We Carry the Cross Close to Us

Motlalepula Chabaku is a South African woman born under apartheid, whose life has been a difficult journey toward liberation for herself and for all people who know oppression. She worked in the women's division of the African National Congress and later began the Black Federation of South African Women, both outlawed by the government; she also helped to form the Voice of Women, which drew together blacks and whites. In 1975 she was elected national president of the International Women's Year for South Africa.

In May, 1976, she came to the United States on an exchange program. In August of that year, after she had returned to South Africa, she received a scholarship to study at Lancaster Theological Seminary in Pennsylvania and was graduated in May, 1979. She later worked with the Presbyterian Church as a missionary to the United States.

Following are excerpts from Ms. Chabaku's comments in a conversation with members of Sojourners' staff. --The Editors

One who comes with the rain.
I was born in Johannesburg, South Africa, in the month of November, a peak spring month. Suddenly there was thunder, lightning, torrential rain, and I came. My parents gave me the name Motlalepula, which means, "One who comes with the rain."

My parents believed that God timed my coming into the world for a special purpose. Even though I may be critical of issues, like thunder and lightning, I must be like the rain. In our part of the world rain is a very scarce commodity. We look forward to it, because where there is rain there is water; where there is water there is life; where there is life there is growth, re-creation, hope. And so I have to come with hope, even in a hopeless situation.

My parents could only afford to educate me up to the sixth grade. So I would pick up discarded exercise books which the whites received with their free and compulsory education, and use a razor blade to cut the empty pages and glue them together with a paste made from condensed milk. Then I sold them to pay my school fees after sixth grade.

I never took no for an answer. Every problem that came to me was not a problem but a challenge. If I am made in God's image, no human being can put me down. This has been my conviction. It was tough, but I went on.

The Episcopal churches of South Africa offered me a scholarship, and I was trained as a teacher. I taught a class of eighty children. Although education for blacks was inferior, I refused to accept this. I got white children to come to the black school for a day. And the black and white children felt the oneness; they wanted to be friends, they learned phrases in each other's languages. It was hope in a hopeless situation.

You feel the pain, and you react.
For me to be a Christian means to be a member of the body of Christ with all human beings. If you are one body and any part of the body suffers, you feel the pain, and you react. I could not keep quiet when there was injustice.... There are a lot of people who have a false notion that to be Christian is to be pious, sanctimonious, unquestioning, like an ingrown toenail. But to be a Christian is to continue changing, continue changing lives, structures of society; and if you don't change people and structures, you are sinning.

I am a woman. I am part of that global force of people who are despised, deprived, discriminated against, and yet we form more than half of the world's population.

In South Africa, we have a law that makes all black women minors for life. I can't even sign my own documents; I have to get a sixteen-year-old boy to give me consent to apply for a travel document. I cannot lodge a complaint in a police station because I am a minor--a man has to complain for me. These laws are passed by a government that is 90% Christian, with the support of the Western world that is predominantly Christian.

The black woman bears the worst of the brunt of oppression in South Africa. Women are not allowed to join their husbands in the cities and can only see their husbands, and sometimes their children, for three weeks or a month in a year. We are the lowest paid people....

I defied many laws in South Africa. As a single woman I was not allowed to have a house. I harangued, cajoled, and finally got a house in my name. They said a single woman could not adopt children. I battled and adopted my daughter, Mamolemo....

I take my vision and courage from nature, from water. There is a poem about the brook. When water wants to go downstream it doesn't matter how many boulders you put in there. It will circumvent the rocks. You may delay it, but you can never stop it moving. And so we may have to change our strategies, but never our commitment.

When the government issued passbooks to women, I tell you, we moved heaven and earth. My job as secretary of the African National Congress was to organize a protest against them. Passbooks are not passports or travel documents. They have destroyed more lives and separated more families in South Africa than any other thing. When the African National Congress was outlawed, the ideas were not outlawed in my heart. You can ban an organization, but you cannot destroy it in the hearts of the people....

I am concerned about the rights of women, the rights of children, and, just as equally, the rights of men; because there can never be a community, there can never be a family, there can never be true freedom when any sector of humanity is not free....

We women have the special role of working for peace and liberation because we have a great power for peace. It was a woman like Harriet Tubman who was able to liberate men, women, and children. It was a woman like Rosa Parks who turned the tide of history. Women can be a source of hope and peace, if we rise and play the responsible role to which we are called. Jesus called us specially, specially.

God knows the powerfulness of women.
God respects women. God knows the powerfulness of women. That is why when Jesus Christ had to be born, Mary could do it alone, without the help of Joseph. The Christian faith liberates women. But we have refused to be liberated.

When it was lawful and traditional for a prostitute to be stoned to death, Jesus spoke for the prostitute. Jesus at that time was not concerned about her sin, but about her life. Life. Jesus gave the woman freedom--but not just freedom. It was freedom with responsibility. Jesus Christ ventured out with women. The women were the first people to bring the good news that Jesus is risen. The first. The men thought the women were mad or drunk.

When Jesus Christ was put on the cross, we don't hear anything about the twelve disciples. They were not there. When Jesus Christ was removed from the cross, in that thunder and in that storm, it was women who were wailing over that body. And when that body was taken to the grave it was the women who ventured to say they would buy spices to go and embalm the body, even though it was dangerous to be identified with the body of a criminal.

Where were the disciples? They were scared. They were feeling leaderless, voiceless, because Jesus was not there. Why then are we women remaining behind? What's our excuse? Why have we left the men to carry the responsibility alone in the churches, to be the decision-makers?...

We as Christian women have to deal with the total person, affected by religious, political, economic, and social factors. You find politics in the Bible from the first page to the last. Jesus Christ himself was political, and so people who say we are not supposed to be involved in politics may not have a full understanding of the gospels and of the word evangelical. What does it mean? It means someone who brings a message; we have to be bearers of good news.

I know that my sharing honestly about the investments in South Africa which exploit my people is seen by the South African government as tantamount to economic sabotage, which is punishable by death. But we are called as Christians to be on the side of justice, of honesty, and pay the price for it. I have known police beatings and interrogations.

My heart and mind and roots are in South Africa, and I want to go back. But I don't know whether it is helpful to go back and face a gun, because when you are a corpse you are newsworthy for one week and then you are no longer helpful. I also wonder how effective I would be if I were in jail.

Five dollars a week.
In South Africa, the gold mines are owned by a company called the Anglo-American Corporation—English and Americans cooperating. We see the price of gold going up when we are not shareholders of the gold in our motherland. Sixty-five per cent of the businesses in South Africa are owned by outsiders.

If you were an American and the Soviet Union came in and took over your resources and employed you to mine them, wouldn't you feel like saying, "Get out, Russia!"? But when you say so, then the whole world says to you, "You must be grateful that Russia came here and provided jobs."

That same stupid argument has been used in our motherland. We never invited Europeans to come to our country. They saw the wealth and strategic position of our country. And they took advantage of our ignorance.

Many businesses in South Africa are exploiting us. For years we have been suffering but trying to say, yes, even though the land is ours, let's share it. But nobody listened to us. Now there is pressure from inside and outside, suddenly these companies are talking about our plight. They say that if they move out, we will suffer.

We have always suffered. If there are withdrawals of investment in South Africa, yes, the Africans will suffer. But whites will suffer most, because they have the highest wages, benefits, and privileges.

For instance, you as a white will get paid one hundred dollars a week for the same job that I do, and I get five dollars a week. If the company withdraws, who loses most? But you start saying, "How will she survive without the five dollars?"

In South Africa black employees cannot say, "I'm tired," or, "I'm sick," or, "I'm resigning." The employer has the right to arrest you and take you to jail for leaving your job. Blacks are not allowed to belong to trade unions with whites, and the few black trade unions do not have the same legal bargaining power as white unions....

You have a number of products that have been declared illegal in America because they are dangerous to health. These products are sold in South Africa. You have your Depo-Provera pill, used for birth control. It causes cancer and internal bleeding. It's being pushed in black communities by the government of South Africa and many companies. Why? Because whites in South Africa want South Africa to be white South Africa. They are basing their desire on American history.

The European whites in America have basically gotten rid of the indigenous Native American people. White South Africans have exactly the same picture. It's the same idea as when you set up your Indian reservations. "Homelands" are being set up in South Africa, which are reservations for blacks. Same idea, same background, same history, same racism, same people.

The last bastion of white capitalism.
South Africa is the last bastion of white capitalism, of white domination. As our God has been liberating the whole of Africa, most of the reactionary whites have been going south. When Angola became independent, the reactionary whites and Portuguese went to South Africa. When Mozambique and Kenya became independent, they went to South Africa. Zimbabwe has now become independent. Where are the whites going? South Africa.

Where else will they go after South Africa? Because our country is going to be free too. It is going to be a non-racial society. They can only go to the sea. So they are going to fight until the blood comes to the stirrups.

When we blacks, who have been voteless, voiceless, landless in our motherland, have tried peaceful changes, we have been met with violence. More and more, our people see that violence is the only answer. I belong to the diminishing few who still hope for peaceful change in the midst of escalating violence.

If you were in our situation, what would you do? We are like people who have fallen under a roller. If you fall under a roller, the main thing in your mind is to get out from under the roller, and anybody who comes to help, you accept. You have no time to ask, "Are you from Cuba? Are you communist? Why do you want to take me out from under the roller?"

Before the West helps, it first thinks, "Is it economically profitable? Is is politically expedient?" Many of the countries that have had strong historical ties with the West in their desperation get help from anybody....

As Christians we are called to give life, give liberation. More and more of our people are getting disillusioned with the Christian faith, the Western world, and capitalism. They're not against the Christian faith as such, but they're against how it has been misused, misunderstood, exploited. A knife is a very good utensil in the house, but if you take it and stab people with it, it doesn't mean that the knife is bad, it is the people who have misused the knife.

The Christian faith is very liberating. But the Christian faith has been misused.

So when my brothers and sisters go for an armed struggle, I cannot condemn them. I know many peace-loving people who have been forced into violence. They've suffered violence, and in desperation they turn to counterviolence. And we always blame the oppressed when they take up arms, but we don't blame the oppressor.

If you want to help us in South Africa, deal with the oppressors. They have power, they are the source of all the terror....

And what does the United States do? It believes in human rights. But it supports regimes and dictatorships all over the world. Somoza was the best friend of this country, not of the Nicaraguans. This country was a friend of Pinochet, not of the Chileans. The shah was a friend of this country, not the Iranians.

The majority of Americans are very loving, caring, trusting people, who really don't care for violence. But your major policies give a false picture of this country.

Look at the record of the United States in the United Nations. The U.S. condemns South Africa, says its policies are wrong, but when it comes to action, the U.S. goes only three ways: It absents itself, it opposes, or it vetoes. The U.S. makes it impossible for any action to be implemented on South Africa.

And who makes decisions for you? It is your business houses. They have employed lobbyists who influence your decisions, and it is those decisions that prevail, not those of the ordinary voter.

Business made the Iranian situation. As Christians we should be able to say we are sorry, because it is true that the U.S. was involved in the violence and exploitation in Iran. But you feel your pride is more important than the lives of people.

So now in the Middle East the image of this country is down. The people there don't hate the American people, but they can't stand your government.

Deal with Goliath.
We have laws that are destroying life. You look at the story of David and Goliath. David's family was suffering from hunger as they were on the battlefield. He used to bring food to them. But that did not decrease the number of casualties they suffered. It was only when David began to deal with the main source of terror and violence, which was Goliath, that there was no more need to send food.

I think this is one of the problems of the church. It tends to concentrate on relief programs.

When Jesus Christ healed the poor, the sick, and the hungry, he was liberating them from charity. They were dependent on alms, on whatever they could be given. But Jesus Christ gave them back their humanity, so they could have life and have it in abundance.

The church in the Western world is so steeped in materialism, in structure, that it loses people. Meanwhile, Christ is being hurt and is crying in pain in places of hunger and torture. Christ is alive in areas of conflict, but where people are materially comfortable, they find it difficult to carry the cross of Christ. They have their house first, the insurance, their car, family, and after all this, they have the cross. How can they hold it with all that too?

We have nothing. We carry the cross close to us. That's why we find that there are more Christians and that they are growing in number in areas of strife and conflict: Latin America, Africa, and Asia.

And we have something to give the Western world, we who come from those areas that are labeled the "Third World." God made no mistake by spreading around the gifts that we need so we can learn to share.