A small archive of photos from months past

All of these Pictures are from the mission in the South where we mento the Kids at an afterschool programe. 

that is the church/mission center in the background

The children are so very loving and caring to oneanother

They are so darn cute

Audra and I belting out "the little tea-pot" song....

we are just about to - pour out -

flower power in action

a few of the children decided to adorn us with native flora

Diego's impish little smile betrays him.

A train running up and down the hill 

I love these kids

To the unknowing eye this might appear as an English class 

Actually those three had made a game of who can goose LauraCatherine's leg

Bishop Duque's family.  His three girls have been studying at a university in Buenos Aires since Feberuary

Mirium and Oscar, the wonderfull couple who hosted both me and Audra

Oscar is still wearing the helmet because of the piece of scull removed after a toumor was removed

This is me and Audra's mom, along with the rest of the crew getting down and funky with live music.  

I love Latin America!

The bishop, a priest and a congragant showing off their dance moves.

This is our dear and lovely Cathedral decked out for a comitioning cerimony; 

specifically for our beloved Father Juan Carlos... whoop! whoop!

what is God doing in this Mission Trip

 

A God one-on-one moment:  So a number of weeks ago, I had a very real and interesting encounter with God.  It was during the time I was feeling the loneliest and I had been struggling to encounter God, trying to get the face-to-face contact.  Among my streaming thoughts I began to wonder about prayer.  I recalled scripture that I have studied related to the topic, meditated on it being through faith that our prayers are answered and I recalled a book that my friend Alicia and I discussed this past fall.  I happened to have read a section of this book where the author suggests a prayer form that he calls "random acts of prayer" or something to that very effect.  The author challenges the reader to use his or her daily life as an excuses to pray for those around you.  Well, as I was walking back to the office one bright sunny day I walked upon a couple of men trying to get their car to turn-over.  It was making sounds that did not give much hope it would cooperate.  I decided that these gentlemen needed a Godly intervention and so as I was walking towards the car I prayed, in the name of Christ, that the car would start.  As I concluded the prayer with an Amen and was passing the car, it started.  It wasn't a surprise that it started at that moment, but I felt a wave of extreme gratitude and love.  I gave thanks over and over again for God's grace and kindness.  That was the face-to-face, instant gratification moment I needed.  I know God is there but sometimes what I really want is for the Lord to be sitting at the foot of my bed, talking with me about my heart and letting me cry in His arms.  I am realizing my weakness of being in this.  I so want my faith and the Spirit to be enough to sustain me.  I want to be abel to say and live into a relationship with God that is so full that I am never lonely, that God is all I need and never waver in knowing that God will give me his best.  Yet I have found myself in tears wondering  where God was and wanting a physical presence to comfort me, but God is much bigger than such moments; He is so much greater than what I think I need.  As I reflect on the waves of emotions that I have experienced I realize where God has been in each circumstance. It is not a pale reflection or a shadow of God's Holy work, but it is bright, beautiful and clearly present.  I wonder how I don't see it as it is in progress.  One bright blessing in this journey is my friendship with Audra.  In this friendship God has blessed me with that physical presence I need.  We talk about our hearts, our pains and trials, we share innumerable laughs and our tears.  I don't know of many such circumstances (if any) where two strangers where placed together as a team in another country and became best friends; it is nothing short of a blessings form an immensely loving God.  So, despite the organization issues with this mission, it has been a remarkable growing experience for me spiritually.  

More about Faca

Facatativa (Faca) has a stunning view with a heavy reality.  The weekend I was there for the weekend, Father Javier took me around the community and explained the issues that plague its people.  There are narco-traffickers up the mountain who demand individuals pay them some sort of life-tax (I would call it).  These people hardly have enough to maintain a basic level of subsistence without being extorted.  Yet if they refuse to pay or just can't then they will "disappear".  Many, if not most, of the young women begin having children as early as age 14.  Claudia, Father Javier's wife, mentioned that it was not uncommon to have a twenty to twenty-two year old with four or five children.  A family that I have gotten to know goes along with that image.  The mother is 32 and her oldest child is 18.  She has four or five children with the youngest at less than two years old.  They all live together in house no bigger than Audra's and my apartment.  The husband who is at least twenty years older than the mother is somehow disabled and unable to work; if you ask Claudia, she says he is just unwilling to work.  So the entire family depends on the 18 year old son to sustain the family.  The young-mother-plight occurs for many of the same reason it occurs in other areas of the world; lack of sex education, lack of parental presence, limited resources in ones own family leads to the 'need' for young women to leave the home early and join with a man who can provide for her (although in the case of this family, the father was only a provider until he could lay the responsibility/burden on his, way too young, son). 

 The agricultural life is absolutely gruling.  An individual may work from 7am - 4 or 5pm picking peas (a labor intensive job) all day to come away with $4; and that is after the work of tilling, planting and tending.  The harvest is the only time when they make any money.  If you are talking about potatoes (the majority of the crops of Faca), the income is even less.  There is also great strife that presence itself in Faca and around Colombia that targets Anglican/Episcopalians.  Father Javier explained that there are three types of people: those that just let the 'Episcopalians' be, those that attend the church and those that are bent against it (as a result of the strong Roman Catholic culture).  The latter has proven to be quite the challenge.  The seriousness of this conflict was made clear when Javier explained that the priest before him left Faca for what he felt were safety concerns.  Another telling example is that one of his son's professors tried to fail him for no other reason than he was Episcopalian.  The only reason he didn't fail him is because Javier is a lawyer and went and laid the law down (literally).  The professor apologized saying 'if I had known his father was a lawyer I would have never thought of failing him' - LIKE THAT'S THE POINT!  I think one of the dominant reasons I didn't come back from Faca refreshed was because it was such a heavy reality experience.  These people are so very kind and full of life and love (those who I met; who granted are not always easy to get along with, as Javier told me; but none the less wonderful people).  They struggle to get enough food, education tends to not be top priority (although there are young people attending college) and non-responsible sex practices are the cultural norm.  

change of plans

This is a message written on a rock along side the road that leads to the church.

 I didn't translate this image the first time I posted it.  Here is what it says: 

"Every day God is born in our Hearts"

A simple message that I love! and since my first visit to Faca I have repeated these lines to myself to help me center in my experiences here. 

So I have been putting off this blog for a while now.  One: because it has become hard to separate what has become common place for

 me (although a fellow missionary reminded me to make the effort) and Two: because I am still in the 'blah's' and I really don't want my blog entries to time and again to be about that.  But that is where I am and this blog is to share the truth that I am experiencing.  So about two weeks ago I decided I needed to get out of Bogotá for my sanity and was making plans to go to Medellin for a week.  The sunday before last I asked the Bishop for a meeting and told him of my plans formedellin; his response, we'll talk, I would like you guys to go for one or two months.  I didn't pay much attention to this as I though

t well we can discuss the extended visit more when I return from my short visit.  Well thursday came and the meeting never happened.   The bishop was in and out of the office.  Thursday I talked to him over the phone and found out he didn't want me to go for this one week trip and to wait until it is a more extended visit. 

 It hurt to have to change my plans so drastically.   In one part it is my fault for making having such expectations for a visit without first approvals from the Bishop, but on the other hand, we just don't have anything at all to do in the 

office right now and I didn't see a reason why not.  This is defenitly a time to tune our communication. 

So instead I went to Faca to visit Father (Padre) Javier and his wife.  It turned out that it was a weekend get together with friends and family.  So there was a whole crew at the Faca house. 

It nice.  Unfortunately because this trip 

was so last minuet I failed to check if my camera battery was charged and yeap, I am sure you can guess, it was dead as a doornail ( where did that expression come from anyway?  reminds me of how wide the language barrier can be)  So that means there are no pictures on my part. These are the pictures I took from my first visit. The weekend was full of food, visiting neighbors and enjoying the beautiful freshness of the countryside.  Friday afternoon the whole crew came together to make a community pot of Ajiaco, a traditional colombian soup of mazorca (big white corn), chicken, potatoes (two or three varieties), some type of tuber who's name I can't recall, and a few other native plants.  It took hours to prepare and 

was amazing.  along with the soup we feasted on grilled sweet plantains and fire roasted pork ribs.  I was literally stuffed until 10 am the next morning.  That friday night those who still remained, a group of 10 or so, partied down with some good whiskey and dancing.  I got to teach some of them some dance moves.  I still take pleasure in the irony of a Gringa (girl from the States) teaching latin dance moves to native latinos.

 Saturday was slow and lazy, no need to do anything, except eat and walk around the beautiful countryside a bit.  Revisit the photos from Faca.  The people were kind and fed me well.  I hope I did my part to help out with the food and cleaning so that I didn't make a pest of myself. Sunday we came together for Padre Javier's Sermon at San Thomas, his church; which is litterally nextdoor to the house we were in.   I was stunned at the passion that man came out with, being that he didn't exactly prepare any sermon.  I was wondering how it would work out.  He has gotten to know the people of this farming community quite well and his language in his sermons hit at the heart of their lives.  Which is actually a more pure and direct interpretation of Scripture, being that the gospel was about the good Sheppard and many of them actually tend flocks.  That is what strikes my heart when I read scripture, how it is so intertwined with the earth and man-kinds tending and working the creation.  It makes me want to sink my hands into the rich soil their to get closer to God and to be present with His love. 

 I stayed with Javier and Claudia Suday night and Javier dropped me off at the apartment at 545 am as he went to work.  Needless to say I went back to bed for a couple of hours.  Audra and I went to my fav. coffee shop and ended

 up talking for two solid hours.  We missed a lot of our talk time in the three days I was away.  I realized that I returned from this trip not rejuvenated like I was sincerly hoping for.  Audra noted that as well.  But, I will go on.

  Truthfully I walked away more refreshed from our coffee-talk.  I do love colombia and my time here, but the bright-

spot is the friendship that Audra and I have been building.  It is a precious gift to come away from any experience with such an encounter.  

Amidst the talk with the Bishop about going to Medellin for more than a week I realized how much I am coming to love the children we work with.  It actually brought tears to my eyes to think of leaving them for so long.  They are begining to really respond to the more structured time schedule.  Wednesday Dylan, although still his bing-bongy self, was much better behaved.  Unfortunately I didn't get to see if it would last since he and his sister left even before we went outside to play.  It is so nice to be with them.  They smile at us with genuine affection.  I love their hugs and their calls to co

me play with them.  

Although I still am a bit in the blahs, I am having lovely experiences and I am confident that personal/ internal struggles are the growing pains of God's grace of transformation.  

Peace

a trial of love

The gifts that we, as missionaries,receive are innumerable. At times I wonder what I could offer in the slightest to offset this seemingly imbalanced exchange. One enormous gift is having a job that, in the best case scenario, is to be in the presence of the risen Lord in every way and every day.  In this active presence of being we are offered transformation.  If we give in to God's beautifully work in love filled relationships, we will not return as we arrived. 

In the past couple of weeks the reality of relationships has swelled from a meer gesture of pleasantries to spirit and emotion shared responses.  

This past  Wednesday was an emotional rug swept from under my feet.  It was close to time that the kids be released to return to their homes, although no one was giving any sign of having intention of wanting to leave early.  Audra and I were singing and dancing with a group of the children as we were in the second round of English lessons.  Those who normally tend to resist the classes were off on one end of the room doing homework or chatting while the rest were hanging out around us.  

As I was jumping around, singing quite loudly 'Do the Hocky Pocky' I noticed Julio siting against the door.  He is 9 years old, a hansom boy with especially light hazel eyes, who has consistently been an eager participant in English classes.  I went to stir him up and get him into the game.  I tried a couple of time to get him on his feet with no reaction.  Something was up.  His head was bowed down with a somber expression on his face.  I sat down next to him and that is when I noticed his eyes were red. I asked a variety of questions to find out what had caused the change from his normally vivacious character. I asked how he was doing,  if he was alright, if something had occurred during class , was he hurt.  To each question he didn't respond.  I asked if someone in the class had hit him, he said no.  I asked if he was sad, he answered yes or maybe it was just his reaction to this question that answered yes for him as his eyes welled up and tears began to trickle down his cheek.  I sat next to him comforting him the only way I knew how to by stroking his hair and forehead.  I again asked if someone in the class had hit him, he said no, and then in a clip of speech he told me that his grandmother had hit him.  A child in the grips of tears is hard to understand, in Spanish it was even more difficult, but I got the gist.  I asked when, he said Monday...it was Wednesday, what had occurred in his home?  He had been holding onto this pain and hurt since Monday.  I said how very sorry I was and how no one has the right to  hit him (which had been the topic of discipline for the past two days with Dylan); the tears began to course down his cheek. His eyes are large and round and as his pain was brought to the surface those large hazel eyes stared off into the distance as tears streamed freely; but that was the extent of his emotional give.  I wanted to pick him up and hold him tightly, but he didn't want to be held, or wouldn't let himself.  This is a culture of a woman is a woman and a man is a man from childhood and one aspect of this is that men don't cry.  I was completely taken off guard. I asked if he was hurting, he said yes.  I was completely helpless, what can I do, what should I do? 

 In this land, abuse is apart of life and the equivalent of DHR doesn't seem to be an option in this part of the world, the world of the marginalized. All of these communities that spread up these hills  came as a result of being displaced by paramilitary or the FARC.  Now a community with some moderate infrastructure, including schools have been established for quite some time but are not given access to the same resources as are available to the urban Bogota.

 I can't make his grandmother stop hitting him.  I  could only keep saying how very sorry I was that he was sad and hurting. I was now trying to be present in the flood of emotions coming from this precious child.  I stayed close by his side stroking his hair and arm. Telling him that it was right and good to cry. As his tears began to abate he leaned forward to come closer to me as the closest  gesture of being held that he could bring himself to.  As the other children, who had also been taken off guard to see their friend was crying, had been coming up to us asking why he was crying.  I had to put thought into how to acknowledge their concern while keeping Julio's privacy guarded.  It turned into a variety of non-verbal ques that the children astutely  and thankfully picked up on.  Just as heart binding as it was to see him cry it was hurtful to see a since of shame cross his face as he wiped the tears from his face.  The tears continued to role until he couldn't cry anymore.  I dried the last of his tears from his cheek and made sure that he looked me in the eyes to share with him how very much I care for him.  He shook himself of the emotional wellspring that had just inundated his being to stand up and join with his classmates to prepare to leave. 

 Although today, as the doors were opened and the sugary lolly pops were distributed, no one was in a hurry to leave.  Most everyone tarried just outside the door.  Julio, his little brother and one of the girls had walked a bit farther down the hill, but had stopped.  Audra and I went around and gave one last hug to each of the children and sent them on their way promising to come back the next week.  I took the opportunity and I ran down the hill and caught hold of Edinson, Julio's little brother, I gave the girl a big hug and then went to Julio.  I gave him my hug and a departure cheek kiss, looked him in the eyes and told him that I loved him (te quiero), with the added question that if he knew that I love him (¿sabes?).  Looking me in the eyes he nodded his head in affirmation, with a smile I let him go on his way as I returned to the church.  My soul was brought to its knees. As for the rest the ride home, that evening and ever since I have been digesting the significance of what had passed.  

Another amazing related gift came on Sunday as we attended the service at the mission.  We saw a great part of our class room.  It was so nice to see them beyond our routine visit and their genuine pleasure to see us was more precious than gold.  And Julio's face brightened to a glow when he saw me and I am sure I glowed back at him as God was and issurly present in our relationship.  

After three months in Bogota I am just now beginning to see a glimmer of what it is that I am doing here.  I ambeginning to see the relationships that started on the surface work their way deeper and deeper into the flesh of Christ.  As I share the Spirit that the Lord has blessed me with they share their Spirit with me.  The soul is a beautiful place to reside with the other.  

Peace dear friends

Still catching up

Well, my heavens!  It is Holy Week and by the time you read this, it will be post Easter Sunday.    Monday through 

Wednesday afternoon Audra and I participated in a Comunication Workshop presented by an organization named YES.  Many of our diocesan pastoral friends attended.  Each time we meet it becomes a more enriching experience of friendship. 

This workshop was to teach us a new way o

f communicating to promote relationships.  The focus of discution was gender and orientation and how to negotiate this sinsitive topic within a world of different beliefs to bring safty, love and hope to those who are suffering.  We were taught a patern of comunication that begins with truley being present with and for the other person; in this mode the conversation becomes about the other person and what it is that they are saying.  The second of this three step patern is to re-create the person, meaning to be able to respond to and repeat what it is that they mean, not mearly parrot what they said and allow the person to be who 

they are at that moment, authentically.  This is a patern that does not allow the participants in the conversation to be the winer or loser.  If this method is to function, both sides must be alowed to remain who they are and no one may loes the discussion/fight.  It is a time to put aside that you know that you belive them to be wrong, and concentrate on who they are.  The third step is to respond with generosity.  In this you are opening up the posibility of an authentic relationship where both individuals are who they are and the relationship itself becomes the tranformative force.  - well, if that makes no sense it's because I am trying to concentrate a two day workshop into one paragraph. 

Just as much as I was greatly enriched by the workshop and the comunity participation I was reneud by the gardens and beautiful sights  where we were staying, it was a Catholic nunery, I guess you would call it.  I took as much advantage of this beautiful environment as I could.  We arrived Monday morning, early and had attended the workshop untill lunch, that afternoon we had free.  I spent a glorious hour and a half or so lying in the grass hiden from all eyes amongst beautifully kept gardens.  The following two morning I awoke with the sun to have plenty of time before breakfast.  It was time to be in silence, to be with God and scripture.  It is in nature that I can finally find my mind quiet.  The city has been draining me more than I realized.  I am making plans to spend a long weekend in Faca in a few weeks.  

I participated in the Holy Thursday service by reading the Epistle.  For Friday I was asked to be one of seven individuals to give a five minuet sermon on one of the last frases that Christ spoke durring the cruzifiction in the Gospel of John.  My frase was 'woman here is your son; and then he said to the other disciple, here is your mother'.  The night before my dad helped me negociate this text.  With some help from the internet to get a better understanding of John the disciple I wrote out some notes. Well, I didn't use the notes really at all and I spoke too quickly, but I was asured that the people were able to understand me.   I kind-of left it up to the Spirit to help me to negociate the language and scripture.  If another oportunity  aris

es I will be considerate to prepare more fully.  

Oh, Saturday evening service I had an emotional melt down.  Earlyer that day I had contended with the man who had been singing during each of the Holy Week services. It is him singing with a guy playing the keyboard, he has a lovley rich voice.  He has some amazing songs and I had been asking him since I arrived in Colombia to help me learn the songs so that I might sing with him or with the other group that sings at the 11am service, but he never came through.  So that Saturday was just too much after I had raised my hopes to sing durring holy week.  Before I went to the service I was studying psalm 63 which, in part, talks about David singing God's praises.  So while in the service I suddenly became overwhelmed with the desire to sing out thanks and praise, to sing the songs with this community, but I couldn't.  The man wasn't calling out page numbers for the song book and I didn't know them. I sudenly missed my church terribly.  A place where I know the prayers and the songs where I can share in this experience with my friends and loved ones.  I burst into tears and had to leave the service. It actually was a needed reliefe to cry it out for a bit.  Ironicly it was the singing man who 

came to check on me and I was able to tell him at that moment how frustrated I was and that singing is something that I need to do.  If he hadn't come to me I don't know if I would have had the strength to go to him.  So I was able to return to the service in time for the second half of the sermon.  Later that evening I got a wonderfull dady-like hug from Father Juan Carlos who had been very concerned.  Audra and I both decided he is probably our favorite  person here in Colombia.  

I have begun dance clases, and they are not exacly what I was hoping for.  The two times I have gon, there has been a dance teacher who has a baby and spends the great majority of the time on the phone.  Monday afternoon I was there for an hour and a half and was taught one dance step.  I am going to try to go tuesday and thursday mornings in hopes of finding the other of the two dance teachers less distracted.  I must say that it did take an hour and a half of dancing salsa by myself to become board.  It was a little bit of excersize, that is better than nothing.  My hair is still insisting on falling out more than I want, but as long as there are no bald spots I won't worry too much.  My stress level has totaly calmed down.  Yoga and prayers in the morning is a great way to start the day.  

Sorry about the long update, but hey a lot occured.

Blessings and Love.

What's the view like

So now it has been more than a few weeks since the convention has pased Audra and I have be

en concentrating on hamering down a concrete schedule with Father Carlos to work twice a week with the mission in the south of bogotá.  

A  blog can be a place where one can share what events have pased, not often do I remember to also share what it is like for me to be living these events. 

The longer I am here the more I realize I have to learn.  First in regards to language.  You know, sometimes I think I know my stuff and I am just rambling on in Spanish spiting out profound thought and making interesting points only to realize that either a) they didn't understand a word I was saying or more likely and even more frustrating b) my lack of grammer skills kills the poinancy of whatever I was talking about and the conversation turns into a Spanish lesson.  Ahhh!! 

 

Ok, so really, what I have to say isn't quite so profound, most of the time.  Latley my   experience with Spanish has been more of a challenge than the first couple of months.

  I spend a lot of time trying to pull together enough vocabulary  and grammer since to put my frases together sufficiently to be understood.  It seems as though most of my time is spent just trying to not trip over my own toung.

Second.  Robin, you were so right.  Robin is a Missionary who is currently in the Sudan. She was in Libiria as a missionary season before last;  she also attended and sincirley enriched our traning in New York.   During the training I expressed a concern that when I was in Ecuador my personality changed for the

 worse, by becoming terribly indisisive, self doubting and fearful about money and other things.  I asked what I could do to prevent this from hapening.  She said - you can't prevent it, the best thing you can do is to realize this is God calling you to be changed/transformed in Him; don't try to fight it, go to God and let Him transform you.  

Well, I havn't returned to being that same person I was in Ecuador, thanks be to God, however I am still realizing I am not the person God intends for me to be.  Over the past few weeks I have felt my stress level steadily escalate., I didn't even realize I was reaching my max stress level untill I realized how much hair I was losing on a daily bases (first noted by my hair stylest).  It is not caused by any one event / thing inparticular, but for general reasons I supose.  Traveling around is rich and rewarding, but it dosn't allow for a routine, which I thrive on, nor does it make regular excersize easy.  It hapens to be my third month in Colombia and there is a three month mark that we were warned about in mission training where things might go a bit awray in ones person while abroad.  I hit that date right on the head.  Latley I have been contending with analizing a future that I couldn't possibly come to a conclusion about (because it hasn't occured, a basic thought that seems to escape me at times).   But thanks to caring advice from Audra, and tender words from Dad I was encouraged to focuse on getting in some basic excersise each day and go from there. 

-What I am missing at the moment: Sunday morning breakfast with my dad at the bakery, wakeing up at Camp McDowel and weekend evenings with my Aunt and Uncle