Volunteer in Mission to Brazil

14 August 2006

He who is able to keep me from falling

It's funny how that particular phrase (based on Jude verse 24) is running through my head as I'm walking along through the hills, valleys and potholes (even the sidewalks can be quite hazardous) of Belo Horizonte. As those who know me well are aware, I am particularly prone to sprained ankles, and I find it absolutely a blessing that I have not yet seriously sprained an ankle. The most serious ankle injury I've sustained to date was absolutely fine within 2-3 days. I wonder if the training of walking up and down steep inclines helped my ankle to heal faster. Whatever the case, I am extremely thankful. I was also excited that my legs were in good enough shape that they didn't hurt after taking a trial two-hour flamenco class last Saturday.

My dad likes to describe the opportunities I've had to earn money to support my stay in Brazil as my "tentmaking," in reference to Paul in the Bible making tents along the way to support his ministry. It looks like it's time for some more tentmaking, to be able to support my living expenses for the next several months. I will try to see if I can offer services at the local federal university to translate some scientific abstracts. Another option is to teach private English lessons, but this requires a lot more time and preparation and might take away from the time I am able to spend at the projects.

The work team from Virginia arrived today at lunchtime. The people are from different churches and cities in Virginia and haven't met each other before. They start painting and light construction at the São Gabriel community center tomorrow. I will be going to the airport tomorrow to pick up the final couple from the team that's arriving in the morning.

It turned out I was able to do a few things to help prepare for the team's arrival such as cutting out bedspreads to send to the seamstress over the weekend. It's really amazing how the whole network of program alumni is mobilized to provide services for these teams. For example, the guy that has his own mini-bus company used to be a kid in the project many years ago, and several of the masons, plumbers and handymen were also in the project as kids. I want at some point to record the history of some of these "success stories."

Even though I'm not working directly with the children this week, it still warms my heart when they greet me by name and come over for a hug. I particularly enjoyed having a relatively long conversation today (more than 5 minutes) with one of the more "active" boys who has some relational and disciplinary issues. He was asking lots of questions about the group that was arriving. It's cool that these kids who would not normally have contact with foreigners along the course of their lives get to expand their horizons a bit, if only by trying to greet somebody in another language and ask questions about the place where they live.

I've been trying to get out and take "expedition" walks of about one hour to get to different destinations on the weekends, both for the exercise and also to see various neighborhoods. Yesterday, I walked over to a mega-church, Lagoinha Baptist Church, that offers an English-language service on Sunday evenings. I'm not really sure why they do that since there are not that many foreigners here in Belo Horizonte (in fact, almost all of the people at the service were Brazilians, except for me and maybe one other person besides the missionary pastor, out of about 30). Before I set out from the apartment, I checked my route out with my roommate, who indicated that I needed to take two buses to come back since it would be dark and not so great to be walking through certain neighborhoods at that time. She also double-checked with me if I was prepared to walk up and down the many hills between here and there. I assured her that I was looking forward to the exercise. After about the 3rd major (San Francisco-style) hill, I was laughing at myself and wondering how many more hills there would be before I reached the church.

I'd already been told about this kind of church that is very focused on financial contributions and "vertical theology," as one of my coordinators likes to call it, talking mostly about you and God and not a whole lot about your neighbors, and that was what I found. This was the first time in Brazil I'd seen paid security guards at a church (and only the second time in my life). The service was held in one of their auxiliary buildings in a very nice, air-conditioned (very rare here) auditorium. It was lead by a Welsh missionary. They had more than 30 minutes of standing and singing "praise music" from the U.S., which is currently very popular here in many of the churches. After such an arduous walk, I was ready to (and did) sit down after about 20 minutes. I admire that the Brazilian musician team is willing and able to learn songs in English (and the praise team leader was even evangelizing in English between songs). Then they had the offering, followed by introduction of first-time visitors. Then the kids left for Sunday school, and then a Brazilian woman got up to read the Bible and preach a sermon. One part I did not like was insisting that each person would be looking at a Bible when she read the scripture and actually trying to orchestrate who was sitting where and asking me specifically if I had a Bible. As my parents pointed out during our conversation tonight, at least that service gave me more of an appreciation for the Brazilian Methodist church services that I have already experienced.

It's interesting that one idea that I, too, had about the causes of poverty here turns out to be incorrect. The general idea in the U.S. (and perhaps other parts of the "developed" world) is that poverty in Latin America is caused largely by overpopulation, particularly because of lack of birth control due to the influence of the Catholic church. In reality, overpopulation is not the issue--the problem is severe inequality in distribution of and access to resources. Brazil is only slightly smaller in size than the U.S. and has a population of about 200 million, compared to the 300 million population of the U.S. And it's not about a lack of resources--Brazil is a country rich in natural resources.The very few percent who are in control of the vast majority of resources in this country are quite adept at maintaining and increasing their advantage. We have the same problem in the U.S., but here it's a little more extreme.

There are several people here who need your prayers for physical healing, marital problems and financial difficulties, so please continue to lift up this community in prayer. Time to call it a night because I'm going to need all the rest I can get this week.

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