A view of the Rockies from the upper deck of Coors Field

A few months ago, Sensei Tony and I had a conversation in which he gave me some memorable advice: “Follow your bliss.” I was telling him how much I loved my trip to Denver. I had never been to the city, and the thought had never crossed my mind to visit. I was there for a conference.  But even just visiting a small area in LoDo (lower downtown), I fell in love with Denver. And I’ve convinced my family to take a vacation to Colorado this summer. I want to see more.

Sensei told me that he had a student some years ago who had a similar experience in Colorado and eventually moved there. This is not to suggest that we’re moving anytime soon. But it was this anecdote that led him to say, “Follow your bliss.”

The view of Denver from the banks of the South Platte River

I’ve been thinking about this recently because I’ve getting much more enthusiastic about hiking the trails, particularly the Appalachian Trail, around the mid-Atlantic region. I’ve enjoyed hiking since I was a teenager but have long made little effort to get out there and trek. For the last four or five months, before the cold set in, I urged several family members to do some hiking with me. I’ve also set up a closed Facebook page for some friends to recruit fellow hikers and to share experiences. And, after reading the book To a Mountain in Tibet, I’ve even started researching a hiking trip to Nepal.

 
To those closest to me, it can sound like I’ve taken on a new fad. But I feel moved to follow my bliss. I don’t want to be 60 and realize there were things I didn’t do that I wish I had done.

Follow your bliss.

At this year’s Satori, our lead priest, Sensei Anthony Stultz, offered a written dharma talk, rather than the typical verbal delivery.  The following is what he wrote.

By Sensei Anthony Stultz

Greetings on this blessed eve. As many of you know, the Buddhist tradition has become the fastest growing faith in both the United States and Europe. Why is this? I believe that this is because the old religious concepts have become bankrupt.

We are currently experiencing a paradigm shift in our collective consciousness. This shift calls for the death of what has been and the birth of what will be. We are no longer satisfied by the explanations of the past.  The idea that we need to be rescued or “saved” has become distorted and useless. The concepts of sin and the corresponding shame imply a definition of human life that I think is false.

We are constantly insulting our humanity out of a particular theological reference.  We have been previously taught that we were beggars before an angry god.  We were taught that we are fundamentally flawed and unworthy.

The teaching of the Buddha is that this is simply not true.  It is therefore bad anthropology, and no one can build good theology on bad anthropology.  The Buddha showed us that it is not that we have fallen into sin.  It is that we have not yet achieved our full humanity.

The real source of our suffering is found in the remnants of our evolutionary history.  This history has conditioned every one of us to become obsessed with our own solitary existence, ignoring the deeper reality of our interconnectedness.

In our beautiful liturgical meditation, we don’t just have faith in this Oneness.  Our own senses become a vehicle of that connectedness: Sight- the ceremony and the symbols; sound- the chanting of our ancient wisdom; smell- the offering of the incense which represents our commingling spirit; and touch- the humble and exquisite act of bowing and releasing into our true selves.

We are not content to merely believe in our Buddha Nature, rather we find it in our immediate experience.

The celebration of the Great Enlightenment is the way in which we realize our capacity to awaken to a more universal consciousness, a consciousness that lifts us into a larger being beyond every personal and social boundary.  It truly presents us with a new image of what it means to be fully human, a source of endless potential to live more fully, love more freely and plunge ourselves so completely into life that we never stop to count the cost.

Namu Amia Butsu

Sensei Tony

Rallies and public demonstrations are fun and energizing.   People of like-mind gather together to push for or against some policy idea.  It’s thrilling.  It feels good to be part of a group advocating for something righteous.

But public demonstrations alone do not create change.  If they did, the death penalty in Pennsylvania would have been repealed long ago. In the first three years that I was involved in Pennsylvania Abolitionists United Against the Death Penalty, from 2000 to 2003, we wrapped crime scene tape around the governor’s mansion, tossed a blown up death warrant with the words “return to sender” over the fence at the governor’s mansion, hosted a press conference with Sr. Helen Prejean at which we released a poll showing 70 percent of Pennsylvanians favor a moratorium on executions, and organized a rally with Governor George Ryan (R-IL) with 1,000 people on the state capitol steps. We think we had some impact on the administration of the death penalty in the commonwealth, but we didn’t reach our ultimate goal or even the big short-term goals we set, like a moratorium or a government-sanctioned study of capital punishment.

(To be fair to myself and my friends from PAUADP, now Pennsylvanians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, we did more than just public demonstrations.)

It’s been hard to miss the Occupy Together movement currently sweeping New York, Boston, Philly, Harrisburg, et al.  When the occupiers say that they’re going to camp out for weeks or even months until they see change for economic justice- the Philly occupiers have talked about being there through the winter- the alarm bells go off.  At least some of these folks don’t understand how to make real change.  Change happened in Egypt and Tunisia with consistent public gatherings because public gatherings to express grievances against the government were unheard of in those countries.

That’s not how change happens in the United States.  Public demonstrations happen every day, even if this one is unusual in its length and size. On more than one occasion, I’ve heard it said at the capitol that rallies have no impact on legislators. I had to explain to a state legislator recently that the purpose of a rally we were organizing was to energize our supporters, with no expectation of directly impacting lawmakers.

That’s how public demonstrations make change, by energizing people to do more.  It’s going to take more than camping out to make the progress on economic justice that the occupiers want.

Look at the work that has been done in the last two years by Equality Pennsylvania, with an assist from its allies, including my employer. From 1981 to 2008, 13 Pennsylvania municipalities passed local non-discrimination ordinances that included at least “sexual orientation” and, in most cases, “gender identity.”  In 2009, House Bill 300, a bill to add LGBT people to the state non-discrimination law, passed out of committee but then stalled before getting to the state House floor.

From 2009 to this week, 10 more municipalities in Pennsylvania passed comprehensive non-discrimination ordinances.  Nearly as many of these ordinances have passed in two years as passed in the previous 27 years.

No one had to camp out to make this happen.  This happened because Equality PA and its allies built relationships with policymakers, supported local activists who pushed their municipal governments to make this move, built the resources necessary to guide policymakers and activists through the process- from model legislation to talking points to stickers- and worked the press to raise awareness.  In a sign of real progress, this week two candidates for county commissioner in suburban Philadelphia endorsed non-discrimination protections for LGBT people.  Outlawing LGBT discrimination is now good politics, apparently.

Certainly, we still have a lot of work to do on this issue. We still don’t have sexual orientation and gender identity or expression in the state civil rights law. But what is happening at the local level is progress.

For my master’s thesis, I analyzed the movement that repealed the death penalty in New Jersey.  The research included interviews with key figures in the movement both at the state level and the national level.  Two national anti-death penalty organizers made observations that the occupiers will do well to heed.  One said that the movement was successful in New Jersey because it “matured.” It stopped chanting outside legislators’ offices and started meeting inside legislators’ offices.

The other national organizer compared the anti-death penalty movement in the last ten years to the movement in the 1990s.  This organizer said that in the ’90s the movement was “culturally weird,” standing outside prisons holding candles on the night someone was executed. I’ve heard other activists refer to these folks as “candle clutchers” and “the sandals and candles crowd.”  In the interview, the national organizer said that the death penalty repeal movement learned to stop being culturally weird.

With all due respect to the occupiers, the people’s microphone, in which the crowd repeats the speaker’s words every few seconds, is culturally weird.  Just watch this video that shows Occupy Atlanta denying John Lewis the opportunity to speak to see what I mean.  (And denying John Lewis, a civil rights hero, the opportunity to speak also shows a tin ear for messaging, especially for a movement that wants to attract racial minorities.)  The movement is going to have to be conscious of behaving in a way that will attract average Americans and not become some side freak show.  They’ll also have to be aware of the fact that each occupy city impacts the other.  If one looks bad for some reason, it will impact the entire movement.

Finally, the movement must lead to some political gain.  This will be counterproductive if the prevailing attitude among movement activists is, “All politicians suck.”  This can’t be a flameout, ala the WTO protests.  The Tea Party has been very successful, in part, by engaging in electoral politics. Occupy Together must do the same thing. That includes not only building relationships with candidates but also, especially, registering people to vote.  If more poor and working class people voted, we would be much closer to reaching the goals we want.

That said, all of this can be overcome.  Unlike some people, I am not a believer in discouraging people who are speaking out, some for the first time, on issues of justice.  We need an engaged populace, especially among people who believe that all people, regardless of their lot in life, should be treated with respect and dignity. The Occupy Together movement must be encouraged to do the hard, boring work for change, not discouraged from participating at all.

I know all of the narratives around capital punishment. I’ve been involved in anti-death penalty activism for 11 years and know all of the messages that do and do not resonate with undecided Americans. If I wanted to write a post to convince the undecided, I would talk about innocence and costs and impact on victims’ families.

But this column by Emily Hauser at the Atlantic moved me greatly. Hauser relays the questions from her eight-year-old daughter:

“How does it work?” my eight-year-old asked last Saturday morning . “Will he just stand there and have to — let them kill him?”

I, too, have an eight-year-old daughter.

So here’s a very simple challenge to supporters of the death penalty who have young children (pre-teen) in their lives: Tell your kids about capital punishment. If this is something you feel is the right thing to do, if it’s something you’re proud to support, then explain it to your kids. Explain to them how the inmate knows when his time of death is coming. Explain to them the last meal. Explain to them how the state straps down the inmate. Explain to them how the state injects IV needles into the inmate’s veins and then slowly allows the flow of poison into his body.

If you really think the death penalty is the right thing to do, this shouldn’t be difficult.

I’m not going to name names, of course.  Maybe I’ll name names in the book I’m going to write when I retire.  (I’m kidding. Probably.) But this kind of rivalry among advocates who are working toward the same goals is another symptom of the either-or psychology that I talked about in another post recently.  When advocates on the same side tear each other down, it comes from a place of clinging to absolute truth, or Truth with a capital T, as my teacher Sensei Tony Stultz likes to say. Their pursuit of what they see as the absolute truth prohibits them from seeing their friends with a clear mind and from realizing that their friends’ intent is the same as their own.  Maybe their friends have a different path to those goals. Fine. But their intent is the same, to bring some form of justice to the communities in which they work and for which they advocate.

I’m fortunate to know a lot of great advocates and activists who don’t behave this way. I have a friend who is involved in the Catholic Worker movement.  Those who make a commitment to the Catholic Worker take a vow of voluntary poverty and immerse themselves in struggling communities. My friend could very easily look down on those of us who don’t follow his path as inauthentic or criticize us for not engaging in the way that he does.  But he doesn’t. He sees with a clear mind that we all have a role to play, and everytime I see him, he expresses his gratitude for my own struggle for civil rights that I take to the state capitol every day.

And to be clear, this problem I’ve described of advocate rivalries is not one that is spread throughout the advocacy community in Pennsylvania.  But I do see it from time to time in a variety of arenas. And it’s a shame.

My attitude about the work of others is very simple.  If you are doing work that is compassionate, fair, and just, then go forward. And I’m with you.

A Somali mother grieves the death of her three-year-old son (from Time.com, by John Moore of Getty Images)

This is outrageous, stunning, and heartbreaking. And yet, not surprising.

Theft of aid is a routine occurrence, but when al-Shabab was designated as a terrorist group, it meant that U.S. officials and foreign aid workers whose actions benefited al-Shabab, even unwittingly, would be penalized. By late 2009 the U.S. was withholding about $50 million in food aid from al-Shabab’s territory in southern Somalia, saying it had no legal alternative. By early 2010 the U.S. was in a standoff with aid workers, requiring them to refuse to pay the tolls al-Shabab demanded if they wanted U.S. funding…(snip)

In effect, southern Somalia was largely without aid and lacked a reliable distribution network through which to move emergency supplies in the event of a disaster. Warning of a crisis, Mark Bowden, U.N. humanitarian coordinator for Somalia, accused the U.S. of fighting its war with aid. “We’re no longer involved in a discussion about the practicalities of delivering humanitarian assistance with proper safeguards,” he told reporters in February 2010. It had become “an issue of where assistance can be provided on political grounds.”

It is a crime under U.S. law to financially support organizations that have been designated as terrorist groups. Thus, aid organizations that operate in territory controlled by al-Shabab in Somalia have been unable to give aid to the local people because they have to pay fees to the organization. To do so would make the aid groups terrorist-supporters.

This is like school “zero tolerance” policies on a global level and with deadlier consequences. We’ve all heard the stories of elementary-age students who were suspended, or worse, for bringing scissors to school.  The policies of their schools are so rigid that there’s no room for reasonable people to give leeway to those who violate the policy. Nor are the policies written in a way that allows that room for leeway.

Our law on supporting terrorist organizations has no place for aid organizations that operate in territories like southern Somalia.  It is a result of the “either-or” mentality that so often creeps into our lawmaking. It’s that mentality that leads to “zero tolerance” policies in our schools, sick drug addicts clogging up our state prisons, the zealous pursuit of dishwashers and janitors who don’t have immigration status, and the acceleration of a famine.

Obviously, there are many factors that have led to the famine in Somalia and elsewhere in the horn of Africa. Severe drought and- yes- climate change. Constant war. Al-Shabab’s control and unwillingness to let aid in. To suggest that the U.S. is the reason for the famine is also a result of either-or thinking.

But the inflexibility of our laws didn’t help and probably made things worse. And for that, I am ashamed.

Ten years ago, Simon came to the United States as one of the so-called “Lost Boys” of Sudan after living most of his life in refugee camps.  Of course, these boys and girls weren’t actually lost.  They were forced from their childhood homes by the civil war between the north and the south.

Simon came to the United States in 2001 as a young man in his early-to-mid-20s and settled in the Harrisburg area with at least several dozen other Sudanese refugees.  (I was never clear on exactly how many were here.)  He lived in an apartment with three other young adult refugees.  They had jobs at a local warehouse.  They were in various stages of their educational process, but they were all working toward something.

The guys had a map of Sudan on their wall, and Simon once showed me his trek from his childhood home in southern Sudan; to Ethiopia, where they stayed briefly before being chased out by Ethiopian forces; and to Kenya, where they stayed for many years before leaving for the United States.  They spent weeks, maybe months, walking across Sudan to seek refuge from the war.  They faced starvation, attacks by lions, hyenas, and other wildlife, and hostilities from forces loyal to the government in Khartoum.  After spending about a year in Ethiopia, they were forced out during a coup attempt to topple the government, and they had to escape across a river while dodging hostile bullets and hungry crocodiles.  Eventually, they found their way to Kenya.

While explaining this story, Simon told me that his “uncle” led their group.  It was only many years later, while reading Dave Eggers’ What is the What, that I realized that his uncle may have not actually been a family member. Sudanese kids call adult men “uncle.”

I visited Simon and his roommates once a week for six to 12 months in 2001.  (I can’t recall exactly how long it was.)  Eventually, my weekly visits ended, but we still occasionally visited with Simon.  He met my daughter when she was a baby.  We took him to my wife’s church for holiday services and at least once to my parents’ home for a holiday meal.

Sometime in late 2003 or 2004, Simon left Harrisburg for Nebraska.  I never knew why until, again, many years later when I read What is the What, and Valentino Achak Deng explained that Sudanese young men had convinced each other that there were good jobs in the agricultural and meat industries in Nebraska.

I didn’t hear from Simon again.  Until February.  My daughter had the day off from school and spent half the day with me in my office.  We walked over to Strawberry Square, a small shopping mall in downtown Harrisburg, to grab some lunch at the food court.  And there was Simon, sitting on a bench on the first floor.  I did a double-take.  “Simon?” “Andy!” he replied.  He looked a little different. He had small dreadlocks and had put on a little weight but still had that gangly look like so many Sudanese.

He was also homeless.

Simon told me that he had been locked out of his apartment. I asked if he had been paying his rent. He said yes. He said that he had money in his bank account but that he couldn’t get to it because the bank wouldn’t issue him a card. That seemed strange, but maybe since he was locked out of his apartment he didn’t have ID or his account number. He said that he was talking with a local temp agency about work and that he slept in a local shelter. He also said that he was talking with the bank. It sounded like he could have this resolved shortly.

Simon with my daughter in 2003 and in happier times

Then over the next few months, when I would see him, his story would be the same. This summer I finally realized that he wasn’t close to getting things turned around, even though he said that he was.

Simon also recently told me that he’s been out of his apartment since November. He spent a few months in a shelter, so I don’t know how much of the winter he spent sleeping outside. But at the very least, he’s been out there this summer, including in July when we had scorching heat and last weekend when Hurricane Irene tore through the area.

I’m embarrassed to admit that I haven’t done as much for Simon as I could. I haven’t talked with Dr. Phuong at the International Service Center in Harrisburg. I haven’t called my friends at Project HOME in Philadelphia.  Last month I did take him to visit my friends at the Catholic Worker house in Allison Hill, but Simon said that he didn’t need their help.  Just this week- yesterday, actually- I finally talked with a lawyer friend from the Community Justice Project who may be able to help in getting Simon public assistance to get him back on his feet. Of course, that will depend upon his immigration status. If he doesn’t have an apartment and he doesn’t have a job, what are the chances that he has his status updated and renewed?

I also don’t how  much Simon’s situation is impacted by cultural misunderstandings and his mental health. I was aware that the guys went through significant childhood trauma, but when I recently read Eggers’ book, it became even clearer. I’m skeptical that Simon ever received quality mental health care when he first arrived in the United States. And when he refused to ride in my car to the Catholic Worker house, I became more concerned.

If you work or visit downtown Harrisburg, there’s a good chance you’ve seen Simon. He sticks out. He stands about 6’3″ or 6’4″. He has dreadlocks. He has the dark skin color of the ethnic Dinka. He’s always wearing an orange long sleeve shirt and carries a tan overcoat. As far as I can tell, from my time with him years ago to my time talking with him on the streets, Simon is a gentle soul. I’ve never even heard him raise his voice, let alone show any signs of violence.

We occasionally hear about the successes of the Lost Boys from the press.  The media covers their graduations. One refugee carried the U.S. flag at the 2008 summer Olympics.

What’s happening to Simon is the other side of life as a refugee. And I’ve rarely felt so helpless.

Stay human….

First, we are all interconnected.  We are all part of one big entity.  Sometimes people mistakenly say that Buddhism teaches that we don’t exist.  That’s sort of true but only in the context of the teaching of interconnectedness or interdependence.  Everything we do impacts everyone else.  When you consider the poverty in Mexico and how it leads to Mexicans seeking to escape it by emigrating to the states, is it is easy to see how interdependence works.

And with this in mind, it becomes easier to aid and to serve those we met in Mexico.  Guadalupe and Maria are as much my sisters as my own sister.  JJ said that he had a teenage volunteer who had this breakthrough while serving with Lantern Hill.  She noted that one of the girls she met was about the age of her sister and even looked a little like her sister.  “She’s my sister!” the girl exclaimed.  That’s interconnectedness.

This lesson also answers the question, “Why help them?  Why not help the people in your own country?”  When one accepts and internalizes the teaching of interconnectedness, borders cease to exist.  We realize that borders are a man-made creation.  Certainly, borders are necessary to organize countries and to provide some sense of order to the world.  But in the context of our humanity, borders do not exist.  It is only by the chance of history that the people of Mexico are not our fellow countrymen.

A well-known saying in Buddhism explains interconnection.  If the left hand is on fire, the right hand does not ask itself, “What has the left hand done for me?  Is the left hand the same religion as me?  Is the left hand straight?  Is the left hand my race, my ethnicity, my nationality?”  Without hesitation, the right hand puts out the fire.  It is the same in our service to others.

Second, this trip reminded me of how little I know.  In Buddhism, this is called “not knowing.”  When we accept “not knowing,” we realize- naturally- that we don’t know it all and that we have a lot to learn.  Kind of obvious, right?  There is such a vast world beyond our little existence here in the United States, and we would all benefit from learning more of what we don’t know.

It reminds me of that Michael Franti line: “The more I see, the less I know.”  Or K’Naan, who said, “Any man who knows a thing knows he knows not a damn, damn thing at all.”

Finally, a note about this series of posts about our trip.  While writing these posts over the last week, I constantly asked myself, ‘Which part of my self is writing this?  My ego self?  Or my true self?’  Service to others for the purpose of looking good is not service at all, and I felt a constant tension over giving the appearance of braggadocio or showing off.  Should we serve in silence?  Before, during, and after this trip, I wanted others to know about the extreme poverty in Mexico, especially to encourage others to take this trip, too, and serve with Lantern Hill.  To that end, writing this was worth the risk of giving a bad impression.

I strongly encourage others to visit Mexico and serve with Lantern Hill.  And even if you never set foot in Ensanada,  you can support Lantern Hill today by making a donation.

Stay human….

Traffic. The flow is basically the same as it is in the states. There are two main differences. One, the distance at which it is ok to pull out in front of someone is much smaller than it is in the U.S.  It’s completely normal to pull out in front of other drivers.  JJ even once pulled out in front of a police officer.  I had a chance to drive the Lantern Hill van and made it a point to exercise this bit of Mexican freedom.

I got a rude awakening when we came back home.  A few days ago, I accidentally pulled out relatively close to an oncoming car in the parking lot at High Pointe Commons in Swatara Township.  As I pulled into my parking space, I looked into my rearview mirror, and the young, burly guy driving the other car stared at me.

Also, unless there is signage that explicitly states otherwise, it’s normal to pass other drivers on two lane roads. We saw this in Guatemala, too.  Bottom line, when you’re driving in Mexico, or at least this part of Mexico, be ready to be on the brake.

The American immigration debate.  We had two brushes with the American immigration debate during the trip.  First, when we first entered Mexico, we drove on a highway that follows the Mexican border fence and the American border wall for a few miles.  We saw the infamous wall that is going to be built from the Pacific to the Gulf of Mexico.  (HAHA! I know- good one!)

The Mexican fence isn’t more than eight feet high and is built of tin or corrugated steel.  It was kinda cool to see the Ozomatli logo graffitied on it, though.

Our other reminder of our home country’s immigration debate was more serious.  In the parking lot of the taquaria (taco stand), a gentlemen and his young adult son approached us and had a conversation with the Spanish speakers in our group.  The young man was headed to Tijuana and then into the United States.  He didn’t know how we was going to get into the states.  Our party wished him good luck, and then my wife said to me afterwards that he doesn’t understand how hard it is going to be.

Food! We ate lots of great food. The best- tacos, of course. I preferred the fish tacos downtown where the stand gave you a buffet of toppings and salsas. Taqueria Poblanos was pretty good, too, especially with the guy at the edge of the counter, slapping tacos together with their special spicy sauce.

At Taquaria Poblano

The most unusual- fruit of cactus, or tuna, in Spanish. It’s semi-sweet with a lot of seeds. The seeds were small enough that I thought I could swallow them, but there were so many that I spit them out.

New things I tried- tamales, which are like cornbread wrapped in corn husks and stuffed with numerous fillings- cheese, chicken, beef, corn; birriria, which is like a beef stew; and sopes, which are like Spanish English muffins with toppings- in our case, refried beans, chicken, lettuce, tomato, grated cheese, and salsa. And tortillas at every meal.

We claimed we wouldn’t eat Mexican food for a while, but by Wednesday- six days after we got home- we had tacos.  In fact, my wife made the recipe of our Mexican cook, with potatoes. Granted, my wife made it with ground soy instead of beef, which I think Margarita, our Mexican cook, would find completely bizarre.

Unusual drink- clamato. This is a combination of tomato juice, clam juice, salt, and beer. I tried it but am not a fan. However, I am a fan of las cervezas Sol and Bohemia. Both were very good. I’ve seen Sol in the states. I have not seen Bohemia.

The standard of living and the cost of living.  The minimum wage in Mexico is around $4 per day. That’s pretty atrocious.  I’ve heard it said that the wages in other countries are relative due to the cost of living in those countries.  Well, goods are about the same cost as they are in the states, so Mexicans are paying basically the same price for goods without the level of income that we have.  A Hershey’s chocolate bar is around $1.  Hershey’s has a plant in Mexico.  I don’t know the wages of workers in Hershey’s Mexican plant, but what are the chances that the wages are equivalent to the wages of the American plants?

These multi-national corporations have no qualms about taking advantage of Third World labor costs but won’t sell the product back to the people at Third World costs. And that’s an outrage.

Weapons. They’re illegal. JJ gave my dad a warning about the Williamsburg souvenir pocketknife he was carrying.  But it’s totally legal to carry a machete because it’s a tool.

Surf! JJ attempted to teach me how to surf. I caught three waves, managed to get up on my feet once. It’s a start. I don’t think there are any pictures of it, thank the Maker.

The pictures talk. JJ said something that I found to be quite thoughtful.  He talked with us about taking pictures with discretion.  He didn’t say it in these words, but essentially what he was saying was that he didn’t want us to be exploitative of these poor communities via photography.  He asked us to take pictures when we built relationships with the locals. I, of course, thought of that old REM song, “Cuyahoga”: “Take a picture here, take a souvenir.”

Religion. It was pretty clear that this is a tough topic.  In an area dominated by Pentecostals and conservative Catholics, Lutherans are considered too liberal. And forget about having any kind of interfaith discussion.

Next post: “The concrete village”

A small part of Colonia 89, as viewed from Lantern Hill's community center.

Colonia 89 isn’t easy to explain, but if you’ve been to another country in Latin America, you may be able to imagine it. If you haven’t, then I’ll do my best to explain it in words.

Colonia 89 is a large community that rests in the hills above downtown Ensanada, Mexico. It is the largest concentration of people living in poverty in Baja California Norte with approximately 87,000 people (based on my friend JJ’s statement that 30% of the population of Ensanada lives there and that there are 290,000 people in Ensanada). The community rests on miles of rolling hills with homes built one next to the other.

The homes themselves are in any number of conditions. They are all built of block and concrete….well, almost all, other than those that are pulled together with whatever materials the builder could find, such as plywood. Some are painted and relatively well maintained. Others have only the bare minimum to provide shelter.

In the picture posted here, you can see some of the differences. Note also the dirt road that runs through the center of the picture. Few roads in Colonia 89 are paved, and after a rainstorm washes out portions of the road, it can take weeks for the government to come through and grade the road.

Colonia 89 includes an area called Freeland. Freeland rests on a hillside and is land that is not owned by either the government or private land owners, so the government has allowed residents to claim whatever space they want, without charge. This is where you see some of the most dilapidated homes in Colonia 89. Electrical and water lines are not run into Freeland, unless the residents find a way to run the lines into the homes on their own.

This is where Lantern Hill has chosen to open its community center, to aid children and families living in poverty to build better lives for themselves. From this center, Lantern Hill will base its feeding program, both at the center and in local schools; teach English and art classes; and offer rec programs for kids. The center will also provide a central location for Lantern Hill’s work building additions on to local homes so that the children who live there will have a quiet place to study and to rest.

The organization is currently working with 30 families in the local neighborhood, and these families are engaged, trying to make a better life for their kids.

It’s been asked of us, and I’m sure of JJ and Abby, “Why give them a handout? Why not teach them how to make a better life for themselves?” By providing a nutritious lunch at school for $1 or a quiet room to study or to rest, Lantern Hill is doing just that. They are providing kids with the foundation for getting a good education. It doesn’t take a PhD in education to know that a child struggles to learn when she is hungry or not well-rested or cannot find the necessary space to adequately study.

Further implementation of the school lunch program was part of the work that we did during our visit. No public school in Baja California Norte has a cafeteria, so the goal is to enhance the education of the local children by providing a nutritious and inexpensive lunch. While Lantern Hill has already started the food program by operating in the courtyards of a local school, the goal is to have a physical structure to operate. Ultimately, a patio-style cafeteria, with a roof but no walls, will be built. We spent two days working toward that goal by digging out dirt to level the ground and then mixing and pouring concrete to set a floor for the cafeteria. We worked on one school, and Lantern Hill’s goal is to build cafeterias in schools throughout Colonia 89.

Obviously, this can only be done with the help of volunteers and donors. The organization has been blessed to have a major donor who is buying the property at the community center. Now the programs need to be sustained, as well.

What we saw in Colonia 89 was high density poverty. But the kids who come into contact with Lantern Hill have an advantage because their families are involved. Their parents want their children to have a better life, and they are doing what they can to make that happen.