‘Why Do You Want To Kill This Boy?’

Alexandra Zavis: BOSSEMPTELE, Central African Republic — The militia fighters were hunting for Muslims when they found the father and son at their home in this mud-brick town. They shot the man, then turned their guns on the 10-year-old boy.

A willowy figure in a black robe rushed up. On his chest was a large red cross.

“You can’t be so inhuman,” Father Patrick Nainangue pleaded. “Why do you want to kill this boy?”

The boy would soon be a man, they answered, and he would take up arms against them. Nainangue stood his ground.

If they wanted to kill the child, he declared, they would have to shoot him first.

One of them swung around and pointed his gun at the priest.

(thanks, Mark)


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