Haitian unrest elicits prayers from Bro. Martin

By Peter Finney Jr.
Clarion Herald

The recent explosion of violence and murder in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, has prompted the province of the Sacred Heart Brothers in Haiti to issue a “shelter-in-place” order for their religious brothers.

Brother Augustin Nelson, superior provincial in Haiti, asked members of the Brothers of the Sacred Heart worldwide, as well as the students they teach, to launch prayer vigils for the intention of peace in Haiti.

In response, Brother Martin High School, which is operated by the Brothers of the Sacred Heart, has begun a daily rosary campaign during three periods of the school day, said campus minister Donnie Midkiff.

“Simply put, our Brothers in Haiti need a miracle, and we will come together as a school community to pray for that miracle,” Midkiff said.

Rosary began Sept. 11

Beginning Sept. 11, students gathered in the school chapel during fourth, fifth and sixth periods to begin the perpetual rosary campaign.

“Every day, there will be students, teachers and administrators leading the rosary with the solemn intention to protect all life down there,” Midkiff said. “Students are being encouraged to sign up to give up part of their unstructured period to pray the rosary.”

A day after receiving Brother Nelson’s urgent letter to pray for peace, the entire student body prayed one decade of the rosary.

“It’s a tradition when we say the rosary that we drop to one knee and pray together,” Midkiff said.

Sacred Heart Brother Bernard Couvillion, who served as superior general of the Brothers in Rome and now serves as assistant campus minister at Brother Martin, last visited Haiti in 2012. He knows Brother Nelson well.

“I have not spoken with him directly because it’s very hard to get verbal communication,” Brother Bernard said. “The newest thing they have described is that gangs are competing among themselves to take over more territory, especially in the capital (Port-au-Prince). The most frightening thing is that people who live in these many sections have started to form militias to fight against the gangs, so there is no government at all. Since the assassination of the president (in 2021), the terrorism of the gangs has increased. The reaction is now by the citizen groups fighting them off to protect their property and homes and people.”

One citizens’ group demanded that the Brothers allow them to use the rooftop of their provincial house in Port-au-Prince to station armed guards to ward off and prepare for attacks by the gangs, Brother Bernard said.

The Sacred Heart Brothers  operate seven schools in Port-au-Prince, the area most affected by the violence, and three others in the country.

Schools shuttered

Brother Bernard said there are approximately 2,500 students served by the Sacred Heart Schools in Port-au-Prince, and most pay minimal or no tuition.

“But the shelter-in-place order means that we have to close those schools,” he said. “And that leaves the kids in the streets.”

There are 52 Sacred Heart Brothers serving in Haiti.

In his letter to superior general in Rome, Brother Nelson described the situation as “chaotic.”

“For more than five years, Haiti has been mired in a multidimensional crisis that resulted in the savage assassination of the elected president, Jovenel Moïse, in his bedroom on July 7, 2021,” Brother Nelson wrote. “This led to the paralysis of institutions and an endless cycle of violence. In recent days, indiscriminate violence has come closer to the center of Port-au-Prince, where our communities and our works are concentrated.”

“Armed gangs are gradually trying to take over several districts of the capital that were previously known to be peaceful. The encirclement is almost total, from north to south, from east to west. An awakening of the population, who lynched hundreds of bandits, led to a period of calm. Since Aug. 17, however, several districts of the capital have been in turmoil, with large-caliber detonations everywhere.”

Brother Nelson called the situation “grave.”

“The meaning of life is disappearing,” he said. “The recorded losses, both in human lives and in material goods, are considerable. Misery increases; the common good is threatened. The country is on the edge of the abyss. The population is left to its own devices and does not know which saint to invoke.

He called for the Sacred Heart community to “form a chain of prayer around Haiti.”

“We hope for a wise solution that takes into account the higher interests of the nation and the right to life,” he said.

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