Carol Windrum has a poster in her office: There is nothing acommplished by war that could not be better accomplished by peace. For 17 years prior to 1993 Mozambique was in the midst of a civil war. When I first traveled there I noticed there was great silence in rural areas - the birds were gone. If ever there was a bird a little boy with a slingshot had him. This was supper. The people were starving. Subsistance agriculture consumed most people's lives. Clean water and a little to eat took a family all day to get together.
The roads were awful -either destroyed asphalt or concrete or dirt. We bumped along from church to church with grave difficulty.
Mail could not get through. Many villages were without any water. The infrastructure needed for a developing state were almost non existant.
Babies died from lack of simple antibiotics easily available back in the States.
Land mines had been scattered randomly about the countryside and most of the land was not de -mined. and thus was unusable. Persons without limbs or sight were a common experience.
Now 15 peaceful years later the country has a road system, cell phones abound, computer communication is available almost everywhere, New industries are started regularly. The airport is brand new. The government is stable and there have been peaceful tranferances of power from leader to leader. Fewer people are hunger and clean water is in many villages. New buildings are all over the capital city of Maputo. Most children are able to go to school for 7 years. More people are able to work. The rate of inflation is reduced. The peace dividend is overwhelming.
I could only pause and thank God. There are still terrible inequities but the progress fills me with joy.
Bishop Ann
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