February 10, 2018 – Please pray for Democratic Republic of the Congo
The Democratic Republic of the Congo, also known as Zaire, DR Congo, DRC, DROC, Congo-Kinshasa, East Congo or simply the Congo, is a country located in sub-Saharan Central Africa. The DRC borders the Central African Republic and South Sudan to the north; Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi and Tanzania to the east; Zambia to the south; Angola to the southwest; and the Republic of the Congo and the Atlantic Ocean to the west. It is the second-largest country in Africa (largest in Sub-Saharan Africa) by area, after Algeria, and 11th largest in the world.
With a population of over 78 million (per Wikipedia, however, other sources state the population is approximately 57 million), the DRC is the most populated officially Francophone country, the fourth most-populated nation in Africa and the 17th most populated country in the world.
Although several hundred local languages and dialects are spoken, the linguistic variety is bridged both by widespread use of French and the national intermediary languages Kituba, Tshiluba, Swahili, and Lingala.
The DRC straddles the Equator, with one-third to the North and two-thirds to the South. As a result of its equatorial location, the DRC experiences high precipitation and has the highest frequency of thunderstorms in the world. The annual rainfall can total upwards of 80 inches in some places, and the area sustains the Congo Rainforest, the second-largest rain forest in the world after the Amazon. This massive expanse of lush jungle covers most of the vast, low-lying central basin of the river, which slopes toward the Atlantic Ocean in the west. This area is surrounded by plateaus merging into savannas in the south and southwest, by mountainous terraces in the west, and dense grasslands extending beyond the Congo River in the north. High, glaciated mountains (Rwenzori Mountains) are found in the extreme eastern region.
The sources of the Congo River are in the Albertine Rift Mountains. It has the second-largest flow and the second-largest watershed of any river in the world, trailing the Amazon in both respects.
The Rift valley has exposed an enormous amount of mineral wealth throughout the south and east of the Congo, making it accessible to mining. Cobalt, copper, cadmium, industrial and gem-quality diamonds, gold, silver, zinc, manganese, tin, germanium, uranium, radium, bauxite, iron ore, and coal are all found in plentiful supply, especially in the Congo’s southeastern Katanga region.
In 2014, the literacy rate for the population between the ages of 15 and 49 was estimated to be 75.9% according to a DHS nationwide survey. As a result of the 6-year civil war in the late 1990s-early 2000s, over 5.2 million children in the country did not receive any education. Since the end of the civil war, the situation has improved tremendously.
Instances of child labor and forced labor have been observed and reported in the U.S. Department of Labor’s Findings on the Worst Forms of Child Labor in the DRC in 2013 and six goods produced by the country’s mining industry appear on the department’s December 2014 List of Goods Produced by Child Labor or Forced Labor.
Violence against women seems to be perceived by large sectors of society to be normal. The 2013–2014 DHS survey found that 74.8% of women agreed that a husband is justified in beating his wife in certain circumstances. Mass rapes, sexual violence and sexual slavery are used as a weapon of war by the Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and armed groups in the eastern part of the country. The eastern part of the country in particular has been described as the “rape capital of the world” and the prevalence of sexual violence there described as the worst in the world.
Christianity is the majority religion in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, followed by about 95% of the population according to a 2010 Pew Research Center estimate, and 80% according to the CIA World Fact book and Pew Research Pew Research Center 2013 data.
The impact of the Roman Catholic Church in the Democratic Republic of Congo is significant. Its schools have educated over 60% of the nation’s primary school students and more than 40% of its secondary students. The church owns and manages an extensive network of hospitals, schools, and clinics, as well as many diocesan economic enterprises, including farms, ranches, stores, and artisans’ shops.
Sixty-two Protestant denominations are federated under the umbrella of the Church of Christ in Congo. It is often simply referred to as the Protestant Church, since it covers most of the DRC Protestants. With more than 25 million members, it constitutes one of the largest Protestant bodies in the world.
Traditional religions embody such concepts as monotheism, animism, spirit and ancestor worship, witchcraft, and sorcery and vary widely among ethnic groups; these sects often merge elements of Christianity with traditional beliefs and rituals and are not recognized by mainstream churches as part of Christianity.
The above are from en.wikipedia.org. These statements have not been fact-checked and are only used here to help us gain a better understanding of this nation.
1. Pray for youth of DRC (Zaire).
2. Pray for the women of this nation and ask the Lord to open the eyes of this society to see the value God places upon all people, especially women. It is through the womb all of mankind has come into being. Women are critically important in society and often undervalued by the male populations of many countries.
3. Pray God will direct missionaries to the DRC to demonstrate the love of God and share the Gospel.
