Fidele Lumeya completed his graduate studies for Eastern Mennonite University last fall by sitting on a park bench in Atlanta. He called his perch, in Olympic Park in the shadow of the CNN tower, his "outside office."
Lumeya, from the Congo, was working on his practicum assignment for EMU's Conflict Transformation Program. He was writing a conflict transformation training manual for use in Africa. He was also striking up conversations and friendships with homeless people who frequent the park.
Meanwhile, Lumeya's wife, Krista Rigalo, an American, was engaged in a CTP practicum by working as an intern at the Carter Center. She was part of an effort to resolve conflict between Uganda and Sudan.
At night, the couple discussed their day, noting how invigorating — and different — their practicum experiences were.
Rigalo and Lumeya are now back in Africa, where their work in peacebuilding began in 1995. They were part of Mennonite Central Committee's program with Rwandan refugees in eastern Congo. Then newly married, the two worked with refugees who had fled Rwanda during the 1994 genocide as well as with people displaced by internal fighting within Congo. They experienced first-hand both the hope and the challenges of working for peace in a society torn by violence.
In 1998, Lumeya and Rigalo both began their graduate studies in conflict transformation, seeing their time at EMU as a way of preparing themselves for further peacebuilding work in Africa. They both graduated last December, and in January moved to Zambia, again working with MCC.
The couple is currently part of the peacebuilding program at Mindolo Ecumenical Centre in Kitwe — a church-based institution that provides training for church and civic leaders from across Africa. A highlight for both of them has been teaching at the first-ever Africa Peacebuilding Institute, an MCC-sponsored training program for community-level peacebuilders in Africa. Some 30 people from 10 African countries attended this three-month program.
Rigalo co-led a class on trauma healing. "We had a strong contingent of women who worked hard at 'unpacking' domestic violence and the cultural baggage around it," she reported. "It was fascinating! The participants brought with them an incredible amount of experience and reflections. While trauma, often of the communal nature, seemed sadly to be a common denominator, the participants also shared traditions of healing, a sense of vocation for this work and a hope for the future of Africa."
Lumeya said his training manual, African Culture: Source of Conflict, Resource for Peace, was helpful in his Introduction to Conflict Transformation course. "We had a good discussion with the participants around gender issues in Africa and culture in general," he reported. "We had young Africans and older adults and the exchange around culture and conflict was insightful for me."
Rigalo and Lumeya will continue their peacebuilding assignment with MCC for the next three years. They anticipate working with the Council of Christian Churches in Angola, returning to Zambia every three months to teach at Mindolo Ecumenical Centre.
Jan Jenner works with EMU's Institute for Justice & Peacebuilding and is a grants writer for CTP. She is a 1999 graduate of the master's program.
