Abducted by Christian extremist group as a teen, Ugandan man now turns to faith to heal his trauma

[Religion News Service] He was 17 years old when armed men from the Lord’s Resistance Army, a Christian extremist group based in Central and East Africa, abducted him from his northern Ugandan home, killed his mother and father and took his sister, whom he has not seen since.

The wave of violence that engulfed his family eventually led to violence he perpetrated on others.

“We could be sent to attack villages and slaughter people,” said the man, now 40, who asked not to be identified because he fears retaliation from the community to which he recently returned.

But, he added: “We are also victims.”

Earlier this month, he joined more than 2,000 former LRA captives, combatants and family members in Lira City in northern Uganda for a prayer service of healing, forgiveness and reconciliation.

Organized by the Anglican Diocese of Lango in partnership with LRA returnees, the gathering brought together people carrying one of the conflict’s most complicated legacies: Many were abducted, some as children, and forced to fight and kill. Some were forced to marry warlords.

Years after returning home, some struggle not only with what was done to them, but also with what they were forced to do, and with communities that sometimes regard them as perpetrators rather than victims.

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