The best response I can give to my six plus years here in
Honduras is “gracias” – thanks.
I just finished reading In the Company of the Poor: Conversations
between Dr. Paul Farmer and Father Gustavo Gutiérrez. In one article, Gutiérrez writes:
The experience of gratuitousness is the space of encounter with the Lord. Unless we understand the meaning of gratuitousness, there will be no contemplative dimension in our life. Contemplation is not a state of paralysis but of radical self-giving. In the final analysis, to believe in God means to live our life as a gift from God and to look upon everything that happens in it as a manifestation of this gift.
And so today is a time to call to mind the graciousness of
God and the ways this has been made known to me.
Thanks to God who let my heart be opened to move from a
place where I was comfortable and happy to a place where I am challenged and
happier than I have ever been.
Thanks to all those who help to make this happen – friends
who have helped me in my continuing discernment, St. Thomas Aquinas parish
which has supported me and is now a sister parish with the parish of Dulce
Nombre de María where I help, the many people who have contributed to the
ministry, and a special thank you to the people who donated to help me buy a
decent vehicle and other people who recently made a very generous contribution to the parish of Dulce Nombre.
Thanks for the people here who welcome me and make me feel
at home – and who challenge me to live more simply and to serve in a way that
respects them. Thanks for those who have helped me get my old car started when
it broke down.
Thanks to the catechists who devote their time to bring God’s love to children, young people, and the parents of young infants.
Thanks to the Dubuque Franciscan sisters in nearby Gracias,
Lempira, who have provided a place of welcome and regular opportunities to meet
together for reflection. I will spend today, Thanksgiving, with them.
Thanks to God who seems to be working marvels with Pope
Francis.
Thanks for the beauty of this land, where, despite the
poverty and suffering, God allows us to see beauty and work for the Reign of
God.
AN UPDATE ON MY LIFE
But gratitude needs to lead us to share that gratitude. This
year has been a year of changes that has offered me new opportunities to serve
God’s poor.
At the end of January 2013, a new priest, Padre German
Navarro, was appointed to the Dulce Nombre parish. He is a breath of fresh air. He celebrates
the Eucharist at least once every two months in the 47 or so towns and
villages.
He has given me a lot of responsibilities this year – mostly
in formation of catechists. I have prepared materials and then trained the
catechists in the four zones of the parish.
This has been very rewarding and challenging – not only
having to write in Spanish (though it’s usually been checked by Padre German)
but trying to develop materials that encourage participation and that are
understandable to people with limited formal education. At one session recently
two people mentioned that six of the people seeking adult baptism are
illiterate.
This past February I did make a pilgrimage to Italy. I had
enough miles to get a really cheap ticket. The highlights were my five days in
Assisi and a day trip to Subiaco. I’ve already written about this pilgrimage earlier on my blog. The place of St. Francis has become more
central in my spiritual life these past few years.
I made a short visit to Ames this year but I hope to take a
longer visit in 2014, as well as to visit cousins and friends in the Philadelphia-New
York area.
But I am most grateful for being here. Honduras is now my
home.
The biggest change next year will be my move from Santa
Rosa, a city of about 40,000 to a rural village in the Dulce Nombre parish.
This will enable me to be more present to the parish and help more in the
parish. It will also let me be more present to the poor – especially in the
remote villages.
Pope Francis in his beautiful apostolic exhortation, Evangelii Gaudium – The Joy of the Gospel, (paragraph
48, emphasis mine), explains why I am here and why I am moving out to the countryside:
If the whole Church takes up this missionary impulse, she has to go forth to everyone without exception. But to whom should she go first? When we read the Gospel we find a clear indication: not so much our friends and wealthy neighbors, but above all the poor and the sick, those who are usually despised and overlooked, “those who cannot repay you” (Lk 14:14).… Today and always, “the poor are the privileged recipients of the Gospel”, and the fact that it is freely preached to them is a sign of the kingdom that Jesus came to establish. We have to state, without mincing words, that “there is an inseparable bond between our faith and the poor”. May we never abandon them.
God has not abandoned me, even in the face of difficulties.
So how can I abandon the people here?
It's so much fun!
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