St. Josephine Bakhita and the Holy Work of Racial Justice and Reconciliation

By Ethan Rowell, member of the Commission on Racial Justice and Reconciliation

St. Josephine Bakhita was born in 1869 in western Sudan to a respected and prosperous father in the village of Olgossa. In February of 1877, at no more than seven or eight years of age, she was abducted by Arab slave traders and forced to walk barefoot 600 miles to El Obeid, where she was bought and sold twice before her arrival. Over the course of twelve years, she was bought and sold three more times before being given away. Marked by the trauma of her abduction, Josephine could not even remember her own name and later adopted one given to her by the slave traders who abducted her and sold her into slavery: Bakhita. During her lifetime, Josephine served three families as a slave before being left in the care of the Canossian Sisters in Italy, where she became noted for her great kindness and courageous love, and later, with the help of those same sisters, an Italian court ruled that Josephine’s enslavement was unlawful and she was finally freed. After obtaining her freedom, she decided to remain with the Canosian Sisters, taking vows in 1896 to join the order. Josephine took up the holy work of racial justice and reconciliation by using her voice to courageously share her story with others, becoming an advocate for the freedom and dignity of all. Over a twenty-year period, she went on to write her own biography, and after its publication in 1930, she traveled the world sharing her story.

St. Josephine Bakhita is a marvelous inspiration for those who endeavor to take up the work of racial justice and reconciliation. Earlier this month in the Episcopal Church, we celebrated the Feast of All Saints. As we continue to reflect on those saints who have gone before us, who continue to be our companions on the way, and the work they gave their lives over to, sometimes losing their lives entirely for the courageous work to which Christ called them, may we be inspired by their courage and tenacity to engage in the hard and holy work of building up the beloved community of God standing hand in hand together with the Communion of All Saints. As St. Josephine once said, “The Lord has loved me so much: we must love everyone, we must be compassionate to one another!”

To learn more about St. Josephine Bakhita, consider this book recommendation: "Bakhita: A Novel of the Saint of Sudan" by Veronique Olmi (Author), Adriana Hunter (Translator).