By Jean-Claude Gaston
“Six years ago, when I
first started college, I met my husband-to-be,” says Julienne, a young
Congolese woman in her early thirties. A fervent Catholic, she has just emerged
from four years of intense moral, physical and emotional suffering that marked
her marriage to a Muslim man whose initial respect and tolerance of her faith
turned out to be lie.
In the Democratic
Republic of the Congo (DRC), Christians form the overwhelming majority, with
Muslims accounting for less than 10 percent of the population. Here, as is
common of many cultures across the world, marriage is a goal and dream for many
girls and their families, as it provides a significant social boost. It is a source of great pride for the parents
and provides economic gain.
Some young women are
obligated to change their religion and practices in order to join the faith of
the husband. When they object, it is often their impoverished parents who
pressure them to accede. Under such circumstances, unions do not last long and
the young bride has a very bad time of it. For Julienne, her marriage was a
nightmare.
“He was a science
student, a few years older than me, at the same school,” she recalls.
“I gave him all my
heart and I loved him dearly. All seemed to be going well. I continued to
regularly attend Mass and sometimes he would come with me to Church Sunday
evenings.”
“There was not a hint
of violence in his demeanor. On the contrary, he showed himself to be generous
and loving. He only went to the mosque on the great feast days and swore that
he would never oppose my Catholic faith.”
“A year after the
start of our relationship, he came to visit me and my parents along with his
own father and stepmother. My parents agreed and gave him my hand.”
“He took the fact of
our relationship now being official as a carte
blanche. I began to notice changes
in his behavior and in his attitude toward me. Little by little, he began to
forbid me going to Church. ‘You know very well that I’m Muslim and so you must
stop attending that Church where you worship “statues and pictures,” he would
say.
“He began to plan his
visits, our walks, almost always on Sundays and at such times that prevented me
from going to Mass,” says Julienne, continuing her story.
“As time went by and
the date of our wedding approached, he became more demanding and insistent:
‘There is no question of you attending that ‘Church of 666 [in an allusion to
the Book of the Apocalypse],’ he’d say. ‘You have to start coming with me to
the mosque and change the way you dress.” That became an almost daily refrain.”
“At that point I began
to have serious doubts; insecurity and fear got a hold of me. I started to
circumvent his vigilance to go to Mass some Saturday evenings. Sometimes I even
pretended to escape our Sunday outings just so that I could go to Mass.”
“I decided to speak to
my parents, to tell them of my intention to break off the engagement and give
up on our impending marriage. But instead of finding comfort with my parents,
they reprimanded me severely and threatened to disown me if I were to proceed
with my plans.”
“They were
strengthened in their opposition by my aunts and uncles who also were hoping to
reap the benefits of my marriage to this son of a well-off family.”
“Despite my
determination and the bond to my faith, I was forced to give in and had a
traditional wedding according to traditional Muslim rites.”
This was the beginning
of the calvary of Julienne, who suffered bitter humiliation, physical and
emotional abuse, the denigration of her faith, and descent into near despair.
“I had all the
comforts I could want in our home and even had a Jeep at my disposal. I lacked
nothing, I had everything, except peace,” she recalls.
“In the four years of
our marriage, I knew no happiness in our household. On days that he was not
traveling, my ex-husband would come home for lunch. Hearing the sound of his
car on approach gave me chills.”
“It often happened
that when he got home he wanted to make love, in always very rough and
inappropriate ways, and right where he found me, and he would be extremely
brutal.”
“He said to me openly:
‘You are my pleasure object; you have to do what I want and if you don’t want
to, you can leave her and join the nuns. And even those nuns are there just to
pleasure the priests.’”
Nonetheless, Julienne
remained firm in her faith. “Whenever he was away from home traveling, I would
spend two or three days intensely praying to Jesus, beseeching Him to transform
my husband and return him to his senses.”
“I had my Bible and
rosary, which I kept hidden where our food supplies were kept, in a part of the
house where he almost never went.”
“A year into our
marriage, he married a second woman, a Muslim this time. My suffering greatly
increased. He did not spend every night in our home; he spent nearly every day
with his second wife. He came to me only to satisfy his physical desires and in
the brutal way he preferred.”
“He also began to beat
me violently. ‘Your Church has made you silly and a hypocrite,’ he would say.
‘Continue praying to your fake virgin and ask her to help you.’”
Almost five years
later, Julienne decided to end the marriage and sought refuge with one of her
aunts. “When I had reached my limit and began to risk getting gravely ill, I
left him without saying goodbye.”
“Taking advantage of
his nearly always being away from home, I took three months to get ready to
separate from this man. With my aunt’s help I escaped and moved in with her in
Kigali. I didn’t even tell my parents I fled.”
“My aunt treated me
with lots of affection and made sure I received psychiatric care to address my
deeply traumatic experiences. Bit by bit, I came back to life, becoming a
radiant woman again.”
“I kept going to Church,
now in complete freedom, and renewed my relationship with the sacraments,
including Communion, which I had to do without for several years.”
“A year later I went
back to college and I have since graduated. I feel proud, free and independent.”
“Little by little, I have rebuilt my
life,” Julienne affirms, “with determination, conviction and a big smile.”
For privacy and security reasons, names of both protagonist and
author are altered. The writer who recorded this testimony is a correspondent for Aid to the Church in Need.
Editor’s Notes:
Directly under the
Holy Father, Aid to the Church in Need supports
the faithful wherever they are persecuted, oppressed or in pastoral need.
ACN is a Catholic charity - helping to bring Christ to the world through
prayer, information and action.
Founded in 1947 by Father Werenfried van Straaten, whom Pope John Paul
II named “An Outstanding Apostle of Charity,” the organization is now at work
in over 145 countries throughout the world.
The charity undertakes thousands of projects every year including
providing transport for clergy and lay Church workers, construction of church
buildings, funding for priests and nuns and help to train seminarians. Since
the initiative’s launch in 1979, 43 million Aid to the Church in Need Child’s Bibles have been distributed
worldwide.
