"A CANDLE ... TO LIGHT THE WAY" - RIP

From the Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

'A CANDLE ... TO LIGHT THE WAY': Local Sudanese grieve for brave, kindly guide
A mentor to the Lost Boys who gave his life in Iraq is laid to rest in Atlanta
....

The double bed has been empty for several months, though the small room in the Clarkston apartment is filled with his things still —- things untouched since Beer Ayuel left home.
....

He escaped one war, but could not escape another.

Ayuel's death in a bomb blast last month in Iraq could be described as among the most tragic of all —- if one dares to qualify human toll.

Because he had survived the persecution of the Dinka people in southern Sudan and managed to find again a life without fear, his death in Iraq seemed sadly ironic.

The shock reverberates through Atlanta's Sudanese community. At Ayuel's funeral Saturday at St. Michael and All Angels Episcopal Church, those who eulogized him said what is said about a man who mattered.

They called him a pillar of strength, his character matching his tall, imposing build. They said he was selfless. And unwavering in his faith.
....

But to truly understand the scope of this loss, one has only to see the sadness that saturates the faces of the men known as the Lost Boys of Sudan. As children, they were separated from families in the turmoil of protracted war. They survived months of wandering and came of age in dismal refugee camps.

Six years ago, 150 Lost Boys were resettled in Atlanta. Many of them lined the church pews to pay their last respects. To them, Ayuel was a hero.
....

They say he was a man who practiced the kind of compassion you perhaps can only cultivate after seeing what he had seen. Like the Lost Boys, Ayuel fled home. He first meandered north when Sudan's Islamic government bore down on the predominantly animist and Christian south. His family, too, was splintered by war.

From the day the Lost Boys arrived in Atlanta, Ayuel made it his mission to look after human beings who had not just been stung by violence but who had never learned to function in modern society. They had never felt the heat of an electric stove or the chill of a freezer, and it was that much harder for them to begin life in America.
....

Most of all, he gave them what they had lost in their youth: the love of a father.

"He came to visit us every day," said Abraham Nyok, a Lost Boy who lives in Clarkston. "He made it his duty to go from apartment to apartment visiting us."

"He told us: 'Open your heart, try to learn new things, it's good for you to go to school.' "

Ayuel knew the importance of education in America, that a college degree would be the ticket out of poverty. He told the Lost Boys they had to learn for the sake of Sudan. They were the generation that could go back and help bring change.

Ayuel dispensed advice like a pharmacist dispenses life-saving medicine. He did it despite the struggles in his own life.

He almost finished college in Cairo, Egypt, where he lived for a decade after fleeing Sudan. He had two tests pending for a bachelor's degree in biology when a Sudanese woman he knew fell ill from kidney problems. He felt compelled to rush her to the hospital instead of taking his tests. He never earned his degree, though he had hoped to enroll one day at Emory University.

"That lady is alive and well today because of Beer," Nyok said.

Many of the Lost Boys have copies of a video that Ayuel sent back from his wedding in Cairo last April. He had known Amiot Mayen since high school, and had worked hard at a chicken plant to save enough money to return to Egypt to marry her.

In the video, Ayuel is laughing with his bride. Who could have known then that war would once again mar their lives, so soon after they had found joy?

Ayuel came back to Atlanta, the city that became home after his resettlement here in 1999, as his wife waited for a visa. But he had trouble finding a job.

"He didn't even have a car of his own because he spent all his money helping people," said Manyang, his roommate.

In the summer, Ayuel left to stay with relatives in Lincoln, Neb., hoping for better economic prospects there.

Then one August day, he left mysteriously for Virginia.

L-3 Communications, a company that provides contracted services in the war zone, hired Ayuel for his Arabic skills. They sent him to Iraq to work as a translator for the U.S. Army in early September. Seventeen days later, he was dead.

His body was flown to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware and kept there as Ayuel's friends waited to see if his wife could secure a visa to attend his funeral. Nyok said the U.S. Embassy in Cairo informed her that she would have to wait at least two more weeks.

"But we could not wait any longer," Nyok said.
....

Massengale told the mourners in the church about the first time she laid eyes on Ayuel. She was dropping off donations at a refugee assistance center when the Sudanese man approached her.

"If you wear such a shirt, people will think you're rich," she said, handing him a striped Ralph Lauren shirt, recognizable by the designer's logo.

"What I really want," Ayuel said, "is that Bible you are carrying."

Ayuel beamed as though he had hit a lottery jackpot as Massengale handed him the Bible.

Ayuel craved simplicity. It was the small things that made him seem so large to the people around him.

"He was a candle that consumed himself to light the way for us," Nyok said.

That is how Beer Ayuel will be remembered —- if one dares to judge.

What a beautiful man of God and what a tragic loss to his community. It's so sad that, in the end, he had to take a job that put his life at great risk, with the result that he was dead within 17 days of arriving in Iraq.

May Ayuel rest in peace and rise in glory. May God grant comfort, consolation, and his peace that passes understanding to his wife and family and friends. May God raise up a shepherd to care for the Lost Boys of Sudan.

Thanks to Ann for the link to the story.