{"id":923,"date":"2015-07-06T17:28:31","date_gmt":"2015-07-06T22:28:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/rosie-cochran\/?p=923"},"modified":"2015-07-06T17:28:31","modified_gmt":"2015-07-06T22:28:31","slug":"falsely-accused","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/rosie-cochran\/2015\/07\/06\/falsely-accused\/","title":{"rendered":"Falsely Accused"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Hewa-main_1436039178_1400x800\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

It’s hard to wrap my\u00a0mind\u00a0around the fact that\u00a0in our day and age\u00a0someone could be accused of witchcraft\u00a0<\/span>\u2014<\/span>\u00a0and\u00a0condemned without a shred of evidence.<\/p>\n

Yet here I\u00a0sit, my heart burdened for\u00a0a family on the other side of the world, for a family\u00a0I don’t even know.\u00a0<\/span>My heart breaks\u00a0for the\u00a0brother who\u00a0thought he could protect his sister\u00a0<\/span>\u2014\u00a0<\/span>and realized too late that he could only stand helplessly by while men from a neighboring village brutally murdered her. I can’t begin to imagine the agony of that moment. The helplessness.<\/span><\/p>\n

It all started when an\u00a0outbreak of measles\u00a0brought death to a\u00a0Hewa village in Papua New Guinea.\u00a0Blame had to be assigned, and in Hewa culture\u00a0that someone would\u00a0be a \u00a0woman or child accused of being possessed by evil spirits.<\/span><\/p>\n

But Mifila wasn’t\u00a0the only one accused of witchcraft. And if nothing is done, those other innocents will meet the same fate as Mifila. Thankfully, an\u00a0intervention is underway. One family has already been evacuated by plane to safety. But another family remains.<\/span><\/p>\n

That’s where things get complicated. For this second family, the extended family is arguing against the evacuation. The family of the husband of the accused woman insists that the\u00a0wife’s family must first pay a “death payment” because it would be like their son has died to them if he leaves. But if they don’t leave…. Well, I think you get the picture.<\/span><\/p>\n

There’s the\u00a0possibility of the final evacuation taking place tomorrow. …\u00a0If\u00a0<\/i>the people will go. …\u00a0If<\/i> they can go.<\/span><\/p>\n

I really don’t like those “ifs” thrown into the equation. But what we can throw into the equation is prayer.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Would you pray for changed hearts that encourage the falsely accused to evacuate\u00a0<\/span>\u2014<\/span>\u00a0rather than burden them with impossible demands?\u00a0Would you pray with me for this Hewa family right now? <\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s hard to wrap my\u00a0mind\u00a0around the fact that\u00a0in our day and age\u00a0someone could be accused of witchcraft\u00a0\u2014\u00a0and\u00a0condemned without a shred of evidence. Yet here I\u00a0sit, my heart burdened for\u00a0a family on the other side of the world, for a family\u00a0I don’t even know.\u00a0My heart breaks\u00a0for the\u00a0brother who\u00a0thought he could protect his sister\u00a0\u2014\u00a0and realized too late […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1023,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-923","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"entry"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/rosie-cochran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/923","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/rosie-cochran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/rosie-cochran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/rosie-cochran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1023"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/rosie-cochran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=923"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/rosie-cochran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/923\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/rosie-cochran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=923"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/rosie-cochran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=923"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/rosie-cochran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=923"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}