ESTA ES SU CASA--JANUARY 2015
A THRILL OF HOPE
If you’re pressed for time, skip this and read Mac McAuliffe’s blog. He’s offering a series of sketches from his visit here last October. I wish I could do it half as well!
NOTE: COMING TO YOU ‘LIVE’ FROM THE KIWI PASTELERIA IN YORO!
Internet in Las Vegas is practically dead. Most of the time, I can’t read your e-mails, I can’t do FACEBOOK, I can’t see the score of a game. But, while looking for birthday cakes (see details below!), I found a little bakery in Yoro (2 hours by bus) that has Free Wireless! That’s where I am right now!!
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Christmas day is usually pretty quiet around here. All the festivities--the tamales, the soccer finals, the big Mass, as well as the binge drinking--happen on Christmas Eve.
But this Christmas was even more still than usual, as we mourned the passing of Richard Cruz, 75. Frail, yes, but no one expected such a rapid descent in a single day, including his son Dennis, who had just arrived with his wife and their two little girls from San Pedro Sula a couple days before. And yet the timing was perfect, if one can say such a thing,
So early Christmas morning, I went over to the house, at the farthest end of town, where the road disappears into the woods, prepared to spend the day. Richard’s wife Melania was steady as she greeted friends and neighbors. Dennis was on the phone rounding up volunteers to “open” the grave. Four other brothers were already on their way from San Pedro, due to arrive about noon. Lola, the only daughter, was organizing a group of women serving coffee and rolls. Cristina Castro led the praying of a Rosary with her own special commentary on its “mysteries.” She reminded everyone that Richard had been a tailor; as a former teacher, she had seen his fine work in hundreds of her students’ uniforms (this included Pablito and Chepito when I got them into school years ago); he charged so little, anyone could afford him.
Then Richard’s father arrived! Chaguito, 108 years old, the same Chaguito who buried another elderly son back in February. Now as then, Chaguito cried more than anyone, shaking all over. They brought him in and got the most comfortable chair for him, lined with pillows, where he sat for at least three hours. Imagine! For a father, your son is always your baby, no matter how old he is.
I get all sentimental, I know, but it seemed somehow lovely that, as the angels called the shepherds to find the Baby Jesus in Bethlehem, so Richard, a man so humble he would apologize even for taking your measurements, was called to the same Christmas scene in heaven.
There are other events, of course, that don’t need a twist of irony to redeem them.
Birthday parties, for example!
Mariana Teresa (“Marite”) turned 4 on December 2; she always gets a cake and party, we make sure of that! since her mother Maricela named her for my sister Mary Anne. Chemo’s little cousin Daguito likewise celebrated number 4, on December 22, with his first cake ever. Usually, the family has already gone off to pick coffee in El Transito, where in fact Daguito was born. Also enjoying her first cake, Daguito’s grandmother Natalia. About time! She turned 65 on December 1. She’s Chemo’s grandmother, too, and I call her “mommy” every morning when I ask for a blessing, so I don’t know what took me so long! And Ery turned 27 on December 30; with Down Syndrome, it’s a real milestone. His best gift was the arrival of his sister Angelita from Mexico, where she has been preparing for several years now for a legal entry into the United States--as a Mexican citizen!
One birthday passed without a cake, Chemo’s late father Juan de la Cruz, born December 1, 1944. He died years before Chemo came into my life, so the only picture we have of him is his national I.D. card, issued when he was 18; the photo is the exact image of his other son Markitos, who is 18 now himself. In a quick visit to Tegucigalpa to renew my own Honduran I.D., we “celebrated” Markitos’ girlfriend Yessica’s pregnancy, with an August due date. Oh boy! I am just so grateful that Chemo still mostly loves soccer and music! And clothes. I had Ostin, the tailor who had tried to interest Chemo in the profession, make Chemo a nice pair of pants for Christmas. And do you know, he did not even charge me! Such a lovely present! I tried to return the favor at least a little with a nice picture of him holding his new baby boy.
Daguito’s family finally packed up and headed to El Transito December 27. The other half of Chemo’s family, Alba and Santos and their kids, had already gone off December 13. The whole town of Las Vegas is depleted in these days, though for Christmas at least an equal number of folks come back for the holidays.
Including Padre Manuel from El Salvador. I really thought we’d never see him again when he left in August, entrusting the parish to Padre Chepito, our very first “native-born” priest from our own mountains. Manuel was genuinely thrilled you could see, to be celebrating Christmas “Midnight” Mass (6:00 p.m), and we were excited to see him. You know, there’s sort of an undercurrent of criticism making the rounds, that Padre Chepito is just not measuring up, specifically his preaching. One person said, “Chepito me duerme” (“Chepito puts me to sleep.”). Cristina Castro, who is a fiery preacher herself when she gets going, even when she’s talking about something as simple as the Rosary, said much the same thing: “I like some fire in a sermon; Chepito is like water.” I don’t know what to say. I love Chepito’s humble, sincere, deliberate “style,” if that’s what we’re calling it.
The whole purpose of the “foreign” missionaries--from Missouri, California, Spain, Canada, or even El Salvador like Padre Manuel--was to build up the “local” church to take care of itself. Now we don’t like the “new wine”? As Jesus himself experienced, Chepito is a “prophet without honor” in his own home town. I usually feel like crying tears of thankfulness just to see this man, against all odds, finding his vocation as a priest in a backward land where I can’t even get Chemo through seventh grade after three tries, in a country where a child dies by violence every 24 hours. He’s our own Cure d’Ars. Who cares what he says! It’s a miracle that he’s here at all! Pope Francis warned in his “Joy of the Gospel” not to look for “star power” in a preacher; just let Jesus come through.
So Padre Chepito did more First Communions, baptisms, weddings, to round out 2014, the blessed work of a pastor.
And then, you know what, on New Year’s Eve, Padre Chepito seemed to come into his own. The church was full to overflowing, and even the drunks who had wandered in were attentive. The music was exquisite, our little choir bolstered by Elvis and Dora’s daughters Lily and Neysey, on break from the university. Chepito’s preaching was the same as always, but somehow tonight it touched a chord; so when he invited another young man, Obed, who will be entering the major seminary in February, to come up and say a few words, Chepito’s own love of his vocation came flowing out. At that point, Cristina Castro came forward and asked for the mike, to praise Chepito! “God must love us very much to have given us this priest!” She had called him “water”; now she was baptizing him! And the whole church burst into applause.
I feel the same way. God must love me--and Chemo and all of us here--very much to have given us your friendship and love. And any donations to the “Birthday Project” would be icing on the cake!
Love, Miguel
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