the churches and southern africa - KORA

directives from the hierarchy.
A list of recommended actions for all churches was
contained in the report, and several top churchmen signed
their names to the proposals, including Anglican Bishop
B. B. Burnett of Grahamstown, Dean J. L. Knutson of the
Lutheran Church, Dr. J. W. DeGrunchy of the South
African Council of Churches, and the Rev. C. F. Beyers
Naude, director of the Christian Institute. (Religious
News Service, Aug. 14, 1972)
FATHER DESMOND DEFIES ORDER, PREPARES
FOR PRISON
Father Cosmas Desmond, a London-born Franciscan
priest who has been under house arrest in Johannesburg
since June, 1971 for his exposes of the living conditions
of Africans in the resettlement districts, is prepared to go
to prison, according to his religious superior. Desmond
has deliberately been disobeying certain injunctions of his
five-year house arrest order, most recently by attending
church services in Johannesburg at least six times.
Desmond, who first went, to South Africa in 1959,
wrote a book called THE DISCARDED PEOPLE, and
helped a BBC television crew produce a documentary on
the subject (both book and film are banned in South
Africa). (Religious News Service, Aug. 11, 1972)
ANOTHER INSTITUTE MEMBER HARASSED
The South African Government has taken action
against a sixth staff member of the Christian Institute of
Southern Africa, an opponent of apartheid. Security
Police removed the passport of Anne Hope, director of
group work for the Institute, who often travels abroad
and was anticipating a trip to Lesotho. Ms. Hope works
with communities trying to solve health and other
problems, and that her program would be hampered by
the lack of a passport is obvious. (Religious News Service,
Aug. 11, 1972)
NAMIBIA BISHOP URGES BUSINESSES TO STAY
Bishop Leonard Auala, 64, of the Ovambokavango
Evangelical Lutheran Church in Namibia has recently
urged U.S. businessmen to keep their operations inSouth
Africa in order to "become acquainted with our suffering
and respond as Christians." He suggested that "in the long
run, American business may become the savior that
overcomes apartheid." During his 45-day visit to the U.S.
under the auspices of the State Department and the
African-American Institute, Auala visited a number of
cities. His church, with 210,000 members, is one of the
largest in Southern Africa, and Auala has been a leader in
the movement for Namibia's independence. Last year he
and Moderator Paulus Gowaseb of the Evangelical
Lutheran Church in Namibia sent an open letter to Prime
Minister Vorster of South Africa calling for Namibia's
independence and praising the World Court's ruling that
South Africa's occupation of Namibia was illegal.
PRIEST CHARGES TORTURE IN MOZAMBIQUE
Father Luis Alfonso Da Costa, F.S.C.J., a former
missionary in Southeast Africa, charged in Utrecht,
Netherlands recently that Portuguese colonists are
torturing and killing innocent people in Mozambique. The
Portuguese priest brought his charge to the Central
Committee of the World Council of Churches (WCC). He
said he had documented proof that 92 persons were killed
in the Cabora Bassa dam region, in northern
Mozambique, between May, 1971 and March, 1972. He
left Mozambique in May, after having been told by
Portuguese authorities that he would have to leave or go
to jail. He said that 17 missionaries had been detained for
questioning in recent months.
In a related development at the WCC meeting, a group
of Dutch churchmen repeated a charge made in June by
Swiss Protestants that 20 Presbyterian leaders in
Mozambique had been jailed. The Elutch group asked the
WCC to "demand' the release of the Presbyterians and
other persons held -without trial in the vicinity of
Lourenco Marques in Mozambique. Father Da Costa said
the Portuguese action was against persons suspected of
contacts with FRELIMO. He estimated that at least 1,000
persons have been killed, including women and children.
He gave names of 16 persons buried alive at Antonio
village in the Mucumbura region in November, 1971 and
also charged that Rhodesian troops helped massacre 18
persons last September at Mucumbura, near the
Rhodesian border. (Religious News Service, Aug. 17,
1972)
BISHOP ZULU DISASSOCIATES FROM WCC
PROPOSALS
Anglican Bishop A. A. Zulu of Zululand disassociated
himself from the most recent World Council of Churches
proposals designed to exert religious and economic
pressure on white-dominated governments-in Southern
Africa. He declined to go along with the
recommendations on Southern Africa, saying they would
"only serve to embarrass the South African churches."
The bishop is the highest ranking black churchman in
South Africa, and is one of the six presidents of the World
Council of Churches. While Bishop Zulu opposes
apartheid, he and other South African church leaders
often refuse to endorse international, ecumenical criticism
of the South African Government because of possible
government repercussions against them if they did.
(Religious News Service, Aug. 16, 1972)
LUTHERANS DIALOGUE WITH SOUTH AFRICA
The Lutheran World Federation Executive Committee
meeting in Indonesia in July'approved recommendations
from an official LWF delegation that visited South Africa
earlier this year. expressing willingness to work with
South African churches for "human rights and
Christian unity." One recommendation adopted by the
Executive Committee calls on the LWF General Secretary
to arrange a consultation with member churches in South
Africa to select a "fraternal. worker" who would
coordinate the implementation of the delegation's other
recommendations with officials of the Federation of
Evangelical Lutheran Churches in Southern Africa. Other
recommendations included improved 'communications
with religious groups in South Africa, and development of
a scholarship and exchange strategy. (Religious News
Service, July 31, 1972)
CHURCHMEN SUPPORT STUDENTS AS REGIME
STEPS UP REPRESSION
Anglican Archbishop Robert Selby Taylor and an
ecumenical group of colleagues in Cape Town were
recently arrested during a student demonstration
protesting discrimination. (See June-July issue of
SOUTHERN AFRICA) The Archbishop was banned from
a radio broadcast, and found himself forced to defend
himself and students aqainst widely publicized trifles