Our Pilgrimage Retreat by Deacon Stickney

After working for a week, we took a break on Thurs June 18th for a retreat. We called it a ¨pilgrimage retreat,¨ because in addition to prayer and discussion, we visited three places where people of faith are making a difference.

Our three themes reflected the ¨hermenuetic circle¨ of doing justice that frees us from poverty: See, Act and Evaluate. For seeing, we meditated on blind Bartimaeus (Mark 10), listening to Jesus ask us ¨What do you want me to do for you,¨ and considering that we could ask, with Bartimaeus, ¨Master, I want to see,¨ to really see the situation of the poor today.

The second mediation, stressing Action, was on the Rich Young Man, also from Mark 10, where Jesus, ¨looking with love¨ on a young man eager to prove his virtue, challenges him to sell his possessions and follow him. We too, are challenged to not just to sacrifice 3 weeks, but to make it our life´s habit to include the poor in our actions and our careers.

Then, we hopped on public buses (c. $.15 a person) to visit a poor high school, Santa Cruz, run by the same priests who sponsor Univ. of Notre Dame in the US.  It is in a huge ¨invasion¨ area, where people displaced from the mountains and jungle are flooding to the coasts. They build little houses of estera, or woven cane.

The school, only 5 years old, has grown with the neighborhood; there are still some classrooms of estera, yet they are building some with block. The enthusiasm of the children was overwhelming.

Next stop was a Brophy-type school, Cristo Rey, which Fr. Green, S.J., started in the 1960s. It is the best school in the city, to all accounts, with a classroom of internet computers where students are designing web pages, an inside Gym (a rarity in Peru) and a GRASS soccer field.

There is also a cow with its calf, guinea pigs (which if you haven´t heard about cuy, are NOT raised as pets) and acres of olive groves. It warmed my composter´s heart to know that the middle and upper class students are required to spend some time milking and harvesting.

After lunch downtown, we gathered by the Eiffel fountain under a Bougainvillea cupola and meditated on the Beatitudes, stressing the happiness of those who dedicate themselves to voluntary poverty. Mr. Daggett looked like a street preacher, waving his Bible around as he spoke. We then discussed an article ¨The Cost of Short-Term Trips.¨ Which gave us guidelines on how to avoid paternalistic mistakes many make when they come to poor countries.

We finished our day by visiting a center for street children, which was started by a Jeff Thielman, a Jesuit volunteer in the ´80s. Originally it was meant primarily for shoe-shine children and others who had no schooling, but it has evolved into an after school program and adult education center. Doctors who graduated from Cristo Rey started a pro-bono clinic there. There is also a sewing workshop, where poor women can learn a trade.

We had all read Jeff´s book about how he started the center, so it was a fitting end to our retreat to see how his sacrifice and that of the Jesuits and their staff is a living example of the happiness of the poor. When we arrived, the children were assembled for a talent show. Smiles and enthusiasm all around our knees!