"I promise to serve God, his people and my country, and to do something good each day", pipes the youngest of all scouts in his clear little voice. The smiling congregation, packed to capacity in the rented cinema hall, rewards him with a round of applause.

The four-year old is among 80 children and youths who take their scout pledge as part of the Sunday worship. The god-mothers and fathers who helped to pay for the uniforms, proudly tie the bright scarves of "their" scouts and embrace them for the closing prayer. Older scouts receive a staff, symbol of their task to lead their troops into service by setting the example.

It is a moving service of commitment and hope, organized by the Lobito Synod of the Evangelical Congregational Church in Angola (Igreja Evangélica Congregacional em Angola, IECA) in close cooperation with the Roman Catholic Church locally. Dr José Belo Chipenda, general secretary of the IECA, emphasizes how well Catholics and Reformed work together in this area, and how important that is in a country as torn apart as Angola.

Jet den Hollander

Angola has everything, yet most Angolans have nothing. Because of its tremendous resources in oil, diamonds, timber, coffee and fertile land, the country has been at war for over 40 years. And both in the war for independence from Portugal, and in the ensuing struggle for control between the MPLA government and the UNITA rebels, foreign economic interests have endlessly prolonged the conflict.

It is the people who pay the price: 20 million landmines, a country full of destroyed or disused schools, factories and hospitals, one of the highest rates of infant mortality in the world, 60% illiteracy, and a quarter of the population displaced.

A small congregation in Dombe Grande near Lobito recounts what has become the daily reality of many:

"First the floods came and spoilt the harvest. Almost all our plots were affected. Then the soldiers came and took whatever we had left: clothes, tools to work the land, the little money we had. And when they left they took more than 200 people with them: mothers with babies, young boys, old men. All of us have lost relatives and friends. Most have not returned from the bush. Are they dead? Forced to help raid the next village? We are glad you have come, from the national church and from the world church. What can we do?"

There are no easy answers. But there are, Dr Chipenda and the IECA believe, opportunities. For this reason the Congregational Church has invited a WARC team to visit Angola early next year to explore with its member churches - the second is the Evangelical Reformed Church of Angola (Igreja Evangélica Reformada de Angola, IERA) - and the wider Reformed and ecumenical family how best the challenges can be addressed. The team visit will also build on the youth initiative of April 2001 and the mission in unity visits paid to the smaller Reformed groups in Angola. For, as Chipenda emphasizes, unless we mobilize all resources and unite our forces as churches, we will not make a difference in this country.

Making a difference in Christ's way: that is the vision of the pastors in training at the IERA Bible school in Estalagem, of the Synod delegates as they debate their stand vis-à-vis MPLA and UNITA strategies, of the women at their weekly prayer meetings, of the 80 scouts as they pledge: "I promise to serve God, his people and my country, and to do something good each day". Angola's sky is dark and cloudy, but there are beautiful rays of sunshine, proclaiming the dawning of a new day.

Jet den Hollander