JULY 21ST , 2005 MINNESOTA NEWS : SEEKING LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL : CAMEROONIAN NATIVE SEEKS AVENUES TO TELL HIS STORY

This story originally appeared in the July 21, 2005 issue of the Chanhassen and Eden Prairie newspapers, Minnesota. USA   SEEKING LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL Cameroon native seeks avenues to tell his story   By Unsie Zuege Staff Writer Nearly two dozen people filled the Thornton Wilder meeting room in June to hear Speaker: Barbara Knudson, Ph.D., professor emeritus, University of Minnesota and adjunct professor at Walden University in Minneapolis, speak as part of the Great Decisions presentation sponsored by the Friends of the Chanhassen Library. The topic was Sudan: Crisis in Darfur. Knudson provided a brief history of the region, and the political events that have created an environment in which Sudanese Arabs are killing African blacks in Darfur. At the end of her talk, she asked for questions from the audience.   Jonathan Awasom raised his hand. Awasom introduced himself as a native of Cameroon, a country that like Sudan, is located in West Central Africa. “Why don’t we have governments that represent the people of the world and not the governments?” he asked. He also wondered why, if the world knows how desperate the situation in Africa is, why isn’t more being done?   There are no easy answers, Knudson responded, but there are nongovernmental organizations that aim to make a difference. Her answer probably wasn’t the one that Awasom wanted to hear.  Awasom, 35, lives in Eden Prairie and works at Summerwood of Chanhassen, a senior housing community owned and operated by Presbyterian Homes. He read about the Great Decisions program and attended Knudsen’s talk during a break. Awasom is an idealist. He is also an ordained Presbyterian minister who spoke truth to power, but instead was removed from his two churches by the Presbyterian Church in Cameroon (PCC) synod. According to Awasom, he was threatened and intimidated and assaulted resulting in his seeking asylum in the U.S. Although his efforts to seek justice for himself have been slowed over the last five years as he’s tried to establish a new life in the States, he continues to seek avenues to tell his story.   A village child Awasom’s passion for justice and speaking for the oppressed began early. Awasom was born in the English speaking northwest province of Cameroon, in a rural village. He is third of eight children, and his father supported them as a subsistence farmer. Although his parents didn’t go to school, his father did everything he could to make sure that Awasom did. The entire family worked to send Awasom to boarding school, making many sacrifices along the way. He remembers his grandfather removing money that he had hidden in his bed, giving it to him for school.His education and exposure to life outside the village made him more aware of the inequities within his own family.   “It started dawning on me that this autocratic system in African government…trickles down into the family system,” Awasom said. He began to see that a trusted uncle, who was charged with making family decisions and handling all of the family’s business was taking advantage of his less worldly relatives. He was inspired to become a minister by another uncle, a compassionate man who played a positive role in his life. He attended a protestant seminary where he studied for four years and received a degree in divinity, followed by post education degree in chaplaincy.   Living in Yaounde, experiencing the diversity of students, teachers, business people and other city residents was a broadening experience for the former village child. In 1997, Rev. Jonathan Fru Awasom was ordained as a Presbyterian minister after completing a degree in theology from the Protestant Faculty of Theology in Yaounde.   A reformer He began to find his voice. “With the background I grew up in, I developed a critical perspective of life at a very early age,” Awasom said. “I had an inspiration from God to speak up against things that are wrong. While I was chaplain, I was overwhelmed by injustice especially in the church. I started speaking up about people being oppressed.” Eventually, the young minister wrote a memorandum to the church, his own version of Martin Luther’s 95 Theses that were posted on the church door. He wrote that the church was in a critical state of injustice, and indifferent in addressing the needs of the poor. He said the church was guilty of espousing a theology that played on the emotions of people, that brainwashed people into accepting oppressive government and church structures, that their pain and suffering would end with salvation in heaven. “That ignorance plays out in their lives,” Awasom said. “When people don’t know anything, when they are not educated, then how do you know you have the opportunity to know better? Those in charge of education are supposed to be creating a theology that is supposed to be relevant to people.But in Cameroon, the church talks about salvation as being something in the future, not in the lives we lead now. If God didn’t intend for us to have a good life, then what is the essence of life? This is a distortion of God’s love of humanity. So I came in, and I deconstructed it. I questioned the church. ‘Why are some living in affluence while others live in abject poverty?’   “Ecclesiastical boards (in Cameroon) receive lots of money from overseas, but don’t use it for social justice ministry. The church has not been there for the people but only for the rich.”Awasom sees himself as a modern Martin Luther with a mission to reform the Presbyterian Church in Cameroon. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a Lutheran theologian who strongly opposed Hitler and his persecution of the Jews is another hero of his.    “What happened with Martin Luther is that he was a common priest like any other minister who wanted to know what happened in the Vatican,” Awasom said. “He discovered the affluence there and he became disgruntled. He saw the poor, helpless widows and children, and that the Church was not willing to step up and do something for people. Instead, priests sold indulgences.”   In exile Because Awasom would not back down, and perhaps more galling, was wholeheartedly supported by his two congregations in Baforkum-Bambui and the Presbyterian Church CCAST Complex, Bambili, the PCC took him and faithful Christians to Supreme court in Bamenda,North West Province. Over one year’s time, Awasom was suspended, then removed from his churches. He said that the church then collaborated with the government to keep him from preaching and to suppress him.   Awasom said that the Cameroon newspapers that covered him and the trial described it as one of the worst miscarriages of justice. A September 1998 news clipping from a Cameroon newspaper carried the headline, “Congregation backs sacked pastor, gives PCC ultimatum.” The article described Awasom as a “reformist pastor,” whose two congregations demanded his reinstatement. Eventually though, the threat of being arrested and jailed led him to leave the country after he and the Christian women and children were dismissed from the church for standing up for the truth   Five years ago, Awasom  came to the United States as a health aid worker through Presbyterian Homes. According to Susan Christenson, Summerwood campus administrator, Awasom was part of a group of 12-15 Cameroonians that were recruited to work at Presbyterian Homes’ Lake Minnetonka campus. “There had been an effort to go to there (Cameroon) and recruit people with a ministerial background and train them as nursing assistants to older adults in the U.S.,” Christenson said, “to do care giving and ministry work.”   At Summerwood Chanhassen, Awasom’s primary job is housekeeping but he also is a senior companion, working with residents and their families. “He’s a friendly, quiet person,” Christenson said. “He tries to spread God’s love.”After coming to the U.S. Awasom attended United Theological Seminary of the Twin Cities and earned a Master of Arts degree in religion and theology.   An advocate Dennis Brown met Awasom about four years ago at Christ Presbyterian Church in Edina, which they both attend.  Through the years, Brown and his family have assisted Awasom with housing and other help as his situation has ebbed and flowed, Brown said. Brown described Awasom’s situation as a mixture of several factors—youthful idealism that is repulsed at the corrupt government and organized church in Cameroon; that Awasom is someone who is in a searching mode—the classic dichotomy that African immigrants have, “that they can stay here and better their lives here, or work to support your family back home, or go back and help them.   People are torn over that issue especially since they are not in a position here to make a fortune. Most people come here on the bottom rungs of the economic food chain and they struggle to keep body and soul together. I know that in the earlier years, he sent his paychecks home. So he has a real sense of responsibility.” Brown, too, has heard of Awasom’s story of exile and asylum. “All I know is what he’s told me, and he’s fearful,” Brown said. “I also balance that with knowing how our immigration system works. It is more inclined to allow people in if they are political refugees. How real or imagined it is, I’m not an expert. But part of the fearfulness he exhibits reflects the political climate in Cameroon, the policing, and the judicial process, which is typically quite corrupt.   You can’t really expect to be treated fairly even if your facts might justify your actions. You cross somebody and you’re toast. You go to prison or you just plain disappear. How do you rate fear on that kind of stuff?”Awasom’s passion for justice comes from seeing those in power controlling everything they can get their hands on, Brown said. “Those who have the wealth keep it from those who don’t have it. That’s the struggle. The haves steal and they steal from the have-nots. The church there is part of the organized structure. His ‘Martin Luther’ paper pointed out to the church where they failed. I’m sure many are dead on true. In the main points, he got it right.”   “I use my multiple talents in many ways,” Awasom said about his current job as Summerwood. “I love to care for seniors. I hold them in highest esteem. My own grandmother inspired me so much by how hard she worked in her life. She was a very strong Christian woman with a very great character.”   Awasom is in the United States under political asylum. While he would like to get a green card in the near future and find a position where his voice can be heard, he said he can't make any definite decisions about his long- term plans. Instead, he's focusing on social justice. Awasom is also an inspirational and motivational speaker. He speaks occasionally about "The true Meaning and purpose for life" and believes that the United States has the moral power to influence the world in a positive way in collaboration with other great nations.   To contact Jonathan Awasom, call  email him at mailto:jonathanawasom@yahoo.com.