Wednesday, June 10, 2009

Guatemala Trip!



At the end of the Spring 2009 semester a group of nine Catholic Community members took a trip to Guatemala. If you'd like to take a look at some of their pictures, feel free to browse:

Kristyne's Pics:




Student Reflections:

I wanted to share with you a little bit about what I did while staying in San Lucas Tolimàn, Guatemala. The Mission at San Lucas was started over forty years ago by and is still run by Fr. Greg Shaffer. It works to uphold the Christian Teachings of Social Justice. Fr. Greg explained this philosophy to my group with a story from early in his time in Guatemala. In his attempts to minister to the people of San Lucas, he considered bringing in huge bags of corn from his home in Minnesota for the people so they could make themselves tortillas. But instead of taking that route to provide food for the people in the form of handouts, he thought that he could do for them one better. He decided that in his ministry he could work to pave the roads for the Guatemalan people so they could hold their heads high with the dignity of providing for themselves. With his philosophy in mind, eight others and I went to work each day in San Lucas in the hopes of continuing Fr. Greg's mission.

One day we went swimming because there was no work for us. We went to the market on the lake and walked around Guatemala for a last time. We left on Wednesday. One of the girls on my trip, Kristyne, did not want to leave. I can't say honestly that I wanted to stay as I was ready to go home after a semester away from home, but I did want the feeling of service to remain. I wanted to do more work and spend more time with the Guatemalan people because it was the people over that helped me to realize the most about life and what I need to do to serve others. Even though I am not in Guatemala right now, I do feel that the impact that the Mayan people and the Fr. Greg's mission (more than the actual work that I did to help the people) had on me will always be with me. In the two weeks that I have been home, I've been trying to live a better life, more active than passive. Why let my life pass me, or be bogged down with things that do not make me happy? I really think that God gives us the gift of life and we just need to make sure we treasure it for everything that it's worth and use it for the benefit of others. That is why I wanted to go to Guatemala. I wanted to start living my life for others. I really think that the trip helped me to jumpstart this passion in me. Even though this trip pushed me outside of my comfort zone, like getting my clothes covered in dirt, I found comfort in the fact that I put my life in God's hands knowing that He would be with me through my journey.

I am so grateful for the opportunity to participate in this mission trip to Guatemala to be among the indigenous Mayan people (who at the tallest came up to my shoulders). It was a very powerful trip and I hope others take the opportunity to take up missions like this one.




-Lizzy Honas is a rising junior English Education Major at Ithaca College. To read Lizzy's entire reflection, click here.




It was a great trip, one I'll always remember. It was my first time out of the country, my first time seeing palm trees (not on TV), and my first time in a primarily Spanish-speaking environment. I kept working on some things I had become aware of during my time at Nazareth Farm, namely that there are many invisible people whom I affect with my way of life without even knowing it. So, for those ten days, my goal was to see and listen and make those people visible so that I would know how I affect their lives, and so that I can live in a way that enables them to live with dignity. (An example would be making sure to buy fair trade coffee instead of just going to the Caribou or Starbucks and not checking whether the producers of the coffee paid the farmers and workers fair wages.) I also wanted to connect with the Guatemalan people, and I found this difficult to do because of the language barrier. I don't speak much Spanish. I knew enough to ask where the dirt we were shoveling should go, and how to barter. My most extensive conversations in Spanish consisted of asking and answering questions of age, hometown, and favorite sports. So, while I was not able to discuss heavy issues with the locals, I did come to a valuable understanding of what it must be like to come to America and not know much English. And, I was lucky, because at mealtimes I came back to the mission where English speakers were in the majority again - not all English Language Learners have that opportunity in the U.S.

I really enjoyed the couple of talks we heard from workers at the mission. Fr. Greg's told us about the encomienda system and how the finkas (plantations) in place did not provide for their workers. The mission at San Lucas Toliman has done so much in the last four decades to improve the living conditions in the town! Fr. Greg also told us that our presence on the work sites, which were led by locals, helped the self-image of the people. "They come to the conclusion that, since you come to help, they must be worth helping," he said. I think that means a lot in a place where about 90% of the advertisements feature happy Caucasian people with all kinds of possessions and access to medical care: the fact that we come to work for them makes us all equals, in a way. I also loved hearing from Choana (sp?), one of the kitchen ladies at the mission. She told us about the civil war years in the '80s, when her husband was abducted and never heard from again. She helped Fr. Greg rescue 11 children from a neighboring town, after the government had killed their parents and was looking to silence them before they could testify against the army in court. I kept thinking, "I couldn't have been so brave." They are such a strong people.

Of course, I also had lots of fun being a tourist, swimming in Lake Atitlan, riding the boat across the lake, shopping in many colorful markets, following an 8-year-old to see the sights around town, and hiking up a mountain. There were so many pieces of the experience that I couldn't sum all of them up in a brief reflection.


-Molly Mattingly is a 2009 graduate of Ithaca College. In the fall, Molly will be enrolled in the Master of Sacred Music program at Notre Dame, and she will also be an Assistant Rector in a girls' dorm.