Sister Grace from the Daughters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary in Mozambique has painfully communicated to Aid to the Church in Need that there is an “atmosphere of humanitarian chaos” in the Pemba region of Mozambique as Islamists unleash a string of attacks.
“There are many people fleeing. At the moment we don’t know how many altogether, but there are children, women and men, many people. The government is also helping and we, too, as a diocese, are helping these people. Two weeks ago our bishop, Bishop Luiz Lisboa, was in Metuge and delivered some facemasks.”
The Bishop estimates that more than 1,100 people have been brutally murdered, hundreds have disappeared and more than 200,000 people have been forced to abandon their homes and seek refuge elsewhere. “The people are no longer cultivating their fields, and this has resulted in a great deal of hunger.”
The diocese is trying to provide food and save lives. They also seek to be spiritual accompaniment for all in despair, as these poor faithful have been terrorized – some even seeing their own family members beheaded. Jihadists were overheard telling people, “If you want to escape, run as far as you can, to the province of Nampula or another province.”
The Sisters are providing psychological counselling, spiritual and material support, and are doing the best they can to welcome and comfort their people. But they need our help.
Can you aid our Sisters and religious so they can tend to the lonely, the scared and the hungry in Mozambique? The situation is critical and emergency aid is vital, and faithful right now have no one to turn to but our Church and you.
God bless you for being the hope they so desperately need.
