Lillian Craig Harris, director of Together for Sudan spoke at our recent charity auction in Lambeth palace London. Her comments are replicated below.
11 October 2011
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| Lillian speaking at the event |
Good evening and thank you for joining
Together for Sudan for this fundraising event which is also a celebration of
our service to the Sudanese people. I am
grateful to Together for Sudan Patron Archbishop Rowan Williams and his staff
for inviting us here this evening even though the Archbishop is currently in
Africa.
Many thanks are due as well to Dr. Christine
Green and to Lady Patey for the many hours they have spent organizing this
event. And, of course, special thanks to
Peter Arbuthnot, our auctioneer, and to member of the Barbershop Quartet who
have sung for us on several occasions. I
am also grateful to fellow Together for Sudan Trustees Norman Swanney and
Adrian Thomas as well as to Dave Lewis, the Together for Sudan webmaster, who
publicised this event. And, of course, my great appreciation to all our helpers
and supporters, especially you who are here this evening.
Together for Sudan has been a blessed charity
since it began in the late 1990s. Our
educational and health care projects remain in great demand in the Khartoum
area and in South Kordofan where we have a second office in Kadugli. However, the charity presently faces severe
financial difficulties as well as disruption of our work due to violence in
South Kordofan. Our Kadugli office has been closed since early June due to
fighting and subsequent looting of our office there. We also face the challenge of recent loss of
southern colleagues who have left Khartoum for South Sudan with the birth of
that new nation.
Alan and I arrived in the UK yesterday after
visits to both Khartoum, the capital of Sudan, and Juba, the capital of the new
nation of South Sudan. We are invited to
begin work in South Sudan and even have there two former colleagues from our
Khartoum office who would gladly work for us in Juba. The needs and opportunities are enormous and
we lack only the necessary funding. Today many people are reaching out to help
South Sudan but relatively few are engaged directly with the critically
important education of women and children.
Sudan’s present circumstances are the
greatest challenge which Together for Sudan has faced in our more than 15 years
of service to the Sudanese people. From the beginning – and at the request of
Sudanese women – the work which became Together for Sudan has brought Muslims
and Christians together in service to the poor. We hope to continue this work because it is a peace building gift which
Muslims and Christians can give to one another. Our basic intent is to cross
tribal, religious and social barriers in order to make peace by demonstrating
that people of different faiths and backgrounds can work together to help other
people in need.
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| This is who we are and what we believe. |
In our present circumstances of combined
peril and opportunity, I am reminded of my mother who was a missionary nurse
and loved people of all sorts, mothers and babies in particular. Mom taught me to look on, rather than look
away from, the suffering of others. When
there were difficult times and seemingly insurmountable obstacles she would
say, “Sometimes you just have to do it!”
And then she would get busy helping.
So what would she do if she were here
today? I think that she would reach out
to desperate Sudanese women who long for education for themselves and their
children. Several years ago when I asked
displaced women in Darfur what they needed they cried out “Teach us to read and
we will help ourselves!” With that
mandate, Together for Sudan carries on although several of our projects are
currently unfunded and the future is not clear.
Thank you for joining us at this critically
important time for all Sudanese people.
It remains extremely important that we as individuals ask ourselves “Am
I my sister’s keeper?” And that we
respond positively. Thank you all for
being with us tonight. Enjoy!
LILLIAN CRAIG HARRIS,
Director .
