Christmas Letter

Christmas Letter

Dear Family and Friends,
Merry Christmas! Happy Belated Hanukkah to all of my Jewish friends (observing and non) out there! With this advent of Christmas it is hard to believe that I am now nearing the halfway point of my journey throughout Africa. It has been quite a journey that has taken me from bustling cities to the quite, calm, and often uncertainty of rural life. It is hard for me to believe that Christmas is only 3 days away. Our experiences are all formed and shaped by the culture, context, and environment (pretty much everything fits into that, eh?) surrounding us. Without the promise of snow, the family and friends returning from all corners of the US, the carols, the coco, and yes the hustle and bustle of last minute Christmas shopping, it is hard for me to get the feel for this coming Christmas day. Attending mass and following along with the daily readings at home over these past three weeks, I understand that Christmas is more than all of this. Liturgically we are celebrating what G.K. Chesterton calls the “staggering mystery of the Incarnation.” Many of these cultural events serve to awaken in us the childlike anticipation that made Christmas mornings somewhat magical growing up. Just as Catholics believe that Christ came into the world and took on the “flesh of man”, with all of our eccentricities of language, culture and relationships, so has growing up in the US wrapped Christmas in the neat package of all the experiences that help to make up what we somewhat mythically call the “Christmas spirit.” Rather than considering these to be distractions, as a Good traditional catholic, I prefer to say “the more the merrier.” Heaven knows I could use a good showing of “It’s a wonderful life” to set me in such a mood right now. Fortunately, I think an electronic copy of Dickens’ A Christmas Carol will do just the trick.
This year is becoming more like a pilgrimage than merely a research project. One recent Christmas letter from a priest friend of mine has reminded me of the challenge that Christmas poses to us. As we celebrate within the Catholic church the incarnation, he reminded in his email that this child who is born is seen in the poor, the lonely, the sick, the stranger, the young children abandoned. As the letter poignantly impressed on me however, we may always see Him, but how often do we recognize him. I have now spent five months living within the developing world. I have come face to face with social ills that no person should ever suffer. I have seen abject poverty, malnutrition, overcrowded classrooms with underpaid teachers, abandoned elderly, lepers, and the wasting effects of AIDS. In the face of so much suffering, I worry at times how normal such situations seem as I go through my erratic daily routine. I fear that too often I see, but I do not recognize. As another friend has recently reminded me however, we cannot deny the hope present in the eyes of these, no matter how uncomfortable this hope may make us. This hope does not allow us to dismiss. This hope inevitably draws into the lives of the suffering. Throughout my experiences here I have at times kept the suffering at a safe distance from myself out of a lack of courage or a lack of wisdom and at other times immersing myself into the lives of those I have interact, giving my heart to them. Below is a little recap of the time since my last email.
Prior to arriving in Tanzania I spent a few days at the IDP camps in Northern Uganda. These camps are a result of the military interactions between the rebel group the Lord’s Resistance Army and the Government. I, of course, was quite shy about taking photos my first day in the camp. I was sensitive to the fact that so many visitors here act as if they were in a zoo, taking pictures indiscriminately so they could capture moments of misery. Encouraged by Caritas workers from Uganda, I asked a woman if I could take her photo. Showing it to her, she thanked me and told me that this was the first time she had ever seen a photo of herself. She was over 70 yrs old and she was taking care of 7 grandchildren whose parents had been killed during the war. I realized then that even photography can be a form of ministry. I continued to take photos throughout the day of the families we worked with. Seeing the expressions on children’s faces as I showed them the images was worthy of a photo itself.
I was also amazed by the vision of church I was seeing within these camps. The role that the catechist is playing is quite amazing. During the past 20 yrs, many of the priests in the north have fled the situation because of the constant threat of danger. These catechist who did not have the same fiscal resources, stayed to minister to their communities. Often they would walk some 40 km to get communion for their communities. Over 40 catechists have been killed during the past 20 years. One priest recounted to me how a man who had come to his training center had found out that his family had died by rebel attacks. Asking what he would do after the burial, the man said that he would return to the center and finish his catechetical training, for he was called to be a minister to his people. Within the camps, the catechists have been trained by caritas to be on the ground resource people. They help to assess who are those most vulnerable and needy. Of late, both the World Food Program and UNHRC have depended on them for accurate on the ground info. These catechist not only show that we as a church are concerned about the spiritual needs of people, but through their work, right there on the ground in these refugee camps, the church penetrates even the most dark situations.
Returning from the north, it was time for me to prepare for my next journey onward. I still had a feeling that there was more to see, but I knew that I would encounter the same feeling of incompleteness in every country I went to. I finished my time in Uganda with a five-day retreat. This time set aside to re-center my journey and myself. Five days of prayer, reflection and breathing time did wonders for the body and soul.
I have now been in Tanzania a little over a month. It is hard to believe how quickly time flew by. I traveled across the great lake Victoria (17hrs, 365km) in a cargo ship with my good friend martin. Martin and I split ways after a few days and I began my new life here in TZ. A new language and a whole new set of people seemed to be daunting circumstances, but I was blessed to have met by the second day a lay Mary knoll missionary who has been my housemate for this past month. Garret is from Illinois. Him and his girlfriend Meghan (from Minnesota, another lay maryknoller) have both become a great source of life here in TZ as we share meals, stories and bad bootlegged copies of movies (needless to say, there are no blockbusters here). Garret and I (the only young lay foreign Catholics here) seem to have our own two person lay male community here as we enjoy good beers and recount stories and make jokes about the 80’s (he lived through it, I watched the reruns).
The research has moved on steadily, but always on African time, which is pole pole (slowly). As one African proverb says, however “haraka haraka haina baraka”, which loosely translates to “Hurry hurry gets no blessing.” While I have continued on my work of interviewing people in the field of religion (including the all star theologian Laurenti Magesa), my week in Ndololeji with Mary knoll missionaries Don Sybertz and Dan Ohhman were most exciting for me. There I had the chance to do real on the ground theology as I worked with Don on his proverb project. Don, who has been in TZ since 1955 (longer than most Tanzanians have been alive), has always had a passion for traditional wisdom (as spoken and sung through proverbs, stories and songs) loves to find correlations and relationships to our own tradition in the bible and in theology. We worked with his research team and two separate groups of wazee (elders) from the village to discuss the meaning of a certain Sukuma song. One mzee danced for us. I will be returning down there next week to live with Dan Ohhman amongst the nomadic tribe the Wataturu.
My program quotidian seems to changes daily. With a bit of an erratic travel schedule (lame excuse), I haven’t jumped into service, as I would have liked. I think I am a little bit intimidated by the Swahili (somewhat better excuse). The language progresses, however, and I try to spend a bit of time each day at the Maasai market practicing with my friend Bahati who originally made for me my tire sandals (literally made from old tires). One of the Maasai kids has learned the somewhat contradictory phrase here “mzungu maskini” as I tried to explain the nature of students debt in the US in Swahili (no easy venture). I have also taken advantage of having a private space here, where I can make coffee (instant sadly) and sit with my laptop to consolidate some of my research. That process in itself can be quite slow going at times. I have recently come down with malaria and worms (which I understand are almost indigenous to humans here anyways) but there was no serious damage, just a little slower than normal. The medicine did wonders and I am top shape now. It is, in fact, kind of cool to be able to tell people I had such an exotic disease as malaria. I guess I have become a little more enculturated to this African environment now.
Christmas will be quite quiet for me this year. My roommate has left for Kenya with his girlfriend and while I was tempted to just grab another cargo ship to UG to see my friends there, I will just make the best of a Tanzanian Christmas. I will be attending some five total masses in a period of two days, which just might give me all the church I need until next year. I will also be visiting a Tanzanian friend at his home for a Christmas meal.
As I reach this midway point during my fellowship, my mind begins to wonder also, what next. I try to live in the present, but it is hard not to plan for the future. While further study is definitely in my future, a lack of GRE scores impedes a direct route to school (which I find unwise anyways). I have toyed with the idea of teaching in France but also relish the idea of a full year in Portland, city of my birth, city of excellent beers. While my inner nature likes to stay 2 steps ahead of life, all of Tanzania sets me on the slow road to discernment: pole pole ndyio mueno… (In effect, the slow road is a good road).
Well, it seems that I have once again allowed myself to get carried away with my letter home. I hope that you see it is an expression of how I care for you all. I would like to hear what’s going on in your life, even if it is just the ordinary things that happen every day (for, as G.K Chesterton says, “Ordinary things are more valuable than extraordinary things; nay, they are more extraordinary.” (Orthodoxy). Thank you for reading. Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. I look forward to hearing from you.

Love,
Mike