Distressed Liberia pins hopes on faith leaders

Christian Century, Nov 1, 2003

Hopes were high in economically devastated Liberia as Charles Gyude Bryant, a prominent Episcopalian with ties to the United States, was installed in mid-October to head an interim government until elections are held in 2005. Described by friends and associates as a mild-mannered businessman, Bryant, 54, chairs the board of the Episcopal Church in Liberia and is a 1972 graduate of the church's Cuttington University College. "He is a pillar of the church, a man of integrity and a man of vision," fellow Liberian Theodora Brooks, rector of St. Margaret's Episcopal Church in New York City told Episcopal Life magazine.

Said Burgess Cart of Stone Mountain, Georgia, a brother of the new Liberian leader: "Everyone is happy; I'm getting telephone calls from the ends of the earth 2 Carr once served as Africa partnership officer and Episcopal Migration Ministries director at Episcopal headquarters. Bryant, backed by the United Nations' largest peacekeeping force and viewed as a conciliator, offers encouragement to the nation of 3 million in the wake of deposed President Charles Taylor's exile to Nigeria.

One of Taylor's most outspoken critics was Michael Kpakala Francis, the Catholic archbishop of Liberia. "He's a psychopath," Francis recently told Religion News Service. Liberians say Taylor feared only one person in Liberia--Archbishop Francis, a man who has degrees from Catholic University of America, Georgetown and Howard University.

Few doubt that Francis, 67, will remain a crucial force as Liberia attempts to extricate itself from a baleful legacy of war and rain. "What we have now is a whole people and an entire country destroyed," he said. Liberia lost some 200,000 persons to war in the past 14 years, and faces an enormous humanitarian crisis. Some 450,000 displaced people have crowded into the capital city of Monrovia. The unemployment rate is 85 percent. And despite a recent peace treaty among warring factions (who jointly chose Bryant), fighting mad abuses by armed groups continue in the country, particularly outside of Monrovia.