I sat teary eyed on the edge of the bed in Nairobi, Kenya. Today, widows from the war in Congo poured into Goma, weeping, mourning, crying in the streets. The police had met them with tear gas and bullets. I held a cell phone in my hand – my friend Francois was on the line, from Congo.

“I am so angry,” he kept saying. “Angry at who?” I asked. “The rebels, the government,” he urged, “I’m so angry.” “Where are our friends?” he asked. “Where are the parents of Jean? I don’t know. Where are the parents of Bernadette? I don’t know. Where are all of them?”

This is war.

One man’s broken voice filtering through the phone lines from Goma to Nairobi. His plea, “Where are our friends?” or “Marafiki wetu wote wako wapi?” haunts me. I ask the question with him.

The few lines from the end of Les Miserables sing prophetically:
“Do you hear the people sing?
Lost in the valley of the night?
It is the music of a people who are climbing to the light!
For the wretched of the earth
there is a flame that never dies.
Even the darkest night will end
and the sun will rise.”

The music of the people climbing to the light. This is the music I want to sing.

Facing war and injustice all over the world, my hope to speak up for those who are suffering stems from Proverbs 31:8-9. In this proverb, I am bid that by speaking up, justice will be ensured. Is there something spiritual in the act of speaking? I think so. As a journalist and photographer, my voice has been the channel of so many voices, my words echoing the words of others.

- -

From my notebook: Marsabit, Northern Kenya.

I am chilled by the white air, reminded of so many days and nights in Congo. Mwenga in the morning – Kitutu at sunrise. The isolation and remoteness, the simplicity and the beauty, it allures and it saturates. So here I am again, this time in a new place.

This is the story of Torbi.

They had come. Two hundred bandits, through the school gates. It was early morning. Some children were at school, many were on the way. Shots fired. Children began screaming. The bandits entered the classroom and killed children point blank, within meters. Some bandits came into the nursery and brutally slit the throats of children too young to read. Twenty-two children died that day. Fifty-six parents were killed. Sixty-eight children were orphaned.

The trauma continues. Rifts of fear and pain spread like waves through Torbi. One girl faints every time she hears loud noises. The government promised to send counselors. It has been three years now and no counselors have come.

Guyo Isacko, the head teacher at Torbi Primary School, ushered us into a classroom where three children were shot. He pointed to the walls where chunks of round divots remained, remnants of where the bullets had pierced the wall, framing a room filled, today, with smiling school children.

Hawo’s son Adano was killed that day. She said he left in the morning like normal. The next time she saw him, he was lying on the ground, lifeless. She says it pains her inside to think of what happened, but that she has to be strong for the sake of her other children.

“I have not thought of revenge for even one day. I know what it feels like as a mother to lose a child. Why would I want someone else to feel what I’ve felt?”

Her strength is loud.

“Yes, I have forgiven them. Even the very day my son was killed I forgave. My religion teaches forgiveness. So I do.”

Food for the Hungry, an international relief and development organization working in 26 countries world-wide, is serving to re-build Torbi through education and clean water initiatives, walking alongside local leaders to overcome the gravest of injustices.

- -

Children killed mercilessly, famine, disease, war. Injustice takes a myriad of forms, and I still continue to ask why. I have seen some of the cruel things in the world and I have seen some of the beautiful things. Both imprint themselves on mind and memory.

From the trans-Atlantic slave trade to the civil rights movement, brave men and women throughout history have decided to stand up to injustice and lend their voice to freedom and truth. This act, this presentation of self for the defense and love of another, is divine.

Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” Nothing operates in isolation. We are all wildly connected.

And so the bid to speak up comes in. My journey has taken me all over the world as a witness to injustices large and small, though no injustice is ever truly small. And my platform for action has been to turn and project these truths back to the world, locally and globally, that justice everywhere might be upheld, and that we would learn to be bearers of both truth and action. They belong together.

- -

An organization that has dedicated itself to just this is Discover The Journey (www.DiscoverTheJourney.org). Founded on Proverbs 31:8-9, their mission is to SPEAK UP for children in-crisis by exposing injustices affecting children around the world through story, media, and art, and to ENSURE JUSTICE for children in-crisis by advocating for intervention across cultures in Love.

This mission has led Discover The Journey to investigate and create media in response to issues such as child soldiers in DR Congo, sexually exploited children in Haiti and orphaned children in Iraq.

With the many forms of injustice around the world, Discover The Journey has found the brunt of these to fall on children, and so they have devoted themselves to advocating for children, being an extension of Christ’s love to those who have faced enormous trials in such young lives.

And the link to justice is that by creating this media, intervention partners can be found to act directly on behalf of the child or children. Until change is realized.

Heal Africa (www.HealAfrica.org) is an organization working on the ground in eastern DR Congo to bring hope, healing, and restoration to the people of eastern Congo. Leading with an excellent medical program, Heal Africa is fighting injustice through physically attending to the survivors. And lives are being changed.

- -

I agree with Martin Luther King, Jr. when he urged, “In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.”

It will be the silence that is the most indicting. What are we silent about? What have we chosen to not see?

William Wilberforce, the great abolitionist who helped bring about the end of the trans-Atlantic slave trade, said, “You may choose to look the other way but you can never say again that you did not know.”

What have we chosen to look away from? What have we, in our comfort, chosen to ignore? For our silence is most assuredly linked to another’s justice. And when we speak, may our words and actions be filled with love and truth, compassion and humility. There is no room for anything else.

As I have learned to open my mouth and speak of what I have seen, things have happened. Humanitarian aid programs have been funded, people have been helped, relationships have been formed, love has come. By taking the step to see we stand at the precipice of truth. To speak, we dive in.

As the new Kingdom comes, these things will pass away, but being here now, we are God’s primary instruments to heal a bleeding world. Do not ask where is the Church, ask what your role is in bringing this Kingdom to bear.

The power and beauty of Jesus is moving, and daily injustice is being pushed back. Do you want to join this holy fight of love? Do you want to be part of the greatest purpose the world has ever seen? This purpose is to bring God’s Kingdom to earth and to advance it – in bodies, minds, souls, and spirits – in slums and war zones and alley ways – in scared minds and angry hearts. The Kingdom we represent is not tarrying to bring about Love. It is our Master’s Way.

And so I bid you now to go and speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves and to ensure justice for those who are suffering. This could mean traveling across the world to do so, and it could also mean advancing justice by loving your family with greater wholeness or providing a platform for an injustice to be spoken of and revealed in your neighborhood. We need not look far to discover wounds desperate for love. And as you go, you will find a nearness with Christ. For He is always near the oppressed.

I remember the one thing. Love is that thing. And this is what I cling to:
“Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth… Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away” (Rev 21:1; 3-4).

Lindsay Branham lived in DR Congo and Rwanda for 18 months, working as a writer and photographer for Food for the Hungry (FH). She has produced film and photography throughout Africa and her work on child soldiers was featured on CNN. Lindsay is currently FH Global’s Communications Coordinator and lives in Washington, D.C. Visit the website at www.fhglobal.org.

The New International Version of the Bible has been referenced.

All photos provided by the author.