Slavery in a Changing World
In the mid-1800’s the enslavement of human beings was changing. Abolitionists, motivated by their Christian faith, had worked to abolish slavery in the British Empire in 1833. The United States had fought a Civil War that resulted in the abolition of slavery in 1863. And in 1860 the Roman Catholic church ceased endorsing the enslavement of others in their preaching.[1]
Italy itself was just beginning the process of uniting its disparate city-states, all with different laws regarding the enslavement of people.[2] And it still wasn’t clear where Roman Catholic law and national law separated.[3] Thus, both citizens and government were wholly confused as to the legality of slavery in Italy.
While the demand for enslaved people slackened in the Western World, it increased inside the continent of Africa. In fact, by 1850 there “were more slaves in Africa than in the New World.”[4] Sudan was an epicenter of slave-trading in Africa, only outlawing the practice in 1924.[5]
Bakhita’s Enslavement Nightmare
These worldwide shifts shaped the world in which Bakhita was raised in the Sudan’s Darfur region. Born in the 1860’s, she experienced the kidnapping of her older sister who had stayed home from the fields to care for their little sister. Several years later, at the age of nine, slave traders held a gun to Bakhita’s head and knife at her side threatening death if she yelled. This is how she was kidnapped into slavery.[6] This experience so traumatized Bakhita that she lost all memory of her name.[7] When her captors asked her name and she could not remember, they mockingly named her “Bakhita,” which means “lucky” in Arabic.[8] This became the name that followed her throughout her life.
Those early years of hunger and beatings haunted her, evidenced in dreams where she was an old woman, calling out and begging that her chains be loosened. Initially sold to an Arab captain, she was beat so viciously she was injured and bedridden for a month.[9] But worse than the beatings, her master’s wife forced her to be bodily scarred.[10] With threats of whipping if she did not lay down to be cut, another enslaved woman made large incisions across her arms, chest, and stomach.[11] Salt was then rubbed into her open wounds to ensure scarification of her incisions. She was incapacitated for a month, only able to reach a towel to wipe her weeping wounds.[12]
Hope on the Horizon
Finally her world brightened when, in 1882, she was sold to the Italian consul working in Khartoum, Sudan.[13] He was kind and treated her well. But in 1884 war came so close to Khartoum that Italy asked him to return home.[14] Bakhita begged him to take her with him, and he agreed. They set out to Italy, accompanied by friends. The madame took such a liking to Bakhita that her master gifted Bakhita to her. Here Bakhita also found kindness and became the nanny for their new baby.
Within a few years business required the family to return to Sudan.[15] They left Bakhita and the young child with the Canossian order of nuns in Italy. Bakhita blossomed in this new environment. She participated in classes where she soaked in the teachings of Jesus, his sacrificial love, and radical forgiveness. After giving her life to Jesus, she was baptized.
“If You Can Gain Your Freedom, Do So!”
When her master returned, Bakhita surprised everyone by refusing to go. That day she lived out Paul’s encouragement in 1 Corinthians 7:21, “Were you a slave when you were called? Don’t let it trouble you—although if you can gain your freedom, do so.” She claimed her freedom!
When Bakhita refused to return to slavery, her master argued her rights of ownership and challenged Bakhita’s insolence.[16] Since the church had not yet faced the question of slavery with a person in their own midst, the church was stymied and initially remained silent. Ultimately the Canossian Mother Superior sided with Bakhita, reaching out to the future Pope Pious X to represent her claim in court.
Navigating the disparate laws of Italy’s divided city-states, the church successfully defended Bakhita’s freedom, setting the standard for all of Italy. Slavery was not allowed and Bakhita was free!
Freedom and Racism
Bakhita became a novelty. She was one of the first black nuns in Italy, and many had never seen anyone with her skin color. As a nun, she served in many different roles—becoming the face of the mission as the doorkeeper, serving as a cook, and during World War I, she served as a nurse. When recovered soldiers returned home, they continued to talk about Bakhita, and her fame spread. Later her story was compiled into a book that became so popular it was translated into multiple languages, spreading her fame even further.
But her novelty also subjected Bakhita to unexamined racism. The church took her on tour to help raise money for the mission and massive crowds gathered just to get a glimpse of her black skin. When a fellow nun found her weeping, Bakhita said,
“It is not a matter of pain in my body, no! The fact is that everybody looks at me as if I were a rare beast. . . and then they keep calling me ‘poor thing! Poor thing!’ I am not a poor thing: I belong to the Paron [Master] and to His home. It is those who do not belong to the Lord who are the poor things, not me!”[17]
Unexamined racism also existed within the church. A fellow nun wondered how she did not tarnish her white habit with her black hands. The children who she taught and loved often asked her to defy her modesty by uncovering herself so they could see her scars. Though she responded to the children with love, humility, and acquiescence, with adults she was known to respond differently. Like many who diffuse racially tense situations with humor, she was known for her quick wit and laughter in the face of racism and objectification.[18]
Meanwhile, general sentiment against the color of her skin solidified as Italy colonized Ethiopia and Eretria. As colonizers married Ethiopians and Eritreans, Italy dealt with the discomfort of interracial Italian children by banning interracial marriages and characterizing interracial children as the offspring of prostitutes.[19] Nevertheless, Bakhita’s presence challenged this narrative. Rather than a prostitute, in her nun’s habit she bodily represented black purity and chastity.[20]
Bakhita’s Lasting Impact
Bakhita internalized Jesus’s transformative love and forgiveness of his persecutors. When asked what her response would be to her kidnappers if she were to see them again, she replied that she would get down on her knees, kiss their hands, and thank them because through her kidnapping she came to know her Jesus.[21] Though thankful for her salvation, she did not endorse slavery. Rather, her salvation provided her with the courage and determination to defy her slavery, which shaped and solidified Italy’s laws against slavery to this day.
Bakhita was sainted by the Catholic church in 2000. Her legacy has taken on new significance in this contemporary era. News from Sudan again reports the resurgence of the slave trade.[22] As people flee the dangers of trafficking and war to Egypt, they congregate at Egyptian churches named for Bakhita, finding solace in her story. Like Bakhita in Italy, the Sudanese people face racism in Egypt where the average Egyptian equates the name for black (sudani) with slave (ebid).[23] In these difficult circumstances, Bakhita’s faith which strengthened her to defy the abuses of human trafficking and racism, encourages them today. Her story reminds us that all people—with their different stories, colors, and backgrounds—reflect the image of God and are, therefore, worthy of dignity and respect.
Additional Resources:
Read:
Slavery: It’s Still a Thing by Kati Brandt
Racism and Sexism: The Groans of a New Creation by Mimi Haddad
Fighting Power Imbalances at the Intersection of Gender and Race by Iris Goicochea
Let’s Stop Doing as the Romans Do by Adam Benner
Listen:
The Unfolding Fullness of Christ: Living Out the Slavery Texts in Today’s World by William J. Webb
Antebellum Evangelical Feminist Voices in Condemnation of Slavery by Kent A. Eaton
Intersectionality: Rebels Follow Jesus with Rev. Dr. Susan K. Williams Smith
Notes
[1] Eve M. Troutt Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita” in Tell This in My Memory: Stories of Enslavement from Egypt, Sudan, and the Ottoman Empire (Stanford University Press, 2012), 196.
[2] Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 196.
[3] Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 196.
[4] Larson, Pier M., “Horrid Journeying: Narratives of Enslavement and the Global African Diaspora,” in Journal of World History 19, no. 4 (2008): 440.
[5] Zeinab Mohammed Salih, “Viewpoint from Sudan – Where Black People are Called Slaves,” in BBC News, July 202.
[6] Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 190.
[7] Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 190.
[8] Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 190.
[9] Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 191.
[10] Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 198.
[11] Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 198.
[12] Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 199.
[13] Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 191.
[14] Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 191.
[15] Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 192.
[16] Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 195.
[17] Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 193–194.
[18] Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 200.
[19] Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 197.
[20] Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 198.
[21] Christopher Heffron, “St. Josephine Bakhita – A Model of Faith,” Saint Anthony Messenger, Feb. 2018.
[22] Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 203.
[23] Terrence Walz, “Tell This in My Memory: Stories of Enslavement from Egypt, Sudan and the Ottoman Empire – Review,” The Middle East Journal 67, no. 3 (2013): 491. Powell, “The Country of Saint Josephine Bakhita,” 203.