Where Is The Love?

I am reading Where Are The Girls? which consists of research and accounts of the atrocities endured by women and children at the hands of wicked men full of hatred and the question I keep asking myself is where is the love. How can these men honestly have no love in their hearts? How can these women be expected to produce healthy children and reintegrate back into society with any hope for success and a normal life after escaping captivity? The first answer and response must be love. That is St. Monica's specialty.

I know that most of the girls and sisters I talk, eat and pray with everyday have experienced a world without love at some point in their lives. That reality is hard to swallow, especially when I have always had a life overflowing with love. The most precious gift and support I can give these women is pure love and to treat them with the same kindness, respect, and generosity that I have always been given from my family and friends. I thank everyone in my life who has never let me experience a day without knowing how loved I am. I am passing your love to these women who desperately need and deserve it.

I am including an excerpt from the book so that you can understand the atrocities I am referring to. However, it is incredibly disturbing and heart-breaking. Honestly, I am writing this with tears on my cheeks so only read it if you are prepared.

Susan McKay and Dyan Mazurana. "Where are the Girls?" Girls in Fighting Forces in Northern Uganda, Sierra Leone and Mozambique: Their Lives During and After War. 2004.

"Especially in Northern Uganda and Sierra Leone, atrocities against pregnant girls/women and new mothers and their infants were reported. In Sierra Leone and Northern Uganda, babies or children were reportedly left behind at health clinics or with captor-"husbands" or their other wives in the bush when the girl escaped. Unknown numbers of babies and children died in the bush or were killed by rebels, sometime by cutting them out of the pregnant girl's body or by banging them against trees or killing them with weapons. To survive, or because they hated babies conceived of rape, girls reportedly abandoned their babies by the roadside or left them at health clinics….Dangerous childbirth practices were reported, such as pushing on the pregnant girl's abdomen when labor contractions were strong and beating the mother when she was in labor and giving birth. Girls and women often gave birth alone. "

The researcher goes on to make policy recommendations.

"Conduct epidemiological studies in war-affected countries, in coordination with Ministries of Health, to improve knowledge of maternal, child and infant mortality, its incidence, causes and prevention. Develop, where possible, innovative ways to provide a minimal level of maternal child health care for girls in the bush. "

I will start by giving love, and later I will return and give them much needed, quality maternal health care. May we all give in whatever way we can… even as simple as prayer.