Central America 2: suffering leads to?

6/13

A touch of beauty in Tegucigalpa

B

I asked to lead worship this morning, because my Nicaraguan friend asked that we join them - the Nicaraguan diaspora-in worship and prayers of solidarity on Thursday or Friday. With of course Thanksgiving for the release of political prisoners and the promise to release the rest. I would like to believe that all our actions of solidarity helped to bring this about but I suspect the threat of the Trump administration for more sanctions had something do with it.

And it’s all in the context of an “amnesty” act that frees those responsible for the murders of protestors  from any accountability and criminalizes further protests. Sigh.

The words of this passage certainly came to  my my mind earlier this year as I watched los Hermanos Mejia in concert and heard the familiar chants “un Pueblo unidos jamas sera vencidos” and “viva Nicaragua Libre” now joined with “ Ortega y Somoza esta la misma cosa”....With the waving of flags and dancing and .....stories from students and people from revolutionary families like Katia Cardenal driven into exile and I think, “ How long go lord, how long does this suffering people have to go through this? Live through this again? "And I look out at a 98 % Nica crowd and realize that before, the audience would be augmented by myriad gringos internacionalistas singing loudly “adelante, el frente Sandinista”.....Overthrowing a right wing dictator is sexy. Forcing out a one time revolutionary turned repressive autocrat, well, you’re on your own.

And then I live through a day like yesterday and realize that Honduras has never had an explosion of hope like the revolution of 1979. When Sandinistas sang Si Nicaragua vencio, El Salvador vencera, y Guatemala prepara ya con fusiles de libertad, nary a word about Honduras. Honduras was never sexy. Honduras is without a doubt a text book testimony to the reality of global predatory capitalism ringing every last ounce of life out of a country....and a people...

You hear stories like I heard last night from everyday Honduran Presbyterians and join in the question “Where is God?” The obvious answer is there...God is there en camino..in the midst of the people...On the journey...by their side. But then, so what? .What does hope even look like here? In the darkest days of apartheid, Archbishop Tutu would smile that all conquering smile of his and say, “ We have already won. The other side just doesn’t realize it yet.” What would that even mean in Honduras?

I hear Paul’s words again:
1Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, 2through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand; and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God. 3And not only that, but we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, 4and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, 5and hope does not disappoint us, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.

And I wonder if I can believe these words. Does suffering always produce persevere despite everything? Doesn’t it also produce desperation, resignation? Does character really grow out of suffering and does hope necessarily follow?


What faith I have says that with the sustaining power of the Holy Spirit, yes. But humility bids me to be silent and listen. And let those with ears to hear, hear.

Central America 1: Bienvenidos a Honduras!

6/11

Presbyterian Church Central America Study Team

Honduras. San Pedro Sula.  My first time back in Honduras in  36 years.  And my first time ever in this city. Honduras. The awkward kid in the back of the classroom . The one who gets picked last for teams. The poor cousin. Back in the '80's, the  Sandinistas sang:

Si Nicaragua vencio
El Salvador vencera
Y Guatemala prepara ya con fusiles de libertad
Somos el Central America, la esperanza de la humanidad.

(If Nicaragua won, then El Salvador can win. And Guatemala is now preparing with bullets of liberty. We are Central America, the hope of humanity.)

Yep. Not one word about Honduras. Nicaragua had the victorious Sandinistas. El Salvador the valiant FMLN in the face of daily death squads. Even Guatemala had a genocidal born-again Christian madman to contend with. There was just nothing sexy about Honduras.

The wet tropic middy heat hits my lungs and I remember. Honduras trying  to contend with refugees from Salvador and Nicaragua. I remember the massive US airbase at Comeagua. The people joked that the US had turned Honduras into an aircraft  carrier. And that the brothels near the base were a metaphor for the country. 

A random connection with an old classmate on our taskforce led to an invitation to Rafael Leonardo Callejas' birthday party. As a what you might call an agrotechnocrat phd from Mississipi State, in 1990  he would be elected President in the first peaceful transfer of power in Honduras since 1932. 

My photo of a Tegucigalpa barrio graced the Presbyterian AD magazine cover in a feature article on the region. I wrote an extended article for a Synod of the Covenant newspaper series on the five countries of Central America pretty much by default. Someone had to do it.  It was called "On the space of a tear." Even then, it was a story of unremitting sadness.

Historically one of the poorest nations in the hemisphere, last year it was the murder capital of the world. 

The hotel, like most local businesses, has a security gate with a red "ALTO"sign and an  armed guard. We are instructed if we go out, not to leave the perimeter of the hotel. 
 Our hosts are against going to  see la plaza in city center or where the caravans gather. The local papers are filled with stories and pictures of the latest murders. Four teenagers. A kidnapping. Traffic disruted by burning tires and striking teachers and doctors.  A pile of tires was ignited on the door of the US embassy leaving it scorched. A few pages later feature the smiling faces and classy celebrations of a lighter class's 2019 graduates. Caravans...why are the people leaving? What would it take to make it livable enough for people to want to stay?

That's what we're here to explore....

Bienvenidos a Honduras.....

Last Sunday in Easter: Prison Break

6/2

Sunday morning Beverly 

It's a beautiful spring day walking from the subway station to Beverly Church. 

along the way....

along the way

As I arrive, Evgeny is very excited telling me about his art show. He will fill the church with 300 paintings.. Today is the last Sunday in Easter....

Ready to preach

                                                                             **** 

Let's start with Paul and Silas in prison. Incarcerated is what we say. When I say that, what do you think of? How many of us have family members or friends behind bars? I was never chosen to be a juror because I always had members of my church incarcerated. 

So common that we speak of the "school to prison" pipeline. A friend of mine who works with homeless people tells me that in Oklahoma they  use  3rd grade failure rates to predict future prison building needs. Michelle Alexander has shown us how mass incarceration is "the new Jim Crow." In a direct line from slavery. 

According to the NAACP:
Incarceration Trends in America
Between 1980 and 2015, the number of people incarcerated in America increased from roughly 500,000 to over 2.2 million.
Today, the United States makes up about 5% of the world’s population and has 21% of the world’s prisoners.
1 in every 37 adults in the United States, or 2.7% of the adult population, is under some form of correctional supervision.

StopFriskRacial Disparities in Incarceration
In 2014, African Americans constituted 2.3 million, or 34%, of the total 6.8 million correctional population.
African Americans are incarcerated at more than 5 times the rate of whites.
The imprisonment rate for African American women is twice that of white women.
Nationwide, African American children represent 32% of children who are arrested,

Though African Americans and Hispanics make up approximately 32% of the US
population, they comprised 56% of all incarcerated people in 2015.


Drug Sentencing Disparities


African Americans represent 12.5% of illicit drug users, but 29% of those arrested for drug offenses and 33% of those incarcerated in state facilities for drug offenses.


In 2012 alone, the United States spent nearly $81 billion on corrections.
Spending on prisons and jails has increased at triple the rate of spending on Pre‐K‐12 public education in the last thirty years.

I'm gonna stop. It's just not right.

There sit Paul and Silas in prison....why? Well as always it's got something to do with money. Seems this slave girl kept following them around. Calling out that these men were "slaves of the most high God" who were ".....proclaiming a way of salvation. Well, come to think of it, that was true! And she is annoying  Paul to no end. So  he discerns that  there's a spirit involved  and he draws the spirit out.

SO the owners who were making  money from her "psychic readings" or "fortune telling" or "tarot card reading" are angry at having lost their meal ticket and seek to find a way to get  Paul and Silas taken in. And it of course involves some "Jew" baiting language and sure enough there's an angry mob and beatings.  And they wind up in double bondage, not only in jail, but in stocks as well !

So far, as to be expected. I like the scene where they are singing hymns and the prisoners are listening...I remember when I was arrested in the protests following the Mohamed Diallo killing. As I was led in to the cells, my African-American brother clergy were singing spirituals and gospel songs, making the prison walls vibrate with sound. I thought of this verse. 

SO here's where the story takes a turn...seems God doesn't like prison walls either . and there's an earthquake and the walls fall down. And everyone runs away, right? No way. They stay. And presumably the other prisoners do too. 

The jailer is sure he will be blamed and made to pay. But when he looks, they're all still there. Still praying, singing , testifying. 

And before  it's all over, the jailer will have become  their  captor, in essence. By this  propaganda of the deed, as my Central American call it, the jailer is converted...and his whole household. 

And Paul and Silas, who took the risk to stay in jail, are washed, bandaged and fed. .

What we see is caring about someone enough to take a very serious risk on their behalf. Showing by doing. We're called to that kind of love. 

Loose ends. I don't expect any earthquake to take down our walls anytime soon. Rikers Island isn't going anywhere anytime soon. We'll have to do our own actions, like Paul and Silas, and see what can happen. 

At our last General Assembly last year in St.Louis,  as a sign of protest against the bail bond system, we  took up an offering of some 65000 and a whole bunch Presbyterians marched downtown and bailed out over 100 prisoners...not a bad way to begin....

Amen

In our prayers, there are many intercessions  as always. But this tine, prayers of thanksgiving as well as Geraldine's granddaughter has 6 college acceptances to choose from.  Geraldine always knew something special was in store. As always we will go downstairs to break  bread together.

Beverly is hospitality

First Reading Acts 16:16-34

16One day, as we were going to the place of prayer, we met a slave girl who had a spirit of divination and brought her owners a great deal of money by fortune-telling. 17While she followed Paul and us, she would cry out, "These men are slaves of the Most High God, who proclaim to you a way of salvation." 18She kept doing this for many days. But Paul, very much annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, "I order you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her." And it came out that very hour.

19But when her owners saw that their hope of making money was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace before the authorities. 20When they had brought them before the magistrates, they said, "These men are disturbing our city; they are Jews 21and are advocating customs that are not lawful for us as Romans to adopt or observe." 22The crowd joined in attacking them, and the magistrates had them stripped of their clothing and ordered them to be beaten with rods. 23After they had given them a severe flogging, they threw them into prison and ordered the jailer to keep them securely. 24Following these instructions, he put them in the innermost cell and fastened their feet in the stocks.

25About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them. 26Suddenly there was an earthquake, so violent that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone's chains were unfastened. 27When the jailer woke up and saw the prison doors wide open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself, since he supposed that the prisoners had escaped. 28But Paul shouted in a loud voice, "Do not harm yourself, for we are all here." 29The jailer called for lights, and rushing in, he fell down trembling before Paul and Silas. 30Then he brought them outside and said, "Sirs, what must I do to be saved?" 31They answered, "Believe on the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household." 32They spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house. 33At the same hour of the night he took them and washed their wounds; then he and his entire family were baptized without delay. 34He brought them up into the house and set food before them; and he and his entire household rejoiced that he had become a believer in God.