Today, our parish celebrated its feast day, the Sweet Name
of Mary – or, for more Anglo-Saxon sensitivities, the Holy Name of Mary.
Here celebrations of feast days of parishes, as well of
patron saints of villages, are often preceded by nine days of prayers, a novena.
Here different communities came to the main church to pray the rosary, followed
by Mass.
Today, the celebration began with songs and fireworks at
dawn. I slept in and stayed at home in Plan Grande and so didn’t participate,
as I have in some precious years.
Before the Mass we had a procession, with a prominent place
for the image of Mary from the Church.
People came from different villages in the parish, several
with their images. I drove my car with bags of water for the people and so I
had little chance to take photos. But I did take too of a new ritual. In the
past a teacher from Dulce Nombre was responsible for the fireworks during the procession,
but he is seriously ill. So one of the altar servers took over the
responsibility. I guess there is a new ministry for acolytes: shooting off
fireworks!
This was followed by a Mass in which six children from Dulce
Nombre were baptized. Padre German asked me to baptize them. For me this is
always a privilege, bringing new members into the Body of Christ. There were a
few fidgety and crying kids, when I poured the baptismal waters over their
heads.
The past weeks have been hard on me. I’ve had two major
repairs on the car – the axle casing (camisa) and one of the axle shafts
(flecha), as well as the motor for one of the windows.
I also had some continuing
dental work (due to not going to the dentist for a few years). But the worst
was serious stomach problems – including vomiting, acid reflux, and hiccups
that had me worried one night. The next day I went to a private clinic and am recovering.
Thanks be to God – and modern medicine.
One day last week two young priests came and we worked on
the material for base communities for next year. This is the fourth year we’ve
worked together. They are a delight to work with, though I think in a few
things they defer to me (and suffer my poor Spanish.) This year I didn’t make
lentil soup as I have other years. They had rice, broccoli, with gado gado
sauce. (Gado gado is an Indonesian sauce with a peanut base, that I
love. Though I often make my own recipe, this time I used a prepared block that
an Indonesian friend who works at Villanova university gave me when I visited
the east coast in March.)
This past Monday I had a training session for twenty-eight
new catechists, mostly young people. They were good to work with and I hope
they’ll persevere since many of the villages need more catechists and we need
to welcome new young people into this ministry.
Last week I had two pre-marriage interviews back to back.
The pastor does the initial interview; the couples receive their pre-marriage talks
in their villages; I just do the interview with the couple and their witnesses –
to try to avoid any problems. I am very happy that we are experiencing more young people seeking
marriage – some of them before living together!
I also had a funeral last Sunday. I had planned to visit the
village of Agua Buena Dolores for a Sunday Celebration of the Word with
Communion. I got a call Saturday evening telling me that a member of the
community would be buried and so the celebration might be delayed. I mentioned
that I’d be willing to do the funeral rites at the celebration early. At about
7 am on Sunday I got a call asking me to come as soon as possible to do the
celebration and funeral rites. No problem.
For me, it seems rather strange that we sometimes have
funerals on Sunday. But here there is almost no embalming and so the bodies
have to be buried within 24 or 36 hours. But, in one sense, it makes sense that
we have a funeral on a Sunday when needed, remembering that we are remembering the
sharing of the deceased in the death and resurrection of the Lord and praying
for the acceptance of the deceased in the Kingdom.
I was moved, as I often am at funerals, and make a special
effort to connect with the family members – often just mentioning their names
in the celebration. This time the challenge was to integrate some remarks on
the passing of the deceased in the homily. I think it worked.
Next week we have a meeting of the social ministry. This
time the director of the diocesan office of Caritas will be with us. We will
also do some follow-up on our concerns about water and deforestation. Our idea
is to do a major reforestation campaign for the first two weeks of October (connecting
this with the feast of Saint Francis of Assisi on October 4). Some have told me
that they have gotten saplings from various governmental bodies and are
planning events. We’ll see how this goes. Another concern is the contamination
of water. There are two major problems. The first is the water sources, usually
springs. They often need to be protected and the reforestation will help this.
The other problem is the contamination of streams by the run-off from the initial
stages of the coffee production process. The de-pulped beans are soaked in water,
but sometimes this water (called aguas mieles) flows into the streams.
Some groups said they were going to evaluate the situation, talk with mayors,
and try to generate projects to lessen the contamination.
Speaking of coffee production and contamination. Coffee has
been sent to the US from the coffee association in El Zapote Santa Rosa. But I
found out that, with the help of several international aid groups, they are
finding ways to decrease the use of chemicals in production as well as to utilize
the pulp and the aguas mieles for fertilizer.
The church in Dulce Nombre is being renovated. It needed to
be painted but in the process of removing the stucco, we discovered that the
two towers have some beautiful hand-hewn stones. The idea is to preserve them
and treat them so that they can be seen – partly because these stones were
gathered and hewn by members of Dulce Nombre fifty years ago.
We are also renovating the interior of the church, removing
a large retablo and simplifying the sanctuary. I had an idea that I shared with
the pastor to have a mural painted on the apse. Next week we will be speaking
to a prospective artist.
One big event coming up, that I’ll write about later, is our
sending of missionaries to another parish in October. For the last few years,
parishioners have gone on mission to different communities in the parish, but
this will be different. We’ve had some trainings and we’ll have another next
week.
There is much more to write about – especially in terms of
the continuing poverty and challenges that our people face, in the light of
massive corruption, possible links between political leaders and drug
trafficking, and incompetence in judicial affairs and in the infrastructure. Just
a few days ago a major portion of the international highway between Santa Rosa
de Copán and Cucuyagua caved in. That means that travel between the Guatemalan
and Salvadoran borders and the major city of San Pedro Sula and the Caribbean
port of Puerto Cortez was stopped and is greatly restricted, or had to be
diverted through Guatemala.
More on this later.
But, for now, a few more images of what I experience.
The kids at the school in Plan Grande celebrated the Day of the Child with a carrera de cintas.
The morning often brings incredible vistas:
And the flowers in the garden continue to amaze me, like this hibiscus:
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