Resources: General Information

Forgotten Conflicts
A resource from NBC News that takes a look at a few ongoing ethnic conflicts that are often overlooked by the media.

The Tumultuous History of the Congo
The Democratic Republic of Congo, a vast nation about a quarter the size of the U.S. in the center of sub-Saharan Africa, is one of the continent's most mineral-rich countries. But it also one of the world's poorest countries and has been the site of near constant warfare over the last decade which has left over 5 million dead. A recent flare-up of violence between rebels and government forces has revived fears that it could slide back into all-out war again. Click through to learn more about its tumultuous history.

Holocaust Encyclopedia
A complete resource of articles, pictures and history of ethnic genocide, compiled by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

Online Exhibitions
Contains online presentations: Rescue and Resistance, Documentation and Evidence, Oskar Schindler, Nazi Persecution of Persons with Disabilities, Auschwitz, Life after the Holocaust and others. From the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.

Genocide in Darfur: 5 Things You Can Do [PDF]
In 2004 the Darfur region of Sudan was classified as a Genocide emergency region. Learn how to help confront Genocide and related crimes against humanity.

Photographs of Genocide
Photo essays of genocide across the globe; themes include: History and concept, International Law, Refugees, and areas such as: Sudan, Chechnya, Balkans and Central Africa.

Spe Salvi, "Saved by Hope" by Pope Benedict XVI
In this encyclical Pope Benedict expounds on the theological virtue of hope and its role in redemption. This topic is especially important in the healing process for the peoples in areas that have suffered from genocide.

Resources: Agencies

Catholic Relief Services
Catholic Relief Services was founded in 1943 by the Catholic Bishops of the United States to serve World War II survivors in Europe. Since then, it has expanded in size to reach more than 80 million people in more than 100 countries on five continents.

Jesuit Refugee Services
In continuity with its quarter century of ministry to and with refugees and forcibly displaced individuals, Jesuit Refugee Service affirms its mission to accompany, serve and defend the rights of these vulnerable and often forgotten people. It witnesses to the reality that God is present in human history, even in the most tragic experiences of persons driven from their homes by conflict, natural disaster, economic injustice, or violation of other human rights.

Catholic Migration & Refugee Services
Migration and Refugee Services carries out the commitment of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops to serve and advocate for refugees, asylees, and other forced migrants, immigrants, and other people on the move. Special concern is given to the most vulnerable among these populations, such as, but not limited to, minors unaccompanied by parents or adult guardians and the victims of human trafficking. This commitment is rooted in the Gospel mandate that every person is to be welcomed by the disciple as if he or she were Christ Himself and in the right of every human being to pursue, without constraint, the call to holiness.

Resources: Books & DVDs

Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust by Immaculee Iligabiza
In 1994, Rwandan native Ilibagiza was 22 years old and home from college to spend Easter with her devout Catholic family, when the death of Rwanda's Hutu president sparked a three-month slaughter of nearly one million ethnic Tutsis in the country. She survived by hiding in a Hutu pastor's tiny bathroom with seven other starving women for 91 cramped, terrifying days. Her account of the miracles that protected her is simple and vivid. Her Catholic faith shines through, but the book will speak on a deep level to any person of faith. Ilibagiza's remarkable path to forgiving the perpetrators and releasing her anger is a beacon to others who have suffered injustice. She brings the battlefield between good and evil out of the genocide around her and into her own heart, mind and soul.

Hotel Rwanda (Film)
In 1994 some of the worst atrocities in the history of mankind took place in the country of Rwanda--and in an era of high-speed communication and round the clock news, the events went almost unnoticed by the rest of the world. In only three months, one million people were brutally murdered. In the face of these unspeakable actions, inspired by his love for his family, an ordinary man summons extraordinary courage to save the lives of over a thousand helpless refugees, by granting them shelter in the hotel he manages.

Prayer Without Borders
This inspirational book unites prayers, stories and reflections from more than 20 countries around the world where Catholic Relief Services works.

Josephine Bakhita: Saint of Sudan
Josephine was born in 1869 in Sudan. As a child of 7 or 8, she was taken away by Arab slave traders and given the name "Bakhita," meaning fortunate, and then sold no less than five times between 1877 and 1883. She was subjected to beatings which left deep scars on her body. This program dramatizes her extraordinary life, which is recalled through a Canossian Sister, sharing the details with her spiritually searching brother and thereby bringing to him serenity, a new hope for life, and a new joy in the Church. Read her biography.

The Lost Boys of Sudan: An American Story of the Refugee Experience by Mark Bixler
In 2001, four young men, having fled the Sudanese civil war that has raged for more than 20 years, left East African refugee camps to begin a new life in the modern sprawl of Atlanta. Follow the progress of the four young men as they adjust to life in modern America, learning to use kitchen appliances, take public transportation, and look for work.

God Grew Tired Of Us (Film)
This film explores the indomitable spirit of three "Lost Boys" from the Sudan who are forced to leave their homeland due to a tumultuous civil war. The film chronicles their triumph over seemingly insurmountable adversities and a relocation to America, where the Lost Boys build active and fulfilling new lives but remain deeply committed to helping friends and family they have left behind.

Resources: Scripture Passages Related to the Injustice of Genocide

Old Testament

Exodus 23:9
You must not oppress the stranger; you know how a stranger feels, for you lived as strangers in the land of Egypt.

Zachariah 7: 8-11
(This word of the LORD came to Zechariah: Thus says the LORD of hosts:) Render true judgment, and show kindness and compassion toward each other. Do not oppress the widow or the orphan, the alien or the poor; do not plot evil against one another in your hearts.

Psalm 82: 2-4
No more mockery of justice
No more favoring of the wicked!
Let the weak and the orphan have justice
Be fare to the wretched and destitute:
Rescue the weak and needy.
Save them from the clutches of the wicked!

Proverbs 31: 8-9
Speak, yourself, on behalf of the dumb,
On behalf of all the unwanted;
Speak, yourself, pronounce a just verdict
Uphold the rights of the poor, of the needy.

Isaiah 10: 1-2
Woe to the legislators of infamous laws.
To those who issue tyrannical decrees.
Who refuse justice to the unfortunate
And cheat the poor among my people of their rights, who make widows their prey, and rob the orphan.

Micah 6:8
What is good has been explained to you: this is what Yahweh asks of you:
Only this, to act justly,
To love tenderly,
And to walk humbly with your God

New Testament

Matthew 25: 35-36,40
For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me. 'Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.'

Luke 4: 18-19
"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord."

Colossians 3: 12-13
Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, bearing with one another and forgiving one another, if one has a grievance against another; as the Lord has forgiven you, so must you also do.

1 John 4: 20-21
If anyone says, "I love God," but hates his brother, he is a liar; for whoever does not love a brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.
This is the commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother.

Galatians 3: 28
There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free person, there is not male and female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.