Finding Your Corner in the Sky

“Everything has its season; everything has its time …. Show me a reason, and I’ll soon show you a rhyme …. Gotta find my corner of the sky.”
Corner of the Sky,” from the musical Pippin

Recently I was at the annual Africa Film Festival events in the Washington, D.C., region. This festival is a treasure, projecting rarely known stories about Pan African peoples.

One feature was the 2025 film Khartoum, which captures the lives of five persons and their families before and during the outbreak of the 2023 Sudanese civil war. The stories include a woman who “had her corner,” where she served coffee and people would gather and share their daily lives and find community. Eventually, the protests, the civil unrest, and the violent deterioration of the neighborhoods by the militias ripped their corner community apart. Despite this horror, the film also conveys this woman’s hope—and the hope of other former Khartoum dwellers who testify to that city being in them. They will never forget who they are or their dream to overcome.

I am a witness to this dream, having lived in the Darfur region of Sudan years ago after my graduate studies. I know something about how Sudan captures your heart and leaves you with the memory of the corner dwellings in places like Khartoum, the Sahara Desert, and El Fasher before the genocides.

The stories in Khartoum convey a season of death and hunger while also conveying the resilience and resistance of Sudanese people, wherever they may be. This month, on April 15, we observe the anniversary of the outbreak of civil war in Sudan, which was accompanied by crimes against humanity—sexual violence, rape, and starvation. Humanitarian assistance and peacemaking strategies are needed urgently, but only 6.6% of needed humanitarian support has been provided.

Bread for the World has called and is calling for prayers and advocacy. Your voice matters when it comes to Sudan and all places affected by the scourge of hunger and poverty, globally and in the United States.

Ecclesiastes 3:1-14 tells us that there are different seasons in life. This is echoed in the song “Corner of the Sky” in Pippin. The musical dramatizes Pippin’s quest to find personal significance during the various seasons of his life. He discovers seasons of war, political power, and romance before realizing meaning lies in a quiet everyday life with his love, Catherine.

Just as for Pippin and Catherine, there is a time and place of significance for all of us—and this includes our brothers and sisters in Sudan. This time does not have to be a season of death and hunger in Sudan, but peace and nurture. We can be advocates for this. Please go here to pray and act with your Offering of Letters to end hunger.