Audiences ‘moved’ by Bible drama
by Konstanse Raen

At every seminar we put on a play of The Good Samaritan with a narrator and actors. It has a very strong effect. Everybody knows the story but we use it to describe the situation with HIV/AIDS infection.

In the last session, we repeat the story. The narrator says that the traveller is knocked down “…and a Samaritan came along the same road.” But no-one comes onto the stage. So he says it again: “And then a Samaritan came along the same road.” At that point everybody in the audience turns and starts to ask where he is. And, thinking that the actor has missed his cue, they start calling out “Come on!” and prompting him with “And then a Samaritan came along the same road!”

Sometimes a member of the audience will go up onto the stage and want to be the Samaritan. They feel so guilty that they say “Let me come!”

At that point we tell them, “Well, we have to stop there because there is no Samaritan.” This person is lying on the road and that is the end of the final session. Then we say, “This is the situation today: so many people are lying around us and there is no Samaritan. Go home, look around you and you will see the same situation. Where are you in that situation? What can you do?”

It is very powerful. People in the audience say that they will never forget the day when no Good Samaritan came… and that on that day they went home and made it their vocation.

Everybody in Rwanda knows somebody with HIV/AIDS. Everybody finds somebody… in their family… or in their neighbourhood… or in their church. There is no need to preach because this story is so strong. (WR 390/33 - 02.05)