum whether or not to secede from the northern part of the country. Should secession come to pass — and it currently looks as though it will — the world will witness the first founding of a new African state since Eritrea split off from Ethiopia in 1993. And Renk would become a place of high strategic value owing to its location near what will presumably become the new border.

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A radical Islamist sect said on Tuesday it was behind bombings in central Nigeria and attacks on churches in the northeast of the country that led to the deaths of at least 86 people.

The police said on Tuesday that 80 people were killed in Christmas Eve bomb attacks and clashes two days later between Muslim and Christian youths in central Nigeria, while more than 100 are wounded in hospitals.

“We have recovered 80 dead bodies so far in Jos,” Daniel Gambo, an official at the Nigerian emergency management agency said late on Monday.

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Further violence between armed groups has broken out in the city of Jos in central Nigeria following bombings that killed 32 people.

Witnesses said buildings were set alight and people were seen running for cover as police and soldiers arrived.

Previous violence between Christian and Muslim ethnic groups in the region has killed hundreds.

The latest unrest was triggered by explosions on Christmas Eve in villages near Jos.

Nigerian Vice President Namadi Sambo is reported to be on his way to the area.

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Voters in Southern Sudan will soon decide whether to secede from Sudan. Many anticipate that the referendum could result in renewed violence between the north and the south. Southern Sudan’s regional representative in Cairo, Ruben Marial Benjamin, spoke with SPIEGEL about the approaching ballot.

SPIEGEL: On Jan. 9, 2011, Southern Sudan will vote on secession from the republic of Sudan. Are you certain that the majority will vote for secession?

Benjamin: Yes, we are already flying the flag of an independent state on our government buildings. The government in Khartoum doesn’t have anything against it.

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Sudanese Episcopal bishop Samuel Peni had one request for central Iowans he met with this week: Pray for us.

Peni told people gathered during two nights last week at St. Timothy’s Episcopal Church in West Des Moines that a vote on Jan. 9 could split his native Sudan, Africa’s largest nation, in two. He hopes for an independent southern Sudan as a result.

Getting that message out is why Peni left his ailing, pregnant wife behind to attend a summit of Sudanese refugees in Phoenix, Ariz., earlier in the week. He came to Iowa to visit the home of a local priest who befriended him during his studies at Wartburg Seminary in 2008.

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As January’s referendum on independence for Southern Sudan approaches, tensions are running high in communities along what many expect will become a new international border with northern Sudan.

Packed buses arrive in Malakal daily with southerners coming home from the North. Church workers report the exodus is fueled by the fear of being attacked should the South vote to separate.

Similarly afraid in any possible post-referendum violence, Arab traders in the town’s market are closing their shops and heading North, causing the price of basic commodities to rise as the flow of commercial goods from Khartoum, the Sudanese capital, grinds to a halt.

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The Anglican Church has expressed fears that violence could occur in the forth coming presidential elections due to increasing voter bribery.

The Archbishop of the Church of Uganda Henry Luke Orombi says according to the recent concluded party primaries which were marred by irregularities and election malpractice the same might occur again in 2011 general elections.

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Proliferation of churches in the society is due to selfishness and greed, the Rt. Rev. Isaac Orama, the Bishop of the Uyo Diocese of the Anglican Communion, has said.

He told newsmen in Uyo that the situation was disturbing, recalling that in the early history of the churches, what could lead to proliferation of churches was “doctrinal differences”.

“But nowadays, churches spring up for greed and selfish reasons because people just want to be church owners.”

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(ACNS) In a spirit of fraternity, The Archbishop of the Episcopal Church of the Sudan and the Catholic Archbishop of Juba registered together at Hai Jalaba referendum registration centre today. But registering, they now qualify for voting on Referendum Polling Day scheduled for 9 January 2011. Accompanying them was the presidential advisor on Religious Affairs, H E Tijwok Adheaguer.

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The head of peacekeepers in the Darfur region of Sudan has warned of increased violence ahead of January’s referendum on possible independence for the south.

Ibrahim Gambari condemned recent clashes between the Sudanese army and two Darfuri rebel groups.

Some analysts accuse the government of trying to eliminate the rebels before it deals with the referendum.

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As regards the Primates Meeting hosted by the Archbishop of Canterbury due to take place early next year, we shall be able to express ourselves but the decision to attend rests solely on the individual Archbishop.
The Archbishop of Canterbury has invited me in my capacity of CAPA Chairman to be part of a preparatory committee. He is also anxious that a small group of primates meet with him. I would like to have your opinion and thoughts about it. I wish here on behalf of all CAPA Primates to thank the Most Rev Emmanuel Kolini for supporting me during these past 3 years as CAPA Vice-Chairman. We should value his great contribution made towards CAPA. Archbishop Kolini, I will certainly miss you wise insights but you will remain for a long time in my heart as a mentor and a committed and loyal servant of the Lord Jesus Christ.

May I also thank the CAPA General Secretary and the secretariat for enabling this meeting to happen.

The Bishops have given to us a mandate when we met at AABCII. I hope that as CAPA we can bring this mandate to concrete terms. We need your support as Primates. We need your involvement so that the information can reach the grassroots. Talking about grassroots, it would be unfair for us not to take into consideration the voice of the Laity. We have a women core group but it is time that our young men and women share with us their vision for the future. I therefore ask of your support to my intention in organizing a youth gathering for 2011. I intend to invite 3 young people from each Province. Giving them a voice will strengthen our role and asking them of their vision of the Church in Africa should be part of our responsibility as leaders of this present generation. I hope that we can discuss about it and take a decision.

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12 Cities | 12 Conversations – Cape Town 2010 from ConversationGatherings on Vimeo.

It is a good question they are asking: What can the American church learn from leaders in other regions of the world?

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Update: Skye Jethani identifies those in the video discussion here.

Lausanne Movement leaders have called for a new Reformation and challenged participants in the 2010 Congress to repentance, renewal and integrity. The Congress in Cape Town brought together more than 4000 evangelical delegates from 198 countries, and despite a sophisticated cyber-attack, many more were able to follow its proceedings on the internet.

Among its themes were how to reach out to other world faiths, ministry in the world’s 10 ‘mega-cities’, each with more than 10 million inhabitants, issues around justice and social action, and HIV/Aids.

The retiring chair of Lausanne’s theology working group, Dr Chris Wright, aimed his Saturday address at the church. ‘What hurts God most, is not just the sin of the world, but the failure, disobedience and rebellion of those he has redeemed.

‘We tend to spend all our time attacking and complaining about the world and ignoring our own failures.’Dr Wright referred to what he called ‘the idolatry of the church,’ pointing out the three idols that are ‘especially seductive’ for evangelical Christians: the idol of power and pride; the idol of popularity and success; and the idol of wealth and greed.

‘Reformation of the church is once again the desperate need,’ he said.

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Precious in thy sight, O Lord, is the death of thy saints, whose faithful witness, by thy providence, hath its great reward: We give thee thanks for thy martyrs James Hannington and his companions, who purchased with their blood a road unto Uganda for the proclamation of the Gospel; and we pray that with them we also may obtain the crown of righteousness which is laid up for all who love the appearing of our Savior Jesus Christ; who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

A team from the newly formed US Civilian Response Corps is building a significant presence across the southern half of… [Sudan].

There is a possibility civil war could break out between the Christian south and Muslim north after the referendum in January which will decide by a simple majority whether southern Sudan becomes the world’s newest sovereign state.

In an interview with The Daily Telegraph Ambassador Robert Loftis, the Civilian Response Corps chief, who is directly answerable to the US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, said he was sending teams around the region to “observe, report and monitor”

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