One witch-doctor led us to his secret shrine and said he had clients who regularly captured children and brought their blood and body parts to be consumed by spirits.Unless the witch-doctor has been mis-quoted (and setting aside the fact that he could be lying or exaggerating), he saw no children, only "blood and body parts". Blood and body parts that could have come from any animal?
In the course of our investigation we witnessed the ritual torching of the shrine of a particularly active witch-doctor in northern Uganda by anti-sacrifice campaigners.Stunning evidence! A mob torched a shrine! How is this NOT a direct parallel to the Salem Witch Trials, where "an angry mob" is enough evidence to bring someone to trial?
We saw a beaker of blood and what appeared to be a large, raw liver in the shrine before it was destroyed, although it was not possible to determine whether they were human remains...No comment necessary.
Mr Binoga said police had opened 26 murder cases in 2009, in which the victim appeared to have been ritually sacrificed, compared with just three cases in 2007.Ah yes, we cannot rule out that they were abducted by aliens, either. Furthermore, in a country of 32 million people, if there truly IS a ring of witch doctors (as the article claims), and each witch doctor performs up to 70 sacrifices in his whole life, "26-200" victims a year seems like a very small number.
"We also have about 120 children and adults reported missing whose fate we have not traced. We cannot rule out that they may be victims of human sacrifice."
When he returned to Uganda he says he was told by those who had initiated him to kill his own son, aged 10.Well? Did the reporters follow up on this at all? Did they talk to the wife? Or to any other children in the family? Are death records kept?
"I deceived my wife and made sure that everyone else had gone away and I was with my child alone. Once he was placed down on the ground, I used a big knife and brought it down like a guillotine."
One such witness is a three-year-old boy called Mukisa, who was left for dead after his penis was hacked off by an assailant.Yes, and the death of my cattle was caused by my neighbor who is known to consort with black cats and has the devil's mark. Furthermore, if the neighbor was the perpetrator, there's a big leap from this incident to "ritual human sacrifice". I see nothing about draining this child's blood or cutting out his heart or liver. Yes, it's horrible that this boy was attacked and mutilated, but I don't understand the significance in terms of the broader article about supposed human sacrifice.
He survived thanks to quick work by surgeons, and later told police he had been mutilated by a neighbour who is known to keep a shrine.
Of the 18 cases of suspected ritual killings reported to Police in 2008, 15 cases have been conclusively investigated and suspects arrested and taken to court. On Wednesday, Justice Eridad Mwangushya sentenced Ssenoga Setubwa to 16 years in jail after she was convicted of stealing a two-year old child with intention to sacrifice her after being given Shs100,000.and further says there had been 'at least 25' such murders since 2006. Of course, there are greater risks to children - abduction by the LRA in the north and many more must die from simple abuse and deprivation, but the issue is real enough to the best of my limited knowledge (know some people working for child rights agencies in Uganda).
"Cases of child sacrifice have always existed, mainly in the Ugandan central region, but there is a new strain of traditional healers in Uganda and their geographical spread is mainly attributed to increased unemployment and poverty," said Elena Lomeli. She is a volunteer with the British charity VSO who is supporting ANPPCAN Uganda, a child abuse NGO, in its work with victims in the capital Kampala. "My experience working with victims suggests that the abusers are greedy people who want to get rich quick. In rural areas, people can sacrifice their own child. In urban areas, educated and rich people will look for somebody else's."From the ANPPCAN site:
Traditional healers should actually be central to the elimination of child sacrifice since it has been closely linked to their activities. The starting point is for everyone to acknowledge that just as we have Christians, Moslems, Hindus, and Bahaiis, we also have a section of our population that believes in the traditional African religion, with the traditional healers as their high priests...So that's a local child rights organisation on the ground that thinks it's an issue; not sure why people find it hard to believe such crimes occur.
Many of the traditional healers I have interacted with condemn the practice of child sacrifice. Some have even come out publicly to disassociate themselves from those committing the crime. They say that it is clearly tainting their image and leading to some of them being lynched by members of the public; or facing banishment from their areas of operation...
Indeed we must realize that as their good and bad Moslems, and Christians, it is the same with these traditional healers; you have genuine traditional healers (such as herbalists) but also negative elements who practice child sacrifice.
The fight against this horrendous crime of human sacrifice may therefore not yield much if we simply come out to condemn the practice without directly involving those that are central to it. Sending a thief to catch a thief sometimes works. Let us not waste time preaching to the converted while those that really need to be reached remain in their evil ways and our children continue to suffer.
The American Civil War makes no sense except as human sacrifice to decide the issue of slavery
If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to Him? Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said "the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether."-- Abraham Lincoln, Second Inaugural Address
In some of the poorest parts of Nigeria, where evangelical religious fervour is combined with a belief in sorcery and black magic, many thousands of children are being blamed for catastrophes, death and famine: and branded witches. Denounced as Satan made flesh by powerful pastors and prophetesses, these children are abandoned, tortured, starved and murdered: all in the name of Jesus Christ.posted by muddgirl at 9:01 AM on January 8, 2010
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posted by Astro Zombie at 2:03 PM on January 7, 2010 [1 favorite]