Greetings from Boston, for now. With a negative Covid test in hand, on Saturday morning I’m leaving for Ecuador, with tentative plans to return on April 21. Here are a few updates and a reflection on my going now for the 14th time (!) to Ecuador. It’s amazing - but still unfinished.
María’s Cancer Recovery
María has communicated to me that she is feeling as good as ever these days, except for having lost weight. In these very days, though, she is going for some exams, and may require kidney surgery. More exams on the condition of her cancer follow in early February.
The fact that she has been able to follow along this path is really special, and it is thanks in part to those here who donated so that she could participate in the treatment. I don’t know is she would have been able to do so without it, and I doubt that her condition would have ever recovered. In any case, I thank you all again too for being a part of it all.
Rebirth from the Pandemic Workshop
I’ve started to offer these workshops in English and Spanish, with a positive reception. If you want a supportive place to talk about your pandemic experience with others in the context of faith, feel free to reach out with any questions
Walking in Others’ Shoes
(A reflection as I leave again for Ecuador, and the essence of Barriers to Bridges.)
As I caught portions of the change of presidency here in the US in the midst of preparations for travel, it all brought to my mind the events of five or so years ago, when the phenomenon of Donald Trump charged through the Republican primaries behind the heroic theme of "draining the swamp" and saving America, which at that time had brought back memories of my very first times in Ecuador in 2010.
During the local fiestas in a rural area, a new friend had brought me for the first time to the bull rodeo. Folks lined the sturdy wooden fencing around the ring, while a wild, angry bull was let loose inside. Lively music blared, which I first thought was to liven up the bulls, but afterwards found out was national, patriotic music - to encourage the people! Anyway, folks would dare to enter the ring and take turns teasing the bull to charge - not to kill the bull, but for the sport of it. But as thrilling as it might have been to see the bull go after someone else, if you were in the ring, one thing was certain: sooner or later, the bull would turn on you. After a while, the bull was the last one in the ring, and finally was driven back to his cage. And what was left for the folks who joined in the ring were the painful consequences: gored wounds, damaged egos, and stiff hangovers.
Well, at one point while we were watching the rodeo, I turned to the friend who brought me, and asked him: "Heroes? Or fools?" He got a good belly laugh. "FOOLS!" he said definitively. I will never forget that. 😄
A sad experience for me has been seeing it all play out in the US since then, in politics and the national social life. From the Republican candidates, to the cabinet members, to the staff, to the Vice President, to whoever has made room for this person to gore the "enemy" to save America and "make it great again", all have experienced the painful reality: eventually, the bull turns on you.
Now, I don't want to pick on just one person or one movement (Haven't each one of us been fooled for something passionate in our lives? And aren't there other extremes, too?) But now that the bull is being put back in its cage, there are questions: Why was it let out? Will it be let out again? And I guess the answer to the second probably starts with the first.
In his inauguration speech, Joe Biden talked about stepping into others' shoes, to understand their perspective. And I think about that particularly now as I leave Boston to once again walk with people from another country and culture.
I tell you, walking in other people's shoes and finding a way to let them walk in yours is a long, difficult, arduous process that is never finished. It is full of constant obstacles, frequent failures, and abundant loneliness - sprinkled at times with the most astounding life experiences imaginable. It is often tempting to quit that road and aim for something more comfortable and easy and secure, walled off from different things. But someone is always walking in our shoes, and the invitation to follow him in his shoes draws us out of our sphere of comfort:
For if you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners do the same. (Lk 6:32-33)
That’s what makes us Christians. We don’t just stay with the people like us. We enter into the world of the “other”, not to save, convince, win, or enlighten them, but to walk in their shoes, to see what they see, to offer who we are in companionship. And equally with that, we find a way for the “other” to be able to do the same for us. This practical reciprocity in trust is the basis for Christian “mission”: to present “the love of God in Christ Jesus”, because at the foundation of Jesus’ mission is his coming to live in our lives first for 30 years and see life from our - yours and my - perspective, and then invite us to to accompany him in his. This mutuality of entering into the life of the other - and receiving them into one’s own - to share the journey, this is the fundamental mark of all human love, and an image of God. And so, I've come to believe that only love - the love of Christ, i.e., the love of God and people - can move people down that road. The road of Barriers to Bridges, and the road of all human reconciliation.
And so I wonder: will the painful consequences of the last four years make us more resentful? Or will we finally have had enough pain to be willing not just to listen to the "other side", but to enter into their shoes, so we can begin to actually understand what they say? Will we hold our ground in our own self-righteousness and right to speak our mind and live life as we believe? Or, even in the midst of pandemic restrictions that keep us in our world, can we find ways to take a step away from whatever music we comfortably move to, so we can enter someone else's reality, and let a little different perspective enter in? And are we willing to admit that maybe we haven't been heroes - that, maybe we've been fooled?
I've taken that step at times in my life, and as uncomfortable and humbling as it has been, I'm eternally glad I did - and do. It’s the foundation that has moved me in following Christ and taken me to Ecuador. And I think that people can look at what I do from the outside and maybe admire “helping the poor”. But I am not doing that. It’s easy to help the poor. It’s probably one of the easiest things you can do in life. It’s easy to find somewhere to offer help, there’s no rejection, everyone thinks well of you, and you get the positive interior reinforcement of having done something good. People might even call you a hero, maybe put your name or picture in a public place. But… it’s hard to become poor to live with poor people as real people, as family, to see life as they see it, to understand them. It’s hard to walk in their shoes. That will cost you a whole lot more. But even that is only a part of it. Because it’s even ten times harder than that to find a way that those people can come into your world and way of life, and walk in your shoes. That, as I know from experience, will cost you everything, your whole life.
It’s easy to demonize the other side and fight the culture wars. It’s a little harder to think and talk about unity and reconciliation, and have good intentions and feelings about it. But it’s then a whole other thing to have the love to actually attempt it in all its messiness and difficulty. Christ can take us there, gradually, if we in the US are willing - quite frankly speaking - to lose our lives in knowing and loving “others” and being known and loved by them. But if we’re not willing to walk in others’ shoes and allow them into ours, then I'm pretty sure that pride and anger will some day come charging back out of the cage.
Which will it be?
Time will tell…
By the way, the fiestas return in August.