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«May Our Children Live in Peace»: Priest Describes Families’ Struggles in Nigeria
A pregnant woman may have to travel 50 miles to reach a hospital. Children face unexpected school transfers, while mothers lose the small businesses that help put food on the table. In an exclusive interview with Press Crux, Father Kuha Indyer describes the human toll of Catholic institutions closing in Ihugh, as the United Nations warns of a displacement and poverty crisis affecting hundreds of thousands of people across Nigeria’s Benue State.
EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW | THE CHURCH IN NIGERIA | PART TWO OF FOUR
Ana Paula Morales (Poli)
10/28/202610 min read
Children carry a statue of the Virgin Mary in a Marian procession through the farmlands of Gboko, in Nigeria’s Benue State. Amid the hardships facing the region, prayer and Marian devotion remain central to community life, while Spiritan missionaries support the education and spiritual formation of younger generations.Photo credits: Courtesy of Father Kuha Indyer, CSSp. / Spiritan Development Centre.
GBOKO, Nigeria — What happens when a pregnant woman goes into labor and the nearest hospital can no longer treat her? How does a child stay in school when the family could barely afford tuition in the first place? And how does a mother feed her children when the small business she depends on suddenly disappears? These are among the questions raised by Father Kuha Indyer, a missionary priest of the Congregation of the Holy Spirit, as he describes to Press Crux the consequences of closing Catholic schools, a hospital and a parish in Ihugh, a community in the Diocese of Gboko, in north-central Nigeria’s Benue State.
“I can just imagine the agony of a pregnant woman going through labor and having to travel about 80 kilometers on our bad roads to reach a hospital because St. Thomas Hospital in Ihugh has closed,” the priest said. Indyer was not recounting a specific case he had personally witnessed. He was illustrating what the loss of a health care facility can mean in a region where poverty, insecurity and limited transportation options shape everyday life.
The Diocese of Gboko ordered the closure of its institutions in Ihugh through a pastoral letter and decree dated October 12, 2026, signed by Bishop William A. Avenya and diocesan chancellor Father Marcellinus Wende. The decision followed a series of fires, burglaries and acts of harassment targeting Church property and personnel. According to the Vatican’s Fides news agency, the shutdown affected St. Winifred’s schools, St. Thomas Hospital and its associated services, and St. Winifred Parish.
In the first installment of this interview, Press Crux examined the attacks against Catholic institutions, tensions involving some members of the local community and the security guarantees the diocese says must be in place before it considers reopening. Now, Indyer turns his attention to those left on the other side of the closed doors: patients, schoolchildren, workers and families who depended on those institutions to get by.
Violence and Displacement Across Benue State
The situation in Ihugh is unfolding against a backdrop of prolonged violence across Benue State, where land disputes, clashes between farming and herding communities, displacement, and ethnic and religious tensions have undermined security. On June 13, 2025, gunmen attacked the community of Yelwata, also in Benue, killing residents and setting homes on fire. Reuters reported on June 17, 2025 that initial estimates put the death toll at around 100, with at least 3,000 people displaced. The news agency documented accounts from families who had lost relatives and livelihoods, including a farmer who returned to find the remains of several family members and the building where he stored his produce destroyed by fire.
Months later, on February 2, 2026, Reuters reported that Nigerian prosecutors had filed terrorism-related charges against nine men accused of helping organize the massacre, whose reported death toll had subsequently risen to around 150. Those events are separate from the attacks on Catholic institutions in Ihugh. They nevertheless illustrate the insecurity affecting Benue and the devastating consequences of violence for civilians.
The United Nations has also documented the scale of the crisis. In a report published September 10, 2026, the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) said Benue was hosting nearly 500,000 forcibly displaced people. The agency documented more than 270 attacks on civilians between January 2024 and August 2025, reporting more than 880 deaths in 2025 and another 76 through August 2026. Those figures cover Benue State as a whole, not Ihugh specifically, but reveal the scale of a crisis that has forced families to flee their homes, abandon livelihoods and seek safety elsewhere.
When a Hospital Closes, the Journey Becomes Another Obstacle
For families in Ihugh, the closure of St. Thomas Hospital means far more than losing a building. Indyer explained that patients must now seek care at other facilities, often traveling farther and facing additional transportation costs. He is particularly concerned about pregnant women and patients who need emergency treatment. The October 12 pastoral letter, whose contents the priest shared with Press Crux, directs that hospital patients be referred to other health care facilities, with particular care for those requiring urgent attention. But for a family struggling to meet its daily needs, knowing another hospital exists does not mean being able to reach it.
The situation reflects broader obstacles to basic services. In a humanitarian assessment published in July 2025, UNICEF found that 74% of displaced households surveyed in affected areas of Benue could access health services, although many faced barriers including medicine shortages, insecurity and treatment costs. The report also identified serious problems involving safe drinking water, sanitation and shelter. The findings apply to the communities surveyed by UNICEF, not to every household in Benue or specifically to families in Ihugh. They do, however, show how a security crisis can become a health crisis.
The shutdown has also affected people who were not directly employed by the Church. Indyer spoke of commercial motorcycle drivers who transported children to elementary school each morning and women who sold food at the hospital and school grounds. Their small businesses depended on the daily movement of students, patients, relatives and employees. “I think of the women who sell food at the hospital and on the primary school grounds. That income is what allows them to provide for their households,” the missionary told Press Crux.
For these workers, losing customers or fares can mean losing the money needed to buy food, pay school fees or cover medical expenses. The priest described the situation as especially painful because Catholic institutions provided more than education and medical care: they also supported the community’s everyday economy. Some families, he explained, had come to rely on these activities as a means of survival in a place where employment opportunities are scarce. Poverty, he added, also fuels tensions over land and expectations of financial assistance from the Church, although those circumstances do not establish who was responsible for the attacks against its institutions.
Children Forced to Change Schools
The suspension of classes has created another immediate challenge. Indyer said students at St. Winifred’s girls’ boarding secondary school had been provisionally placed in other Catholic schools within the diocese so they could continue their education. Options are more limited, however, for preschool and elementary school children, whose schools do not offer boarding facilities. Parents and guardians must find new schools, cope with potentially higher fees and purchase different uniforms — expenses that may be beyond their means. Many families, the priest noted, had already made substantial sacrifices to prepare for the beginning of the school year. Now they must find additional money to keep their children in class.
The disruption comes in a country where millions of children already face barriers to education. According to UNICEF’s humanitarian appeal for Nigeria, more than 10 million children are out of school nationwide because of poverty, displacement, insecurity and other obstacles. In Benue, UNICEF has also documented how violence forces children to leave their schools and start over in unfamiliar places.
On August 20, 2026, UNICEF published the story of Ayoosu Myoom, a 15-year-old girl who spent years in a displacement settlement before having the chance to return to school. Her story is unrelated to the closure of the institutions in Ihugh. But it shows that returning to a classroom can mean more than resuming lessons: it can mean reclaiming part of a childhood and imagining a future again.
From Poverty to Opportunity: The Spiritans’ Response
For Indyer, Benue’s challenges cannot be understood solely in terms of armed violence. In his interview with Press Crux, he stressed the need to create economic opportunities, combat corruption and give families the means to live with dignity. He described poverty as a breeding ground for insecurity, kidnappings and other forms of crime. His argument does not excuse attacks or blame people living in poverty for violence. Rather, it suggests that a lack of opportunity aggravates social problems that demand responses extending well beyond policing. Building peace, he said, also means protecting education, improving access to health care and helping young people find dignified ways to earn a living.
Despite these challenges, Indyer continues to work on education and community development initiatives supported by the Spiritan missionaries. One is the Spiritan Development Centre in Gboko, a project of the Congregation of the Holy Spirit’s Nigeria North-East Province. The center offers spiritual support, education and development opportunities for vulnerable families, including a Youth Leadership Academy with a one-year program in leadership, social values, media and digital literacy, trauma healing and entrepreneurship. The goal, according to the priest, is to prepare young people to serve their communities and help transform their surroundings.
The academy has also established a faith formation school for children who attend weekend classes in religious and moral education. Some receive basic instruction and English-language lessons, particularly those whose families cannot afford conventional schooling. The center also runs an adult literacy program in the Tiv language and a community savings and small-loan initiative for people who have difficulty obtaining bank credit. Through these programs, families can gain tools to establish small businesses, meet basic needs and improve their living conditions.
Yet the Spiritan Development Centre faces significant challenges of its own. Indyer explained that it lacks a reliable electricity supply and depends on an aging generator that frequently breaks down. When the generator fails, staff cannot pump water into a storage tank that also serves the neighboring community. The center needs classrooms where children can learn and take part in activities in a safe environment, while a community residence intended to house missionaries remains without a roof because of insufficient funding. Transportation is another pressing need.
These shortages show that even those working to assist vulnerable families must carry out their mission with limited resources. Indyer expressed hope that individuals and institutions would support the Spiritans’ educational, community development and evangelization initiatives, pledging that any assistance would be used responsibly and properly accounted for. Such programs cannot, on their own, resolve Benue’s wider crisis, but they offer practical ways to prevent poverty from determining a person's future.
«May Our Children Live in Peace»
Asked what sustains his hope amid such difficulties, Indyer pointed to his faith in Jesus Christ and the example of holy men and women who persevered through adversity. He also recalled a saying that captures the sacrifices of those working under difficult conditions: “What is to give light must endure burning.” For the missionary, hardship does not diminish the meaning of his vocation. Instead, it strengthens his commitment to proclaiming the Gospel and accompanying those most in need.
But his deepest wish is not expressed in ambitious projects or financial figures. It concerns children. “I would cherish it if the authorities created conditions in which our children could live in peace and pursue their educational dreams, ultimately helping to make the world a better place,” he told Press Crux.
His appeal reflects the concerns of families who depended on Ihugh’s Catholic institutions: that their children can attend school, the sick can receive medical treatment, adults can find work and violence will not take away their chance to build a future. As the diocese keeps its institutions closed until credible, lasting security guarantees are in place, Indyer insists that communities need protection, opportunity and continued support.
The hope he describes does not overlook poverty or suffering. It rests on the conviction that, even under difficult circumstances, education, solidarity and faith can open new paths. Behind a closed hospital are people who need care; behind an empty classroom are children who want to learn; and behind every shuttered small business is a family wondering how to make it through another day. In Ihugh, restoring peace would mean restoring those possibilities. For Father Kuha Indyer, that hope has a human face: children who deserve to grow up without fear and have the chance to pursue their dreams.
Editor’s note: This is the second of four installments in an exclusive Press Crux interview with Father Kuha Indyer, a Spiritan missionary serving in the Diocese of Gboko, Nigeria. The series examines violence, poverty and the challenges facing Christian communities, as well as the Church’s efforts to support families and keep hope alive.
Children take part in educational and training activities at the Spiritan Development Centre in Gboko, Nigeria’s Benue State. Run by missionaries of the Congregation of the Holy Spirit, the center provides spiritual guidance, education and opportunities for personal development to vulnerable families in a region affected by poverty and insecurity.Photo credits: Courtesy of Father Kuha Indyer, CSSp. / Spiritan Development Centre.
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