They Are Living In Chains: My Quest to Liberate Africa's "Untouchables" & God or Nothing (2 Book Set)

• They Are Living In Chains: My Quest to Liberate Africa's "Untouchables" 
• One man's inspiring story
• From the birthplace of voodoo, West Africa
• How God used him to help the mentally ill
• God or Nothing
• Intriguing interview with renowned African cardinal
• Covers today's controversial issues

In the West African country of Benin – the birthplace of Voodoo – witches, “healers,” and charms are common and a way of life for many. Yet those who suffer from mental illness are nearly universally perceived as being possessed demonically and are thus objects of shame, disgust, and terror. In fact, most are chained to trees and treated like animals.

One man, however, travels all over West Africa to find those “unclean” people who have been disowned by their families and thrown out onto the streets. With love and affection, he gives them a home, medical treatment, and mental care.

In this gripping memoir, Grégoire Ahongbonon recounts his journey from a simple garage owner to a beacon of hope to the homeless and mentally ill of West Africa. You’ll learn how a succession of life trials and hardship brought him to the brink of suicide — and how God intervened and set his life on a new and valiant course. 

You’ll journey with Grégoire through war zones, stonings, and near-death experiences as he swims against the cultural tide to care for those shunned by society. You’ll come to understand the dire poverty that grips this part of the world, as well as the horrific damage that widely held superstitions inflict on societies.

Best of all, you’ll be inspired by the real-life miracles performed through Grégoire’s efforts, demonstrating that God is actively engaged in our world and ready to work through those who care for His children.

Despite financial destitution and overwhelming obstacles, Grégoire has established 79 institutions in Africa that have helped more than 100,000 people. Few stories offer such a stirring, real-life example of courage, and fewer still provide such exhilaration over what can be accomplished when one follows God’s will.

God or Nothing

"The idea of putting Magisterial teaching in a beautiful display case while separating it from pastoral practice, which then could evolve along with circumstances, fashions, and passions, is a sort of heresy, a dangerous schizophrenic pathology.  I therefore solemnly state that the Church in Africa is staunchly opposed to any rebellion against the teaching of Jesus and of the Magisterium. . . .  The Church of Africa is committed in the name of the Lord Jesus to keeping unchanged the teaching of God and of the Church."
— Robert Cardinal Sarah 

In this fascinating autobiographical interview, one of the most prominent and outspoken Catholic Cardinals gives witness to his Christian faith and comments on many current controversial issues. The mission of the Church, the joy of the gospel, the “heresy of activism”, and the definition of marriage are among the topics he discusses with wisdom and eloquence.

Robert Cardinal Sarah grew up in Guinea, West Africa. Inspired by the missionary priests who made great sacrifices to bring the Faith to their remote village, his parents became Catholics. Robert discerned a call to the priesthood and entered the seminary at a young age, but due to the oppression of the Church by the government of Guinea, he continued his education outside of his homeland. He studied in France and nearby Senegal. Later he obtained a licentiate in theology at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, followed by a licentiate in Sacred Scripture at the Studium Biblicum Franciscanum of Jerusalem.

At the age of thirty-four he became the youngest Bishop in the Catholic Church when John Paul II appointed him the Archbishop of Conakry, Guinea, in 1979. His predecessor had been imprisoned by the Communist government for several years, and when Archbishop Sarah was targeted for assassination John Paul II called him to Rome to be Secretary of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples. In 2010 Pope Benedict XVI named him Cardinal and appointed him Prefect of the Pontifical Council Cor Unum. Pope Francis made him Prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments in 2014.

Robert Cardinal Sarah was born in Guinea, West Africa. Made an Archbishop by Pope John Paul II and a Cardinal by Pope Benedict XVI, he was named the Prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments by Pope Francis in 2014.

Nicolas Diat is a French journalist and author.

• Author: Grégoire Ahongbonon 
• Pages: 192 
• Format: Paperback

• Authors: Nicolas Diat and Robert Cardinal Sarah
• Format: Softcover
• Pages: 285
• 6" x 9"