Josephine Bakhita (Sudan).

Rome--A former slave, Josephine Bakhita, now canonized, is widely venerated in the Sudan where a fourteen-year-old war continues to devastate the country. The mainly Muslim and Arabic north is seeking to destroy the Christian and animist black people of the south. (See our last report, Dec. 1998, p. 21.) Intermittent attention is paid by Western media only if there occurs some extreme outrage such as the bombing of schools, or if access to Sudan's major natural resource, oil, is threatened.

On October 1, Pope John Paul raised Josephine Bakhita (1869-1947) to sainthood as "a symbol of suffering and hope.". The new saint was born in El Obeid, Northern Sudan, and kidnapped into slavery at age 7. Bought and sold five times, she was taken to Italy by her final purchaser, an Italian consular agent. She became a Christian in 1890 and in 1893 entered a convent near Vicenza. Her deep and simple faith and the humility with which she carried out the most menial tasks soon gained her a reputation for sanctity.

Devotion to Mother Bakhita is widespread in Sudan. The persecuted Christian minority identifies with her early sufferings, and Sudanese refugees empathize with the fact that she attained a measure of peace only in exile.

The Sudanese bishops' conference travelled to Italy for the October 1 canonization and used the occasion to hold their annual meeting, something they find very difficult to organize at home due to the conflict.