In 2008, Fr. Uwem Akpan, SJ of the North-west Africa Province of the Jesuits published his first book, Say You’re One of Them. Newspapers around the world rushed to publish reviews and nominate Fr. Akpan for various awards. Now Oprah Winfrey has picked up this extraordinary book about ordinary lives and capitalized on it’s stories about the resilience and faith of children – as told by the children themselves.

Fr. Akpan entered the Society of Jesus in 1990 and studied at both Crieghton and our own Gonzaga U. He’s been a priest for about 5 years now and works in Christ the King Parish in the bustling metropolis of Lagos, Nigeria (pop. 9m).

Here’s a short excerpt from his book:

Mama took out our family Bible, which we had inherited from Baba’s father, to begin our Ex-mas worship. The front cover had peeled off, leaving a dirty page full of our relatives’ names, dead and living. She read them out. Baba’s late father had insisted that all the names of our family be included, in recognition of the instability of street life. She began with her father, who had been killed by cattle rustlers, before she ran away to Nairobi and started living with Baba. She called out Baba’s mother, who came to Nairobi when her village was razed because some politicians wanted to redraw tribal boundaries. One day she disappeared forever into the city with her walking stick. Mama invoked the names of our cousins Jackie and Solo, who settled in another village and wrote to us through our church, asking our parents to send them school fees. I looked forward to telling them about the lit parks and the beautiful cars of Nairobi as soon as my teachers taught me how to write letters. She called out her brother, Uncle Peter, who had shown me how to shower in the city fountains without being whipped by the officials. He was shot by the police in a case of mistaken identity; the mortuary gave his corpse to a medical school because we could not pay the bill. She called Baba’s second cousin Mercy, the only secondary school graduate among our folks. She had not written to us since she fell in love with a Honolulu tourist and eloped with him. Mama called Baba’s sister, Auntie Mama, who, until she died two years ago of a heart attack, had told us stories and taught us songs about our ancestral lands every eve ning, in a sweet, nostalgic voice.

The sky rumbled.

Learn more about Say You’re One of Them