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| Rostro Vols at our 6-month retreat |
Hi friends!
I apologize for the break from blogging – January was an eventful month!
First off – it is the start of “retreat group season” here in Mount Sinai. We
had two wonderful college groups staying with us this month, Villanova
University and Manhattan College. The normal routine we have gotten accustomed
to in these past 6 months was disrupted a bit as most of our free time was
spent with the group translating, touring our worksites, cooking, and just
chatting about our lives. While I am still waiting to lead my own group, it was
nice to share my life here in Mount Sinai and the relationships with our
neighbors with these groups. It was refreshing and regrounded me to walk the
streets of Sinai in their shoes and witness things I have become so accustomed
to with new eyes. Walking with the groups reminded me of a passage of Dean
Brackely describing those who visit El Salvador for the first time, and
probably a similar feeling I had my first month in Ecuador:
“The visitors feel themselves losing
their grip; or better, they feel the world losing its grip on them. What world?
The world made up of important people like them and unimportant poor people
like their hosts. As the poet Yeats says, “things fall apart;” the visitors’
world is coming unhinged. They feel resistance, naturally, to a current that
threatens to sweep them out of control.
They feel a little confused–again–like the disorientation of falling in
love. In fact, that is what is happening, a kind of falling in love. The earth
trembles. My horizon is opening up. I’m on unfamiliar ground, entering a
richer, more real world. We all live a bit on the periphery of the deep drama
of life, more so, on average, in affluent societies. The reality of the
periphery is thin, one-dimensional, “lite,” compared to the multilayered
richness of this new world the visitors are entering. In this interchange with
a few of their representatives, the anonymous masses of the world’s poor emerge
from their cardboard-cutout reality and take on the three-dimensional status of
full-fledged human beings.”
At Hogar de Cristo this month I continued forward on my project on
microenterprises in Mount Sinai. In 2013, one of the initiatives of my office
is to collaborate with the Microcredit office of Hogar de Cristo and make their
services more widely known and available. No research has been done on small
businesses in Mount Sinai, and therefore I am researching the process of
starting a business, the obstacles, the benefits (financial, health, and
educational), and more. This month I finished walking and mapping all of Mount
Sinai for the small businesses. There are over 200, and this is not even
including the countless women running businesses out of their own homes that I
will soon interview. I´m uncertain, but definitely excited to see where this
project goes and what I uncover.
This past weekend the Rostro Volunteers hit the beach for our 6-month
volunteer retreat. It was a necessary and refreshing break for rest and
reflection. We relaxed on the beach, went running in the rain, and ate some
great food we cannot easily make at home, like strawberry pancakes, peanut
butter and jelly sandwiches, and baked ziti. Even more than the necessary
physical rest, our retreat leader, Jimmy, provided many great sessions to help
unpack our first 6 months in Ecuador in preparation for our upcoming 6 months.
During the retreat I continued to reread and finished one of the books I
brought from home entitled, The Call to
Discernment in Troubled Times by Dean Brackley. Being the nerd that I am, I
sat on the beach underlining and marking up my copy. Flipping back through the
book now, two quotations I feel really summarize my reflections on spirituality
in Ecuador:
“In Latin America, the poor speak of
Diosito, our “little God.” They speak of Jesusito and Papà Dios. Diminutives ad
terms of endearment express belief in a God who draws near, understands,
forgives – a “little God,” little like them, for whom the world shows contempt.
This is the Deus menor, the lesser God. Because God walks among us and shares
our sufferings…”
“Grieving over the crosses of the
world gathers our fragmented selves, centers and heals us. When we share the
sorrow of the crucified of the earth, we are no longer alone. This, too, is
part of our vocation. We were made to share each other´s burdens”
In these first six months I have witnessed the enduring faith of my
neighbors who believe in a God of accompaniment; a God who desires to walk
right beside them through the mud of Sinai, the insults of the rich, and the
suffering of financial burdens and broken families. They are grounded in this intimate
relationship with God and are unified in this shared sorrow. While prayer and
time for reflection can be hard to incorporate in my day (outside of retreat weekends)
my daily life and interactions with my neighbors has served as a form of
prayer.
Below are a couple pictures from January:
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| Participating in a concert at the church to celebrate the 5 year anniversary of the parish! |
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| Amy´s First Birthday party! |
Love and miss you all,
Colleen
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