My Analysis
The Catholic Church has created
rebels against God’s salvation plan for mankind. No wonder it has a number of
rebel leaders and dictators all over the world. The million dollar question is;
if Catholics can rebel against God’s salvation plan by arguing that Jesus is not the only way to heaven, why not rebel
against MERE MEN like Pope Francis. Kissing the feet of catholic leaders like President
Salva Kiir does not change the inner man that is already dead to sin. Do
catholic leaders like President Salva Kiir care about how many Sudanese end up
losing their lives, after all when these catholic leaders die they will go purgatory
and masses will be offered for their release from purgatory to heaven? It is
just a matter of time before God exposes how useless Pope Francis’ Feet Kissing
was.
Extraordinary moment Pope Francis kneels to kiss the feet of rival South Sudan leaders as he begs them to avoid a return to civil war
- The pope has never performed such a show of deference to political leaders
- He got down on his knees and kissed the leaders' feet one by one in Rome
- The pope usually holds a ritual washing of feet with prisoners on Holy Thursday
Pope Francis
knelt and kissed the feet of South Sudan's rival leaders in an
unprecedented act of humbleness to encourage them to strengthen the
African country's faltering peace process.
At
the closed two-day retreat in the Vatican for the African leaders, the
pope asked South Sudan's president and opposition leader to proceed with
the peace agreement despite growing difficulties.
Onlookers
appeared to be stunned as the 82-year-old pope, who suffers from
chronic leg pain, was helped by aides as he knelt with difficulty to
kiss the shoes of the leaders and several other people in the room.
The
pope usually holds a ritual washing of the feet with prisoners on Holy
Thursday, but has never performed such a show of deference to political
leaders.
'I express my heartfelt hope that
hostilities will finally cease, that the armistice will be respected,
that political and ethnic divisions will be surmounted, and that there
will be a lasting peace for the common good of all those citizens who
dream of beginning to build the nation,' the pope said of South Sudan in
his closing statement.
The spiritual
retreat brought together President Salva Kiir and opposition head Riek
Machar. Also present were Kiir's three vice presidents. The pope kissed
the feet of all of them.
South Sudanese Vice President Rebecca Nyandeng Garang said Francis' actions moved her profoundly.
'I had never seen anything like that. Tears were flowing from my eyes,' she said.
South
Sudan gained independence from Sudan in 2011 but two years later the
country plunged into a bloody civil war, which left at least 400,000
people dead.
The two-day Vatican
meeting was held a month before the end of the shaky peace deal's
pre-transition period. On May 12, opposition leader Machar is expected
to return to South Sudan and once again serve as Kiir's deputy.
However, the agreement, which was signed
in September in Khartoum, the capital of neighboring Sudan, has been met
with delays, missed deadlines and continued fighting with key aspects
still not implemented.
A military coup
in Sudan on Thursday fueled worries in South Sudan that the toppling of
longtime President Omar al-Bashir could derail the already fragile peace
deal.
'Sudan has helped us with the
peace deal. We hope that the new system will also focus on the
agreement, ensuring that it will be implemented,' said opposition leader
Machar, who attended an evening prayer vigil for peace, held at Rome's
church of Santa Maria in Trastevere.
Pope Francis poses with South Sudan's President Salva Kiir Mayardit
(C-L), South Sudan opposition leader Riek Machar (C-R) and a delegation
of South Sudan prelates at the Pope's Santa Marta residence in the
Vatican
South Sudan became independent from its northern neighbour Sudan on July 9 2011 after decades of bloody conflict.
But just two years later it plunged into its own intermittent civil war.
The
conflict began in December 2013, after President Salva Kiir accused his
former vice-president Riek Machar of orchestrating a plot to overthrow
him and sacked him.
Fighting quickly broke out between rival militias supporting Kiir and Machar, which soon became divided along ethnic lines.
Thousands
of people were killed throughout December in violent struggles, during
which rebel militias seized control of several regional towns.
South Sudan gained independence
from Sudan in 2011 but two years later the country plunged into a bloody
civil war, which left at least 400,000 people dead
By April 2014, millions of people had been displaced and several ceasefires had been broken.
On
14 April 2014, pro-Machar forces stormed the town of Bentiu, capital of
the state of Northern Liech, and killed hundreds of civilians in what
has been described as the 'worst massacre' of the civil war.
On
9 May 2014, President Salva Kiir and Riek Machar signed an agreement
recommitting to a ceasefire, but mere hours later both sides accused
each other of violating the deal.
Throughout 2015, intermittent peace talks began and then later broke down, but meanwhile the fighting continued.
In
April 2016 Riek Machar returned to Juba - the South Sudanese capital -
to be sworn in as the first vice-president in a new unity government,
but after three months he was sacked and went into exile.
In
December 2016 a UN commission on human rights said that ethnic
cleansing was taking place in several parts of the country, which
President Salva Kiir denies.
The
government and the UN declared a famine in parts of South Sudan in
February 2017, in the first declaration of famine anywhere in the world
in six years.
In February 2017 the UN declared that 5.5 million people would need food aid urgently, including 1.1 million children
The
UN said the catastrophe was a direct result of the civil war leading to
economic collapse and declared that 5.5 million people (almost half the
population) would need food aid by July, including 1.1 million
children.
In May 2017 President Kiir declared a unilateral ceasefire and launches national dialogue.
By
August 2017 the number of refugees who had fled South Sudan reached 1.5
million, according to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees.
One
year later, in August 2018 August - President Kiir signed a
power-sharing agreement in Ethiopia with Machar and various opposition
parties in a bid to end the brutal war.
But
little hope has been generated from the shaky agreement, which critics
say does not address many of the root problems that caused the
conflict.
Over the course of the civil war 400,000 people were killed and nearly a third of the population uprooted.
The
UN has documented war crimes included forced cannibalism, ethnic
killing, government sponsored mass rapes - including of children, and
the recruitment of more than 17,000 child soldiers.
