Editor’s Note: Lyn Lusi died of cancer on March 17, 2012.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: There are few images of war’s destruction in the eastern Congolese city of Goma. Little was built in the first place. For two decades, regional militias have clashed over the minerals here. U.N. troops have brought some order but their reach—and mandate—are limited. So is the Congolese army’s effort to assert control.

A series of peace agreements and two democratic elections have brought some stability here, although very little development. There’s still virtually no paved road in this whole country. What has continued unabated is an epidemic of sexual violence. The United Nations says the Democratic Republic of Congo is the worst place on earth to be a woman.

One place where you get an idea of what that means is a refuge called HEAL Africa.

Women work to shake off unspeakable atrocities they have faced. The trauma has left most of them with injuries that render them incontinent. This woman wears a mask to conceal her maiming at the hands of militiamen who raided her home one night about a year ago.

ANNONCIATA: My older daughter escaped from them. they told me to go get her. And I said she’d escape from you, how could I ever catch her. Since I wouldn’t give them my daughter, they hit me on the head with a machete and after I fell down they used the same machete to cut off my lips.

DE SAM LAZARO: A volunteer health worker brought her to HEAL Africa. It is the only specialty care hospital in all of Eastern Congo.  It was started 12 years ago by British-born Lyn Lusi and her Congolese husband, devout Christians who’d served the region for years before that as medical missionaries.

LYN LUSI(Co-Founder, HEAL Africa): Well, my husband was an orthopedic surgeon. He finished in Belgium in ‘84, and to this day he’s still the only one, the only orthopedic surgeon in the east of the country.

DE SAM LAZARO: Dr. Jo Lusi has performed thousands of surgical operations—fixing everything from club feet and cleft palates to fistulas, the vaginal, sometimes rectal tearing that comes from rape trauma or obstructed labor. HEAL Africa has trained nearly 30 young Congolese doctors, paying for their education elsewhere in Africa. Its bare bones emergency and intensive care are the only such services in a region of eight million people—supported by various private and international government grants. Seven hundred children with HIV get life-saving antiretroviral drugs here. But Dr. Lusi says all this is just one part of a much larger idea.

DR. JO LUSI (Co-Founder, HEAL Africa): When you serve human, I don’t see you here like a human. I see you like an image of God, so to do that you have to be holistic. You have to be total, you have to know what about the spirit, about the flesh, about the soul. Here the people are lacking everything. They don’t have food; absolute poverty. They are exploited. They are perishing because of lack of knowledge. They are perishing because of the lack of justice. So me and my wife said OK, how do we do a holistic system?

LYN LUSI: HEAL is an acronym, it stands for health, education, action in the community, and leadership development, and all of those are components of a healthy society.

DE SAM LAZARO: For many patients who come initially for medical care, healing is a years-long process of rebuilding a life. This shelter serves women whose fistulas have not healed—about a quarter of such cases.

BASENYA BANDORA: It is very different here from back in village. People were laughing at me: “She’s smelly, she was raped.” Here people know I am a complete person.

DE SAM LAZARO: Women are taught to sew, make baskets, and raise small animals, and they are allowed to dream.

BANDORA:  I want to have a little shop, and I will make bread and I will sit there with my sewing machine and people will bring me things to sew.  I will make baskets.  If I can have a little house, that would be very nice.

DE SAM LAZARO:  For now, for practical purposes, such dreams are pure fantasy, thanks to lingering health problems and also militiamen who continue to raid villages with impunity. Annonciata frequently sees the men who maimed her, but she reacted viscerally to a suggestion she might report them to the police.

ANNONCIATA: Uh uh uh uh! I’m terrified, they would kill me. Only God can punish them for what they did.

DE SAM LAZARO: But HEAL Africa has begun working to bring a more immediate justice to victims of rape. In partnership with the American Bar Association, local lawyers work to apprehend suspects and put them through the legal system here. It is flawed and corrupt but Lyn Lusi says only when Congolese begin to buy into it will it begin to work for them.

LYN LUSI: I would always encourage our legal aid to work ten times more on the issue of bringing the community in line with the law so that they appreciate what the law is trying to do and that they agree with it and that there’s social pressure, there’s a a desire within the community for zero tolerance of sexual violence, of any sort of violence.

DE SAM LAZARO: That’s what brought this 15-year-old girl and her father to the legal clinic to bring charges against a young man who raped her while she went to collect water for the family.

PATRICE KIHUJHO: I want him not only to be put in prison but I also want him to pay for the damages he caused. Last year, I turned 75 years old. When we were growing up, we never saw this kind of behavior. When you liked a girl, we would get married. I am really astonished. I’m not sure what’s going on, how they can take little girls and assault them.

DE SAM LAZARO: Lyn Lusi thinks it’s a consequence of fighting that has raged for two decades in Eastern Congo, destroying any sense of community.

LYN LUSI: You have seen your village destroyed, you’ve seen your people killed, you’re a young man with no future, I mean you have every reason to fight and every reason to go off and join the militia. There are also those militias that will kidnap children and take them into their armies and just to reinforce their ranks. Children are extremely good soldiers in that they have no fear, and they have no conscience.

DE SAM LAZARO: Where does one begin to repair this? The Lusis say they have worked to tap the enduring faith of most Congolese.

LYN LUSI: Here is a mandate to care that’s in the Muslim community, that’s in the Christian community, and it’s present in every single locality in Congo. You could say that probably 95 precent of Congolese will go to a place of worship once a month at least. So this is an amazing power within the community, and if we knew how to mobilize people correctly, around their mandate to care, then you can make a big impact on a social problem.

DE SAM LAZARO: HEAL Africa has gathered religious leaders and other community elders into so-called Nehemiah Committees. These gatherings address sources of violence early on, mediating local business disputes or competing land claims before they escalate. Lyn Lusi says it’s a start.

LYN LUSI: I have no illusions that we’re dealing with major issues that are pulling Congo apart. I don’t think HEAL Africa is going to empty the ocean, but we can take out a bucketful here and a bucketful there. There is so much evil and so much cruelty, so much selfishness and it is like darkness. But if we can bring in some light, the darkness will not overcome the light, and that’s where faith is. We believe that.

DE SAM LAZARO: For her work, Lusi was awarded the 2011 Opus Prize, a one million dollar award given by the Minnesota-based Opus Foundation to a faith-driven social entrepreneur.

For Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly, this is Fred de Sam Lazaro in Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo.

BOB ABERNETHY, host: All week, financial experts in and out of Washington warned of the catastrophic consequences if Congress does not raise the country’s debt ceiling by August 2. After that deadline, the government would not be able to pay all its obligations for the first time in history. Officials warned that that could trigger financial chaos and vast hardship. By week’s end, there were signs of a temporary fix to the debt ceiling problem, but no agreement on a long-term deal on spending and taxes, which many had wanted, including the president.

President Obama: And I think it’s important for the American people that everybody in this town set politics aside, that everybody in this town sets our individual interests aside, and we try to do some tough stuff.

ABERNETHY: In the midst of the financial debate, where are the churches? Can religious leaders influence the politicians? Author and activist Reverend Jim Wallis is the editor of Sojourners magazine. His is a leading religious voice in political debate. Jim, welcome.

JIM WALLIS (President, Sojourners): Thanks, Bob.

ABERNETHY: There are two big questions that people have been arguing about in this town. One is the debt ceiling. The other is long-term. The debt ceiling is something has to be done now, but long term, how do we bring the country’s spending and taxes in line? You’ve been working very hard lobbying to protect government programs that help the poor. How are you doing?

WALLIS: Well, I think I’m happy with what we’ve seen so far. We started with a provocative question: What would Jesus cut? That got attention to the question. Then we fasted for almost a month in Lent. That brought more attention to it. Then we formed a “circle of protection”: Roman Catholic bishops, Salvation Army, National Association of Evangelicals, many people, not the religious left here, almost everyone saying that you can’t balance the budget on the backs of the poorest people. And I think that voice is now being heard. We’ve talked to Republicans, Democrats, and the White House right along on this.

ABERNETHY: You are trying, I think, to get a meeting with a lot of the players in this?

WALLIS: We have been meeting right along.

ABERNETHY: Well, what do you say to them?

WALLIS: We say, you know, there are principles here, that a budget is a moral document and must be evaluated by those from the bottom up. That’s our point of view. And the common good has to outweigh ideological political battles in this town. But we also ask them what their faith means. If they are people of faith, and many say they are, what their faith means, their moral compass, how they decide things.

ABERNETHY: You take that argument, what does your faith mean, to Republicans in the House who insist on no compromise?

WALLIS: We sure do. The Catholics, evangelicals, Republican side, Democratic side. Now we don’t get involved, Bob, in which bill we are going to support. We don’t lobby for bills. But we say there are principles here. You can’t just have the benefits all go to corporations and wealthy people and nothing for those who are most vulnerable.

ABERNETHY: But the common good. This idea of the common good, very important in religious and ethics. How do you define it, and who says what the common good is?

WALLIS: Well, this week we’ve organized 5,000 pastors to say let’s look at the real people in our congregations and our communities, what’s going to happen to them, as opposed to the Washington, D.C. question, who’s up, who’s down, who’s going to be the Speaker of the House next time, who’ll win the next election. The common good is about the real people, the people we have to always take into account. And pastors, I think, I wanted to talk to people whose job it is to have re-read the Bible to get to the focus on who the real people are here.

ABERNETHY: But this argument about how to cut spending, what could be cut, how to raise income, this is a very technical, very political argument. How do people, how do religious leaders feel? Do you feel that you have the ability to get in and be influential in something as technical as this debate?

WALLIS: You know, the details are technical and not difficult, really. Once you agree to some principles, the details can be worked out by the politicians. We say “let justice roll down like waters.” Let the politicians work out the plumbing here. You know, we don’t get into all the details. We’re saying there are principles here. If this is going to focus on targeting poor people, we say that’s wrong. It’s got to be shared sacrifice here. How you do it, this really isn’t rocket science. We could solve this if the principles were clear from the start.

ABERNETHY: Many thanks to Jim Wallis of Sojourners magazine.

WALLIS: Thank you, Bob.

BOB ABERNETHY, anchor: Now, a special report on religion and the economy. According to new figures from the U.S. Labor Department, more than six million Americans are now receiving unemployment benefits. Every metropolitan area in the country has seen a rise in unemployment rates over the last year, and the biggest jump was in Indiana’s Elkhart County. Kim Lawton went to Elkhart to find out how the religious community there is responding to the crisis.

KIM LAWTON: In Goshen, Indiana, just outside Elkhart, it’s the annual Family Fest at Bethany Christian Schools. Usually, it’s a time of joyous community celebration. But this year there was a new note of anxiety as the area reels from one of the worst unemployment crises in the country.

Allan Dueck

ALLAN DUECK (Principal, Bethany Christian Schools): People are recognizing this as a widespread need and know that “there but for the grace of God go I.” It could be me tomorrow or my family member, and so I think there’s a real sense of pulling together in ways we can.

LAWTON: This is RV country, where more than 60 percent of the nation’s recreational vehicles have been manufactured. But in tough economic times when gas prices are unpredictable, when people aren’t buying luxury items and when banks are restricting loans, the RV industry has collapsed. Factories here have closed or made drastic cutbacks, and the ripple effect is touching virtually everyone.

According to the Indiana Department of Workforce Development, since the beginning of this year the unemployment rate in this area has jumped to nearly 20 percent. That’s well over twice the national unemployment rate, and many believe the rate here is actually much higher, because the official numbers don’t include those who don’t file for unemployment benefits. In this area that includes large numbers of laid-off undocumented immigrants and Amish people who took factory jobs when they couldn’t make a living on their farms.

Derald Bontrager is president and COO of the Jayco RV company, which his parents started 41 years ago on his family’s farm. At Jayco’s peak two years ago, they were producing nearly 40,000 campers a year. Now they’ve had to cut that in half.

DERALD BONTRAGER (President and COO, Jayco): It’s a gut-wrenching experience to go from 2,200 employees down to 1,100, particularly in this environment, because you know that each one of those employees you lay off, that the chances of finding any meaningful employment in the near future is almost non-existent.

LAWTON: Bontrager, who is a leader in his local Mennonite congregation, says he’s dealing with a difficult moral equation.

Derald Bontrager

Mr. BONTRAGER: In many cases, the people that we’re no longer able to employ are the same people that I go to church with on Sunday. I see them at the basketball games on the weekend; I see them at the restaurants. But you really have to try to separate that from knowing that we have a real obligation to make sure that we survive as a company in this environment, because we still are employing 1,100 people.

LAWTON: Bontrager says he’s relying on his faith.

Mr. BONTRAGER: You need to draw strength from somewhere, and I can’t think of anywhere else I’d rather draw strength from than God.

LAWTON: In this overwhelmingly Christian community with a significant Mennonite population, churches are being called upon more than ever to help meet physical and spiritual needs. One of the most prominent efforts is Church Community Services, a ministry supported by Mennonite, Catholic, mainline Protestant, and evangelical congregations. CCS has several programs, including a food pantry that is seeing all-time highs in the number of requests. They also provide emergency assistance to people who can’t pay for rent, utilities, and prescription medicine. Dean Preheim Bartel is executive director.

DEAN PREHEIM BARTEL (Executive Director, Church Community Services): To me, it’s a way of Christians actually putting their hands and their feet to what they believe. So it’s not just something in their head, but it’s something they are actually doing. They’re putting their heart and soul into it.

LAWTON: The needs are now so great CCS is moving to a bigger space to better handle the situation. Resources are being stretched thin. The agency has been seeing between 300 and 400 new clients every month. Many have worked their entire lives and never needed outside help.

SHARLEE MORAIN (Volunteer, CCS): And these people, they’ve not been in the system before. They just got laid off, and they’re, like, “Ugh, I don’t know what to do,” and the system just beats you up.

Dean Preheim Bartel

LAWTON: The agency is sponsoring a job-training program for women called Soup of Success or SOS. It’s a holistic project that teaches women how to be good employees as they work in a small business packaging dry soup and cookie mixes into gift baskets. They learn life skills as well as job skills. Preheim Bartel says through it all CCS is trying to instill hope amid tough times.

Mr. PREHEIM BARTEL: Sometimes as an agency we can’t provide the tangible things people need, but what we can do is we can treat them with dignity and respect, and we can provide them with an atmosphere that’s hopeful.

LAWTON: Requests are also dramatically up at the Maple City Health Care Center, which provides sliding scale discounts for people who can’t afford medical care. Until now, they’ve always required patients to pay at least 10 percent of their costs.

Dr. JAMES GINGERICH (Family Practice, Maple City Health Center): When you start having families come in where the kids are only really getting meals at school for free lunches and breakfasts, and they’re choosing between food and healthcare, a 90 percent discount doesn’t cut it.

LAWTON: The health center has begun asking patients to volunteer at a local charity in exchange for $10 credit toward their medical bills. Dr. Gingerich says the program has been especially meaningful for the area’s growing number of unemployed Latino immigrants, many of whom are undocumented.

Dr. GINGERICH: Those people don’t have access to food stamps. They don’t have access to unemployment. They don’t have a safety net that other unemployed people do, and they’re often socially much more isolated because they don’t — they’re immigrants. They don’t have generations of connections in the community.

Dr. James Gingerich

LAWTON: The trickle-down effect of the unemployment crisis is hurting businesses and nonprofits across the board. Bethany Christian Schools is a Mennonite school for about 280 students in grades 6 through 12. They’ve been trying to provide tuition help so unemployed families can keep their kids in the school. Bethany’s main fundraiser is an auction at the annual Family Fest. People donate items to be auctioned off, such as handmade quilts and furniture. This year’s event fell short of what they made last year. Principal Allen Dueck says the school faces a tight budget.

Mr. DUECK (Principal, Bethany Christian Schools): Teachers are looking at a zero increase this year, and we hope that will be enough to make things work. We may have to reduce staffing a little bit, depending on how enrollment shakes down for next year.

LAWTON: Churches, which support these community ministries, are facing their own budget shortfalls at a time when they are being asked to do more. Many congregations have established job counseling programs and support groups for the unemployed. Church leaders say the situation has taken a heavy spiritual toll.

At Elkhart’s Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary they’re teaching future pastors how to counsel people affected by the crisis. Seminary president Nelson Kraybill says it starts with listening.

NELSON KRAYBILL(President, Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary): You don’t come with quick and easy answers, and anyone who does, saying, “Well, this is what you ought to do” or “This is where you’ve made a mistake” — if you start with that I think you have defeated the entire purpose of the pastoral encounter.

LAWTON: Rick Yoder was laid off in September after working for a major RV manufacturer for 25 years. He’s in a church support group.

Rick and Joy Yoder

RICK YODER: Some people are executives. I come in as a laborer, forklift driver, truck driver, and we all say the same things. It’s about our identity, our livelihood, and changing. It’s the hardest thing to do.

JOY YODER: It’s probably the biggest challenge for me. I pray a lot, and I journal a lot, and it fluctuates from day to day, because I’m the main bread winner now, and I’ve never been in that role before.

LAWTON: Rick’s wife, Joy, works in the kitchen at Bethany Christian Schools, so she gets a discount to help with their daughter Jama’s tuition. But she doesn’t earn enough to cover all the family’s bills. Church friends have stepped in to help.

Mr. YODER: Right away some people come to me from our Sunday School class and said, “We know you need a roof on your house, and we want to do something.” That was so hard to accept, but I had to. But, you know, you do, and someday I’ll be on the other end giving.

Ms. YODER: We are used to giving and helping needy people here, and I think that’s been one of the biggest struggles, but also an area that I’ve had to learn to — the people want to help, and to say no you’re hurting them, and you’re taking that gift away from them.

LAWTON: Laid-off executive Michael Stevens says unemployment has made his faith stronger. A cradle Catholic, he’s spending more time at church and in prayer. He believes God will provide him the right job at the right time.

MICHAEL STEVENS: Even though it’s devastating to lose your job, as one door closes another one opens, and people should really embrace that and pray to God about that and look to go into that next open door, because that might be the door that he’s calling you to.

LAWTON: Kraybill says the entire community is learning important spiritual lessons.

Mr. KRAYBILL: When I have my bank account and my retirement and secure employment and my mortgage pretty well paid off, it’s pretty easy for me to get spiritually smug and think I don’t need God, and it’s in the people around us who are the most vulnerable where we are going to see the face of God.

LAWTON: Despite all the bad news, local leaders say faith and a strong community spirit are prevailing.

Mr. BONTRAGER: We’re still a very vibrant community, and people are committed to making it work—and we’re not going away.

LAWTON: They say that spirit will get them through this crisis. I’m Kim Lawton in Elkhart County, Indiana.