Sudan's extreme poverty almost beyond words
BY TOM JOHNSTON
STAFF WRITER

It's been about a month since they returned from the dirt-poor desert of Sudan, and only now have they begun to talk about what they saw there.

The Rev. Al Johnson, pastor of St. Michael's Episcopal Church in Barrington, and two parishioners, Jackie Kraus of Barrington and Laurie Michaels of North Barrington, sometimes struggled to put the experience into words.

"It is so overwhelming," Johnson said.

Their speechlessness was rendered by the good and the bad, the faith and hopefulness of the local people, and their extreme poverty.

For Kraus, who made her third trip to Sudan, and Michaels, it was the woeful conditions at a makeshift medical clinic. For Johnson, it was local women honoring four fellow missionaries by placing on them traditional tribal dresses called lawas.

They were invited by Bishop Daniel Deng Bul of the Renk Diocese in Renk, Sudan, to celebrate the dedication of a newly built Anglican cathedral, which was consecrated by Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams on Feb. 28, in a ceremony attended by more than 4,000 people.
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