Everybody else's Nicaragua!

Due to the abnormal lack in the photo department of the last two posts, I'm going to make up for it now! A few of this and that from different parts of our Nicaragua trip! (some pictures that fit with old posts- all ones that I didn't take this time, thanks friends!)

Augusto César Sandino

- Hero of the Nicaraguan people.

Us- and Sandino on top of the hill where Samoza's palace used to be.

Old Cathedral in Managua- Damaged by an earthquake in 1972 and unusable.

(Photo Cred: Nanda- http://nnavis.blogspot.com/)

Base Community #1

Base Community #1

Base community #2 

(Photo Cred: Sara. Thanks!)

Buseta!! (including our awesome driver Edgar)

(Photo Cred: Ticcia. Thanks!)

Courage.

      Today marks six weeks left in the trip (last Saturday was half way), and I'm both excited but also a bit saddened by the idea of leaving this great group of students/teachers/TAs/families. It has been such a pleasure to be down here and to learn everything that I'm learning. Looking into the spring will be a complete change. Back to a schedule full of theo classes and work and some play, but not quite the experiential learning that we have gone through here! We were asked by Lara (student life coordinator) a few days ago how we would fill in the blank "Studying in Costa Rica has required courage from me in the following way___________." A challenging question for sure, but it has forced me to think about the ways that we are pushed outside of our comfort zone. I have learned a bit of language. I have learned how to navigate public transportation. I have learned to bounce ideas off of a small group of students in an effective and productive manner. I have learned how to read the Bible in a way that I personally can engage in better. I have felt discontent. I have understood history from another perspective. I have eaten many different foods. I have stuck up for my beliefs. I have played soccer. I have watched soccer. I have walked in 'their' shoes. I have come to new conclusions. I have wondered. I have learned. I have gained a more global perspective. I have lived in tension. I have.
     It makes me wonder about those who don't have. Take a look at what is in your hand right now. What sits on the shelf above you. What is in your pocket. We have. I spent some time this morning taking a look at some of the major protests going on around the world today. We live in tension and the question is how do we respond from the Christian perspective. Health and wealth gospels likely wont cut it. The Liberation Theology of Latin America (which expresses God's preferential option for the poor) may be closer to the target. But if we have, what do we give. Of ourselves, of our time, of our possessions. Is our life comfortable enough not to allow us to have courage to trust in the Creator God who has given us what we have. Moral of the story is this, take courage in the God who is bigger than our needs and our haves, he wants us to become a part of his kingdom here on earth in a new way. Let us do everything with this end in mind.

Nica (3/5) Sunday= Time for Church!

     Ok people sorry for the delay, a little bit of a computer glitch for the last week or so, but with a new (1995) monitor and a connection cable to my computer with its defunct screen we're back in action. So how's for a bit more of Nicaragua?


     Los comunidades eclesiales de base, or CEBs, as they are called down here became our focal point for the morning. These base communities (as we will call them) are the result of people in the general populace looking for a hands and feet connection to the gospel messages they would hear whenever a priest happened by their town. I say whenever a priest happened by their town very much on purpose, these communities were similar to the house churches of the first century. Many times the base communities would go for months or even a whole year without a priest and yet they maintained their services through the laity (common people). Difficult times historically produced a need for an active voice in the Church in response to social inequalities and government abuses of human rights. The communities are in no way separate from the Catholic Church from which they started, rather they are small groups of devout Catholics who take their faith seriously and continue to practice meeting together even in the absence of a priest.
     The first base community we visited on Sunday was called Colonia Nicarao and consisted of predominately middle to older aged women. The service started off as any traditional Mass would have, however the reading and exegesis of the scripture was done by the woman leader of the church; that is until the priest walked in. In this community, a shared priest comes to celebrate the mass weekly with the celebrants. As he was came walking in late my assumption was immediately that he had come from another base community and was running just a bit behind. The whole service was very true to Catholic word and practice and was interesting to see in this small of a setting (think 15 members). 
     Second we headed to a much different base community called San Pablo Apóstol where we were greeted by a man in his late fifties with salt and pepper hair and a shirt that looked to be right out of the seventies (with matching baseball cap). I wouldn't have known the difference if we had not been studying the current political situation in Nicaragua; seeing as we had been however the shirt made sense, it was a part of the political campaign for the incumbent president Daniel Ortega. Seeing this as the first impression of the base community gave me a good idea of what we were in for. The community was still tied to the Catholic church however hardly ever received a priest due to some of the ways that they taught and thought. The day we were there the mass was led by a group of students aged 16ish-22ish (I would say). Upon questioning the congregation later we found out that they have several different groups that lead and this was the youngest, however the leadership in this manner kept the congregation young and allowed the youth to take ownership and leadership of the community. Our group of 12 became a part of the congregation of about 30 quickly as the youth who led issued us into small groups to discuss the passage read. To see a Catholic group meet in this manner broke some serious notions of 'all' of the Catholic Church for me. I really enjoyed the group and found it very interesting. We were allowed to celebrate the 'Lord's Supper' with them (as non-Catholics this is generally not allowed) because it was not held as 'Eucharist' because a priest was not there to administer the elements. I found it fascinating that they still held value in recognizing the Eucharist in the traditional Catholic manner but also renamed it as the Lord's Supper and took the elements in the Protestant manner.
     Following the service we circled all of the chairs up and were able to ask some questions about Nicaragua and US involvement and pretty much whatever we wanted to talk about. This provided one of the best looks into the Nicaraguan's view of the United States. "We know that you are individuals and do not work for the government that caused..." was the way that several comments started off especially from our 70's shirt wearing pro Ortega friend. It was incredible the resentment that was readily palatable in their voices and mannerisms. We did sense a spark of hope in their voices as they were encouraged that we were there and learning about policies and government; this of course with the hope that we would eventually have some influence on others in the States if not the government itself. 
     Side note- We met a wonderful couple in the 70's or so at this base community and the wife had gone to Whitworth many years ago!
     Side note #2- Read more about the history and practice of the base communities- Here.
     We spent the afternoon touring historic Managua and taking a tour of the previous site of the presidential palace for dictator Samoza in the center of town (on a hill) It was incredible to see the little bit that remained of a palace that once housed over 4,000 guards alone and now is the site for a massive statue of the man credited with kick-starting the revolution in Nicaragua- Sandino. We also visited the old cathedral in Managua (both the palace and cathedral were destroyed in the earthquake of 1972; palace completely, while the cathedral was only damaged to the point of not being able to use it.)
     Finally we made our way to Freddy's church which is a Baptist Church in Managua. Freddy ended up preaching as the pastor was running late, and the service was rather short. Following that service we headed to a nice restaurant for dinner and a solid conversation about the services we had seen and the idea of Liberation Theology (which I'll probably post about soon- its really interesting!).


(sorry for the lack of pictures, check back later, I'll stick some more in when I have time to grab them from a friend!)

Here's one just for fun! Me playing some ninja with our group and the girls

from Villa Esperansa. Super entertaining!

A Song! And some numbers...

     A few thoughts from today... lets start with a song- (or maybe read Isaiah 1 and Amos 5:21-25 first)

    Heard that song this morning as I walked up to my internship at YWAM. Good stuff certainly.


     Next thought- I read a chapter of our textbook (co-written by our professor) called "Terrorism and the War in Iraq- A Christian world from Latin America." Really interesting stuff so far. Food for thought- Who has committed the greater act of terrorism? The hijackers on 9/11 or our own country for withholding the potential to send aid money by spending it all on the war that only killed more. I heard one time that hunger in Africa could be solved using the United States' ice cream budget alone... 
     30,000 people die daily from hunger and disease. I'm thinking we could have made a pretty decent dent in that number if we would have channeled the $1,000,000,000,000+ toward those 30,000 people. Lets see- that works out to a DAILY salary for each one of those 30,000 people of $913.24... for the next 100 YEARS. Or since of course thats the number of people who die daily lets look at it a different way- lets just give all the people that will die in the next 20 years a check (I know I took the 30k as constant for that period but go with it for a minute...). What's it come out to? $4,566.21 per person. 30,000 a day. 10,950,000 a year. 20 years. That's a grand total of 219,000,000 people! (70% of the current US population). Just saying.
     So did the terrorists of 9/11 who killed about 3,000 people or the United States who started a war killing somewhere in the range of 100,000-800,000 Iraqi civilians along with nearly 4,400 United States military persons. Add in other countries casualties and journalists' deaths and I wouldn't be surprised if the number would climb right over the 1,000,000 mark. Oh ya, don't forget that 30,000 people have been dying every day for the duration of the war in other parts of the world (that's 94,260,000 people). Wow and I'm usually the one to skim over the numbers! Point being- 95,263,000 people have died since the morning of September 11, 2001. Could $1,000,000,000,000 have done something to lower that number? I'm going to argue an emphatic 'YES!' (lets hang on to $10 million to get some potholes fixed in Spokane then we'll hand each of the 95+million a $10,497.14 check in the mail.)


     All that to say- the lyrics of the song have it right for us as Christians- it's not about a show. It's not about supporting a war just cause it's patriotic. It's not about pretense.

It IS about a flood of justice.

"AN ENDLESS PROCESSION OF RIGHTEOUS LIVING"

(how beautiful would that be? so- "quit playing religious games")

Nica (2/4) A lion of a trip to León

            Friday morning we headed out on our first overnight trip to the lively, youthful, university town of Leon. We spent the day touring 5 museums and a cathedral. A few of note were the home of poet Rueben Darío, the art museum of Leon, and a civil war museum. If you are not familiar with the recent history of Nicaragua I encourage you to do one of two things (preferably both)- watch Under Fire, and/or read up on a little history- Here or Here (see chapter on Nicaragua). An extremely oversimplified and flat out disgraceful description; Somoza regime came to power in the 1930s in Nicaragua. Due to fear of revolutionaries with leftist (named 'communist') leanings the United States supported the dictatorship through 1979 when finally the regime was ousted. Many implications came from this United States support as well as support from early twentieth century, including a dependent and weak economy and a war ravaged countryside with the stories and bodies of many left untold and unclaimed.

            Our guide through the civil war history museum was a part of the FSLN (Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional) and fought in and around Leon in the struggle for freedom from the dictatorship of Somoza. He became involved as a Sandonista at the age of 13 and was captured 3 times during course of the war (he claims that God had/has special plans for keeping him alive as individuals who were captured during the war usually were never seen or heard form again). His story (history) of the war took us through the museum then up to the building’s roof. He made reference to the fact that it is a comfortable place for him because that is where the fighting took place.

Rooftop discussion with our guide about the war

            We found our way to Hostel Italiano (run by a Lebanese from New York City) near central park to drop our belongings before heading to dinner. After dinner a group headed to central park to discuss some of what we had seen and experienced through the day. The basic themes of the discussion surrounded the idea that there is quite a bit of Central American history that was/is hidden from the American populace. Often the political actions were under the guise of pronouncing our foreign policy as protection against the spread of ‘marxism’ or ‘communism’ (this in the midst of the cold war for the most part). It can be argued that our nation, the United States, is at fault for the strong majority of the violent deaths in Nicaragua over the past 40 years, all in the name of keeping the United States strong and safe. Without government training and support the civil war might have been much different.

            We were up early again the next day to make three stops before heading back to Managua. We stopped first at a thermally active site near one of the local volcanoes (there's a 'local' volcano no matter where you go in Nicaragua- I think there's something like 19 or 20 in the country!) Far from ‘walking on lava’ as we had been told, it was still quite interesting and beautiful. We did get to walk through the small community that makes its money off of the tourism that is present there. (Whitworthians- a bit of CORE 350; our guide in León ran for mayor and will likely again, he wants to change policy and develop the tourism at this site- good for the community? bad for the community?)

            Second we went to a location where a different volcano's crater (top of a more or less symmetrical mountain) had filled with water and collapsed during the rain storms caused by Hurricane Mitch in 1998. The resulting landslide wiped out farms, homes, and families in its mile and a half wide path. 2800 people died in the tragedy.. We walked through a forest planted in the victims memory and visited their educational center which gave info about the slide and the area’s history since the tragedy (Side note- national tree of Nicaragua is the madrone).

            Finally we made our way to a World Vision office near León that focused on supplementing local education and distribution of and education of chickens and other self-sustaining items for individual families and communities. They talked quickly and with a heavy accent, it was hard to understand.

Cathedral in León (oldest in Nicaragua)

What can I say, its a beautiful church, deserves a few good pictures!

            Extra side note- it was ridiculously hot and humid in León; we’ll say probably 90 or so with at least 85-90% humidity. With that and a sleepy three-hour buseta ride we returned to Managua.

seeing the bell rung from across central park!

Nica (1/3)-La Chureca and the rest of the beginning

            We awoke Wednesday morning at o’ dark thirty (3:30), excited but not quite sure what to expect of our ten days in Nicaragua. We hopped in our hired buseta and headed down the mountain to San Jose and TicaBus. After checking in and waiting 30 minutes we climbed aboard and settled in (which was a challenge for me as my shoulders hit the headrest, that is until I realized the seats reclined.) We hit the road around 5:15. By the time we made it to the Nicaraguan frontera (border) at about 12:20, I had read, talked with Nanda, watched part of Fast and Furious in Spanish, viewed mountains, towns, coffee fincas, banana plantations, sang peanut butter jelly time, and finally passed a line of about a million semis waiting for customs. We hopped of the bus to get our Costa Rica stamps then drove a kilometer or so and came to the Nicaragua customs and unloaded everything and find our bags to have them checked. Overall the border took about an hour and fifty minutes. We finally pulled into Managua at about 4:15. Edgar, our awesome buseta driver for the week, drove us to Villa Esperanza where we ate and headed to bed.

            Morning came at 7 with breakfast where we met with two of the board members of Villa Esperanza’s overarching ministry called Forward Edge (based out of Vancouver, Washington). The opportunity provided an interesting exchange of ideas based on ministry from the people’s perspective in Nicaragua, Whitworth’s perspective, and the general North American perspective of these leaders. Raquel, our guide through Nicaragua and co-worker of Freddy Mendez at InterVarsity, arrived and we headed out to experience first hand the reason for the ministry of Villa Esperanza (meaning hope), La Chureca. La Chureca is the largest garbage dump in Nicaragua and is located in Managua. The community that exists in the dump has done so for more than 40 years by collecting recyclables and other items worth reselling. There is quite a bit of interesting change coming to the community, but first a description of it. We were able to walk the whole area in just over an hour including 3-4 short discussions at different locations with different residents. The community consists of somewhere around 400 families, nearly 1000 people, with 50% under the age of 18. Our guide came from a local church called El Faro (the lighthouse). The church does ministry work in the dump by providing lunch for youth and education for kids in the first three grades of primary (we toured the church first- lots of cute kids excited to see us and show us their classrooms!).

            Back to La Chureca- we visited with several residents who were raising pigs as a small business venture. We saw small store operations in the community and we saw many shanty homes but the one image that sticks with me the most reflects a painting that hangs in the living room of my host parent’s home. The painting shows the blue side of a shack with the top half of a split door open and a young girl looking out over the doorway with one arm along the half door and her chin resting on the other hand looking blankly back at the viewer. As we walked through La Chureca, I found this image, staring out of the window of a tienda (small shop) was an elderly woman. Staring blankly as we passed; her wrinkled brow, heavily salted Nicaraguan hair, and creased cheeks showed she could have been the same girl in the painting, only now 40 years older. There seemed to be an almost spiritual lapse of time as I viewed and imagined both women and the story that must exist in each member of the community of La Chureca who has lived so many years in that community.

View over the community to the
new Spanish building project

Our guide as we learned about the community

       We were allowed to participate in the lunch time ministry that El Faro provides to the youth in the community. It was energetic and almost mesmerizing as we saw kids come together and interact just as kids do; excited about a piñata, ready for food, playing duck duck goose; they resembled nothing of our previous view of the community.

Kids will be kids

            After returning to Villa Esperanza and eating lunch we met with a missionary who works at the villa to have a tour. The villa is currently home to 24 girls with the potential for the addition of two more houses of eight girls apiece. House moms run each house and the girls are exposed to a very structured lifestyle and are given opportunity to be successful in whatever way they envision. These girls come from La Chureca where they are often exploited, usually sexually, by the truck drivers who deliver trash to the dump, generally under the direction of their own mothers (as a source of income). The villa provides hope, home, and positive Christian influences. The leadership at the villa spoke several times of the leadership qualities that were being exhibited in the girls. The goal behind the ministry is not to change their reality- the girls stay connected with their families, they stay connected with their upbringing, they are rather given a new opportunity. Often this works to repair the relations with their families. I found the experience new, eye-opening and different than expected. 

Our tour of Villa Esperanza

           The smile of pig owners, the Spanish government who is providing change (in the way of a new development of homes- free for current residents, and covering up the trash in a normal land fill way so as to produce a profit off of collected methane gases), and positive ministries such as Villa Esperanza and the work of El Faro provided a decently well rounded look into the life and issues of the community.

            And as if you thought that was enough we still had one more event on our plate. We were able to go to a concert by Carlos Mejia Godoy, a Nicaraguan revolutionary era musician who wrote songs with very pointed messages about the social reality of many poor Nicaraguans during the 70s and 80s. Many of these songs have become nationally recognized and are incredibly popular. The concert was upbeat, engaging and entertaining. We had done some research beforehand so that we had some idea of the meaning and history behind his more popular songs.

Nicaragua Nicaraguita!

Well we went, we experienced, we grew, we laughed, we learned, we hurt, we smiled, we tried, we sympathized, we ate, we talked, we listened, and we called Nicaragua home for 10 days.

Group shot at thermal pots outside of Leon

The coming posts are in some sense chronological, but there is much to write so the trip will be broken down into several posts. Thanks for your prayer, thoughts and well wishes during my entire stay down here in Central America, it has been a blessing, and God is so good!

Living Passionately

     Well as we look into heading off to Nicaragua in a day or two, I have a few thoughts to offer about the past four weeks. I have grown a ton over the course of the time here; I've been challenged, stretched, pushed way outside my comfort zone, and experienced the love of God in a new way as I explored his creation with others around this awesome place. I will still certainly admit to the fact that the hot and humid is not my favorite thing, but I'm learning to live with it. 
     This fall I have been struggling my way through Deitrich Bonhoeffer's The cost of Discipleship. It takes a look at many aspects of discipleship, specifically (for a large section of the book) through the lens of the sermon on the mount. There have been many quotes that have made me think, here are a few- 


The Passion of Christ is the victory of divine love over the powers of evil, and therefore it is the only supportable basis for Christian obedience. Once again, Jesus calls those who follow him to share his passion. How can we convince the world by our preaching of the passion when we shrink from that passion in our own lives? On the cross Jesus fulfilled the law he himself established and thus graciously keeps his disciples in the fellowship of his suffering. The cross is the only power in the world which provides that suffering love can avenge and vanquish evil. But it was just this participation in the cross which the disciples were granted when Jesus called them to him. They are called blessed because of their visible participation in his cross.


The call to follow at once produces a new situation. To stay in the old situation makes discipleship impossible. Levi must leave the receipt of custom and Peter his nets in order to follow Jesus. One would have thought that nothing so drastic was necessary at such an early stage. Could not Jesus have have initiated the publican into some new religious experience, and leave them as they were before? He could have done so, had He not been the Incarnate Son of God. But since he is the Christ, he must make it clear from the start that his word is not an abstract doctrine, but the re-creation of the whole life of man. 


Bonhoeffer quotes Luther as saying- Discipleship is not limited to what you can comprehend- it must transcend all comprehension. Plunge into the deep waters beyond our own comprehension, and I will help you to comprehend even as I do. ... You cannot find it yourself, so you must let me lead you as though you were a blind man. Wherefore it is not you, no man, no living creature, but I myself, who instruct you by my word and Spirit in the way you should go.


     How are we called? To what are we called? In Bonhoeffer's view, it appears clear that his belief is in a call wholly outside of ourselves which is also wholly intimate inside of us. We are to live in a way as a Christian body of believers that reflects the passion of Christ and his commitment to love so that we can overcome every type of evil. We have spent some time here in Costa Rica examining some very difficult issues surrounding the role of Christianity in a world of sin and hurt. We have watched several films articling issues of genocide, issues of Marxist and Communist thought, issues of death, pain and justice. This call to love is very challenging in the midst of moral crisis. One of the more recent films Romero (read here- Wiki) documents the challenges faced by Catholic priests (and in Oscar Romero's case as the archbishop) in dealing with the disappearing of citizens and the fight of civil war in El Salvador. I strongly recommend the movie, and while I don't want to spend time detailing it here, the point is discipleship and how it is and should be manifested in our lives. Should we pick up arms? Should we remain passive? Should we fight without violence? How do we love?
     I am realizing more and more how complete the call is and how different Christian life is from the rest of the world. If Bonhoeffer is correct, the call that Jesus puts out for us is not a matter of changing an aspect of our lives, rather it is matching the work and the effort that Jesus himself put into the passion. The Biblical evidence is clear. Bonhoeffer states it in a question, "How can we convince the world by our preaching of the passion when we shrink from that passion in our own lives?"
    So how do we challenge ourselves in a university setting, even while in a different country to live the passion? Do we only plan for the future passion we will have in our lives or should we live it now?
    God seems to be opening up some doors in my life, but the opportunity is not quite here yet. Do I wait for it? Try to force it to be sooner? Or live in the passion where I am now? I think the answer lies in the final question. Now is when we live Christ's passion.
    A final thought to leave you with, can we live Christ's passion through his own words from the cross? As Jesus gasped his final breaths from the cross he proclaimed, "Father, into your hands I commit my spirit" (Mark 23:46). If we truly want to live in and through Christ, that is to die to him- we to must be able to truthfully proclaim in a loud voice as Jesus did, 'Abba father, I give you everything; my spirit, my soul, my life, and my PASSION.'

    

And you thought you'd get away without a few  pictures...
This is at Lynne's house/school where she's teaching elementary kids!
The dog's name is pepper and Nanda did a pretty impressive catch/slip/get really muddy during our frisbee game!

Another update email went out! here's what it said and some pictures to boot!

   We have completed our fourth week of classes here in Costa Rica (which means I survived Spanish class!) We will still be doing a paper and some conversations for the Spanish class but for the most part we are done. What's next you say? IDS 301- Interdepartmental studies look at the culture, history, politics and religion of the region I'm calling home for two more months! Lindy takes over for this class and I'm quite excited to get rolling on it this Tuesday. Core 350 is rolling right along with some good old Neibuhr Christ and Culture stuff as well as some new readings.

   A few fun things that have happened from the last update- A massive thunderstorm rolled through campus a few days ago and was quite fun to watch/listen to. Three strikes of lightning we on our property, or at least very close, as we would see the flash and hear the clap almost at the same time. Here's the cool thing though, the clap would be followed by a roll that lasted for as long as 25 seconds or so as it bounced around the surrounding mountains and rolled its way down the hill. We went to hear a classical guitarist from Argentina about a week ago in El Teatro National in San Jose. It was an excellent evening of music! I gave a short message in Spanish to the guys at the rehab center I go to as part of my internship relating to the theme of peace and its effect on our lives as reflected in the Bible. That was an interesting experience and while I think what I said made sense it was short and not too deep. I think i'll get a chance to share  something later in the semester as well- we'll see if my spanish has improved by then! Construction on our invernadero (greenhouse) is moving right along up here on campus. It's really interesting to see how it's being done and I'm excited to start to see some plants take root in the final product! I would imagine it will be completed by the time we return from Nicaragua (which is the subject of the next paragraph!) I'm doing a bit of research right now and will work on construction with Luis and Travis on a revamped aquaponics system as soon as we return from Nicaragua as well. Finally, we went off to the beach! My tico parents and their older (13ish?) grandson twins took last Saturday to head out to la playa Herradura near Jaco. What a beautiful and not too crowded beach this time of year! Water was warm and the guanabana juice was flowing! (for picnic lunch that is).

Beach!

Our 'neighbors' up at campus.. (campus is just through those back trees)

   NICARAGUA! Wow, come Wednesday all of the students and the 24/7s will be off on a bus to our northern neighbor to experience and learn a bit about a different country and culture here in Central America. We are all getting quite excited, and ready for a fun adventure!

The new greenhouse! It's big!

Herb 'greenhouse'

Defunct aquaponics to be revived!