Redemption Story - A Knotted Ball of Grace

When he arrived at Children of the Promise, he came with the label "abandoned" because his family of origin had left him for good.  A small, fierce, boy with chocolate skin and eternally brown eyes --left by man; loved by God.  And so another God story of redemption began.  Not the kind of saving we like to think of where a great hero sweeps in and makes everything aright, but an earthy, nuanced one, full of hope and bitterness, joy and loss, all entwined in a knotted ball of grace.  This is *Jean's story... and ours, too.

One of the great joys I get to be a part of in my role as Infant Mental Health Provider at COTP is to help children transition when adoptive parents finally get the go ahead to come pick them up.  That is happening right now, and today our first farewell in over two years is happening!  This is a moment of celebration to be sure, but all week I have been thinking about how adoption is a true reflection of the Biblical narrative and a re-telling of the "already - not yet" paradigm that story tells.  By this, I mean that the entire Bible points to a fullness of God's glory coming, having come, and being not yet completed.  The taste of fullness is on our lips!  This is revealed in the history of man's brokenness with God, Jesus coming for redemption of mankind, and all of creation groaning and waiting for his final return when all will be made new.  It is breathing in the beauty all around us and waiting to be complete. That story is being retold in one life here and now.

Having recognized that families are the best place for raising kids, and moving to a foster-parent style of caregiving at COTP, Jean moved into a family home three years ago.  His foster parents, perfectly imperfect, moved from strangers to caregivers to parents over the course of time.  In the usual style of parenting they changed his diapers, played on the floor, lost their tempers, took his temperature, let him eat too much candy, tucked him in bed with kisses... all the while knowing their job was to love him until it was time to let him go.  This child slept each night under the protection and care of those who understood that in order for this sweet boy to be able to love, he must be loved well.  

This involved risking connection knowing the heartbreak that would come.  This involved laying down their lives for the life of another – a reflection of redemption.  This involved Christ-like love.

Just a few nights ago a Papa leaned in for the last time for a goodnight kiss before bed, unable to hold back the tears pressing in for release.  A Mama mindlessly prepped 7 bowls of rice for lunch before her breath stuck in her throat, realizing it was one bowl too many.  The ache of loss after having loved deeply is oh so real!  They let a child go having offered restoration and renewal, knowing they now enter into a time of a life remembered and mourned.

But that is not the whole story.  Three years ago a family responded to God's call to care for the orphan and began a long process of bringing a child to a forever family.  An imperfect solution in a broken place but a faith-filled response lined with God-light - another small reflection of redemption.  So they came this week, knowing their child is loved and loves others, knowing the transition will involve more pain and loss than joy at the outset, knowing they will make mistakes and knowing it will take time for the emotional reality to match the legal one.   They come having entered a bittersweet love, as well.  They come offering restoration and renewal, knowing there will be a life remembered; a life mourned. 

In foster care a good outcome follows risking connection and permitting relationship to be the healing balm that allows the neural pathways for attachment to even form.  It involves loving well and letting go.

In order to adopt well, initially, one must resolve to parent without what comes more naturally with biological children-- love a stranger in your home and sometimes submit to the smothering need of a child frantic for attachment.  Of course, at the outset, foster parents experience much of this as well, but adoptive parents agree to do this for the long haul.

Jean carries his monkey and backpack everywhere as if those are items that will keep him safe in this transition from one family to another.  They are the only items that tie his two worlds together.  He did not ask to be born to a family unable to care for him.  He did not ask to be brought to strangers for care or turned over to yet others for a lifetime.  He may feel anger and sadness and powerlessness in many areas of his life.  He may not want a good-bye party.

But bit-by-bit, in small doses of trusting relationship, he may feel cherished, held, and secure.  He may come to know, through the example and experience of those reflecting a small piece of a big God, that his life is part of a greater story of redemption that encompasses us all.  And because God has invited Jean, and foster parents, and adoptive parents and vast community before and after them to be a part of this story, a new day will come -- a day that is already dawning in our hearts and lives.  Until then we will choose to walk a nuanced path, tasting all of life with the bitter and sweet entwined.  These are the gray spaces, the blurry edges, the broken Hallelujah we walk until Christ comes again in glorious clarity.  What a great day that will be!

(*Jean is not the child's real name, in order to protect the privacy of the child and his family.  Permission is given by COTP and those involved in this adoption to write about Jean's story.)

Brother Beaurel's Wedding

It seemed like a bad sign when we arrived in Pont Gracia and the groom was standing in the road wearing a worn, short-sleeved, polo shirt with basketball shorts.  He greeted us warmly but shook his head with concern.  There was a problem.

The pastor hadn't arrived.

And besides that...

the bride was having trouble after going into early labor that morning.

Months ago, I was on my back porch hanging the Wednesday morning bedsheets when Beaurel leaned on his palm frond broom to talk across the fence.

"Sister Christina, I have done wrong.  My fiancé is pregnant and I need to marry her to make it right before her and God."

His confession was straightforward.  His plan direct. He loved her and wanted to do right by her, God, and the church, so he was going to save up the money to marry her.  Beaurel said that to get married in Haiti you must have a house, table, chairs, and hutch, and a bed.  If you can't provide those basic things for your wife it would be shameful to marry.  Beaurel had the house and was now setting about to earn the money for the important furniture items.  But there was a deadline since his fiancé was pregnant and they wished to marry before the baby arrived.

The wedding was scheduled for Saturday, June 27.  The bride was to get ready in Cap Haitien and be chauffeured to the wedding by the best man.  The women of the family had the menu planned and beans and rice, plantain, salads, pikliz, and pate were being cooked.  The church had given it's blessing on the marriage and the pastor was going to marry them.  Everything was set.

But Saturday morning, the bride was not feeling so well and told Beaurel to call the midwife.  Before she could arrive a tiny baby girl was born -- and then another.  Twin girls, tiny and perfect!

Beaurel was a proud papa and was excited to get on with the wedding.  Since the babies had been born that very day, they moved the wedding time from 5 to 6 to give the bride some time to recover.  After all, she had just had two babies.

After further assessment the wedding got moved to the family home so Mama wouldn't have to travel anywhere.  But as the wedding time got closer it became clear that the bride was not doing so well.  The placenta had failed to deliver and the family realized she might need to go to the hospital.

This was the discussion when our party arrived at 6 PM.  Seth and Melissa Johnson, Joel Doorlag and I had donned our wedding best -- suitcoats and ties, heels and pearls.  After preliminary discussion about the setbacks, we were invited in to see the new babies.  We took turns cooing at and cuddling the 4 lb delights and then decided to leave.  Beaurel told us he would call when his fiancè returned from the hospital and they would continue with the wedding.  We piled back into the van to return to COTP.

As we were about to drive away, Beaurel came running after us.  He asked if we would be willing to drive his fiancé to the hospital.  We turned around and stopped at the house where a sister, Beaurel's sister-in-law, and Beaurel all got in with the fiancé laying across their laps.  The bride lay in a bejeweled-collared, fuchsia gown.  Her nails were manicured and her hair once straightened and styled, crumpled with the stress of the day as she breathed with the strain of pain.  Then the babies were carried out.

Someone asked, "Who can hold the babies?"

Someone else responded with, "the foreign ladies can do that".  So the babies, wrapped in bath towels for warmth in the 90 degree heat, were passed to us.  A tiny, precious, baby girl lay on my lap. A little cotton green gown with careful embroidery, stitched in darker green, dressed her little frame, and a handkerchief, pinned at the center served as a diaper.  The other twin had a matching dress in yellow, and was laid in Melissa's arms for the ride to the hospital.

I have not visited Milot hospital in formal wear before, and I can tell you that being a foreigner in this land is enough to garner attention all by itself.  So walking in with the twin babies in our wedding best created a spectacle (and privilege) wherever we went.

Well, after some hours of baby cuddling and waiting, and the news that the Bride-to-be would be admitted for care, Beaurel conceded that the wedding would no longer take place that day.  It was 10:00 PM after all, and it might be hard to get the pastor to the hospital yet that night.

The rest of us drove home though the moonlit Haitian countryside, jostling and bumping over the rough gravel roads to the comfort of our homes.  I lay in bed, some time after midnight, smiling about the evening that had just passed, knowing that little goes according to plan in Haiti, but that I am sure to find adventure here should I be willing to follow it.

Bondye Konnen (God Knows)

It was not a happy announcement.
Though we were completely alone in the house, she beaconed me close, as if to tell me a secret.

"I am pregnant", she said.

Her eyes locked mine and spoke the words of disappointment and worry her lips did not utter, before she looked away.

"Men Bondye Konnen (But God knows)".  She added.

"God knows", spoken out of discipline and prayer, hope and trust.

Often when Haitians speak of something they have no control over, something that is difficult or painful, they will add, "Bondye konnen (God knows)".  I have struggled to know how much of this is fatalism and how much is dogged trust in a God so omniscient that to put their trust in him is the final logical solution to any pain or problem, but whichever it is, it is a common Haitian response to difficulty.

The story is old, though the circumstances often different.  A women faces an unwanted pregnancy due to hardship of one kind or another, and fears for what having that baby will mean.  Milouse was already over 40 years of age, had numerous "female problems" and just months earlier had carried another challenging pregnancy for a number or months, before losing the baby to miscarriage.  Afterward, the doctor had told her and her husband that she should not get pregnant again, as her body could not handle pregnancy and it would not be safe for her to have another baby.  In fact, Milouse believed she could no longer get pregnant, so she was all the more surprised and dismayed when she found herself, very much so…

Milouse has been an important part of Children of the Promise (COTP) for many years.  Though some might find her job unimportant, she does much more than clean houses.  She blesses households.  She prays for and delights over the inhabitants of the homes she cleans, not to mention works with diligence at mopping floors, clearing cobwebs, and washing dishes.  She considers children a gift from God and prays for families to have many of them.  She invites her boss to church, prays for her employers, and sometimes lays her needs before them.

The day she told me she was pregnant, she asked me to pray for her.  She asked me to remember her needs before God and I could feel the weight of burden she carried for herself and her unborn child.

"Bondye konnen"  -- God knows.

Months passed and her pregnancy progressed.  Her feet swelled, her hands became sore, but the baby seemed healthy and she neared full term.  She seemed bulky and uncomfortable as women often do as the end of pregnancy looms, but she continued on with her work, with her patient way, her gentle smile, and her trust in God.  Bondye konnen -- God knows.

And then the day after Christmas, a child was born.  A beautiful baby girl like a ray of light with solid black hair, and delicious carmel skin.  A baby perfect and plump, and hungry and good… a baby whose coming brought unexpected joy like a gift at Christmas time.  It was as if God knew she was needed.  It was as if God were telling Milouse that his care for her included this precious blessing even though she did not realize she wanted or needed it.  And Milouse was filled with delight.

 Baby Danisha is a child to celebrate!  Not all children come when they are wanted or chosen or expected, but God knows.  God knows and allows and plans for moments like this.  I know it will not always be easy for Milouse to parent her or provide for her, but Milouse has trust in a God who has seen her through difficult places and will see her through more.

And I pray for Milouse and Danisha, for her teenage sister Ketley and her father Fritzner, too:

“‘“The Lord bless you
    and keep you;
the Lord make his face shine on you
    and be gracious to you;
 the Lord turn his face toward you
    and give you peace.”’

Numbers 6:24-26 NIV

Talking Turkey

There are mornings sounds of the rural countryside around Children of the Promise irritate me.  The roosters crow long before sunrise, a tethered cow bawls outside the gate, or a crow creates a cacophony that sounds like it must be reporting something important to another in a nearby branch.  But this morning I smile as I hear a turkey from behind the chicken wire in the back yard.  I am quite sure his gobbling is a hallelujah of sorts, and the smile on my face is a reflection of the little leap of joy in my heart.

It may not be readily apparent why that unintelligent gobbling would help joy well up in my core, but the turkey is much more than a turkey.  It is a gift that reminds me that my heart has much more room to grow and that giving from a deep place is a joy-producing thing, even if, especially if, it has required much sacrifice.

A few weeks ago our friend, Camille came up the path riding his bike and grinning, with a large turkey under one arm.

"This is for you, Miss", he said, offering to hand me the turkey.  

What does one do when being gifted a a live turkey?  I tried to offer to pay for it, to which his smile fell away, and he insisted it was a gift.

This is the second time I have had the honor of receiving fowl as an act of gratitude, so I really should come up with a plan or at least an appropriate response to being handed a large bird, but as before, I faltered a bit, not really knowing how to hold this monstrosity of feathers.  I asked Camille to hold the bird while I went to check if it could be kept in the chicken coop until it's life would be ended.  So to the coop it went and I said my thank you's to a sweet teenage boy, obviously so pleased with his "cado" to me.

I did not realize until later that day the turkey gift was no small thing.  A turkey costs around 300 Haitian dollars to purchase.  300 Haitian dollars is equivalent to around $30 US dollars.  This may not sound like a great deal of money to those of us from Western economies, but here, where a grown man sometimes earns $5.00 (US) a day, a turkey is  luxury item.  A family may buy (or raise) a turkey for eating once a year at Christmas or New Year's but many families in our community would think of this as an unrealistic dream.

When Camille works on Saturdays, he is paid well.  He receives 60 HT which he then needs to pay for moto transportation to and from school in Cap Haitian, where he stays during the week, and to pay for noon or supper meals at 10 HT a meal. Without supplemental income, he may not get three meals a day.

What I know then, is that for some time, instead of eating, he saved his earnings to buy me a turkey.  Me.  A woman who has more food available in her pantry than he can imagine eating in 3 months.  Me.  A women who struggles with being overweight because of excess consumption and the inability to use disciple to change my eating habits.  Me.  A woman who carelessly throws away the whole tomato if part of it is bad.  Me, who could actually pay for his entire life's needs with very little sacrifice, with very little adjustment, with very little effort at all.  Me.

I hid away in my room as I felt the warmth of tears filling my eyes; tears from mixed emotions of gratitude for what the gift meant, tears of shame for my own selfishness, tears of realization.

The boys and I have been reading through the gospels in our morning school time, and we recently read the account of the rich young man who comes to Jesus asking what he needs to do to have eternal life.  He's doing so many things right, he breaks no major commands, but he goes away sad, because when it comes down to it, he is so tied to his stuff, he can't do what Jesus tells him to.  Jesus says to him, "sell all you own, give it away to the poor, and follow me."  He doesn't, and he walks away in the knowledge that he is choosing his wealth over God.

How wretched am I to be that man!  I want to believe he is someone else; someone who has much more wealth than I, but I am looking face to face with the reality that I am he.  

I have heard many times that those of us in the western world are among the wealthiest in the entire world.  According to www.richlist.com, if you earn $25,000 a year you are in the top 2% of the wealthiest people in the world.  If you earn $50,000 a year, you are in the top .31 percent richest in the world.  And if you earn $100,000 a year, you are in the top .08 richest people in. the. world.

  This thought remained very distant to me before moving to Haiti.  The reality is that the face of poverty remained an intangible, and so unimportant construct in my life.  It's not that I did not care at all, but I lived as if that knowledge bore no consequence on my choices.  I bought what I wanted, ate what I wanted, gave what I wanted because I had earned it and had the right to decide what to do with my own money, all the while ignoring the fact that I am the one Jesus is confronting about my wealth.  

What would it be like for me to give with such abandon that I would take the absolute very last money I have and buy something extraordinary for someone I needed to show gratitude toward?  And what if that action brought such immense joy that it spilled out all over my face and and made my eyes sparkle with delight… what beauty might be in that place that I may never know or experience because my wealth keeps me from it?  What if…

What if for Christmas this year, instead of asking for the ________ I give towards putting a roof on the house of a friend who has lived with sewn-together table clothes trying to keep out the tropical rains?  What sweetness and fellowship might be there that can't be found in a beautiful package under the tree?  

What if instead of spending hours in lines waiting for great deals, I find a way to serve in my community or build relationships with those who are hurting from the burden and brokenness of poverty in their lives.

What if…

The turkey is now in the fridge awaiting it's rub-down.  Tomorrow I will bake it lovingly, eat it with great joy, and share it with great satisfaction because that turkey is more than a turkey.  It is a reminder that gifts and lessons come in places we do not expect them and that I have much more room for growth if I only accept Jesus' invitation to join him in a place of deep generosity.

Elijah and "Camille"

"Camille" reading with Natalie and Rose

Chick-V

Yesterday as I drove through a neighboring village on my way home from Milot hospital, Brother Borell flagged me down with a finger wag and a nod, which I was to understand, meant "stop".

After the usual pleasantries and inquiries about family and children and the wellness of them all, he says, "Sister Christina, my brother's son, Grey, is very sick.  He has high fever and pain in his bones. It's the virus.  We don't know what to do."

Litzner, aka "Gris" (Grey, in Creole) is a young boy in our community of Lagossette.  He is the son of a poor farmer who works the ground next to our compound, and whose wife who works in the laundry pavilion here at COTP.

While you might notice his labored walk and awkward crutch use as his palsied body moves along the dusty roadside on his way to school, you are more likely to take note of his flashy smile and cheeky spirit.  If he has limitation from his crippled form he's not about to admit it in his face.  He is full of life despite his daily struggle against the movements of his own body.  But as I step through the open doorway of his stick woven house, none of that life is observable as he lays on a simple, clean, reed mat on the ground.  His eyes are open but dulled with pain.  His forehead glistens with the sweat of his fever, and his parents wear the tired worry in their shoulders and brows of those who love but have nothing else to give.  He appears to have Chikungunya, the mosquito-borne virus hitting Haiti and the Dominican hard right now.  He father says he has already been sick for a couple of days and they do not know what to do to help him.  They cannot afford to seek medical care.  They cannot afford a bottle of Tylenol to help ease the pain and fever he suffers from.  They cannot afford to build a house to better shelter him, so they pray and apply the traditionally known leaves and herbs to try to alleviate his illness.

There is not much more I can do for them, but I listen, and pray, and then I take his mom back to my place and give her some acetaminophen in a little bag with careful instructions for how to take them and not to take more than instructed.  They are so grateful for this small thing that I feel ashamed not to do something more.  A dollar's worth of off-brand Tylenol and sympathy… that is all I have to give right now.

Almost every day I hear similar accounts from friends and people I know from our village or towns nearby.  A family member is sick with "virus Chikungunya" -- a father, a wife, a child.  And I pass out my little oval tablets from the big bottle that never seems to run dry.  When life is already hard in this place, I want to do something to show those around me that I care about their added burden.  Perhaps the bottle of Tylenol is just a good reminder for me of Mother Theresa's God-filled words to "do small things with great love".

According to the CDC, Chikungunya began in West Africa in 1952 and has sickened people worldwide since then. Only recently has it made it's way to the Caribbean and not to Haiti and the Dominican Republic until 2013.   For most people symptoms develop 3-7 days after a bite from an infected mosquito.  Primary symptoms are high fever (102 F) and joint pain for 3-7 days.  Other possible symptoms are headache, muscle pain, joint swelling, and rash.  In some people, joint pain can continue for months to a year.  People at risk for more severe illness are those who compromised health,  underlying health conditions the very young, and the older adults (over 65).

Here at COTP increased groundskeeping including mowing and restructuring drainage as well as spraying of the grounds is being done to help prevent exposure to the virus.  Even so 3 people on the compound have gotten it thus far.

If you would be willings, I would appreciate prayer for our community and compound and that God would be glorified even for those who afflicted with this rough disease.

All You Can Eat

Have you ever done it -- pushed away from the Thanksgiving table where the feast for eyes became more than your belly could handle?  Or a last smooth mouthful of too, too, good cheesecake, or make it that perfectly grilled steak, that was three bites too big, but you just had to finish it?  You loosened the grip of your button on your distended abdomen and groaned with the last flavor of pleasure on your tongue knowing regret was already setting into your gut… tell me I'm not alone in having behaved so foolishly!  I've been on a binge and I don't feel good.

We returned to Haiti this past Wednesday after a 5 week visit to the United States.  The trip was full of truly wonderful things!  We had the pleasure of going to the CAFO Orphan Care Summit held in Chicago where we were able to reconnect with wonderful friends and family.  We had happy reunions with our parents, siblings, aunts and uncles, nephews, nieces and cousins.  We had coffee and dinners with friends and supports where we experienced really meaningful fellowship and prayer.  We spoke in church where supporters gathered to listen and be challenged, and encouraged us in our work.

And in addition to all of that we had marvelous access to healthcare, and food, and technology, and music, and media, and shopping venues and… I binged on it all.  I overindulged until not only my waistline further bulged, but my senses and spirit, too, and yet I consumed more.  I packed it all in, rationalizing all the way, telling myself my time in the US was short and I had to enjoy all the good things available in the land of endless ice-cream, 99 cent nail polishes, falling prices, and wifi; telling myself I was living no differently than those around me and that it was ok to want more, to fill my time, to get the most out of the visit.

Before leaving Haiti, I was talking with a friend of mine, Magalie.  We were talking about the expense of children's clothing here and I told her I could get some clothes for her baby at a garage sale.  Do you know I have trouble explaining to her what an ice-cream pail is, or a cereal isle, let alone the concept of a garage sale!  How is she even to imagine such a land where the majority of the population buys so much that a year or two later the items are still good enough and plentiful enough to be sold out of the car house?  We laughed about that… but then I spent hours going to garage sales, looking for "good deals" on things from my mental lists of wants while numbing my mind with the endless browsing of stuff another did not want and I did not need; finding fancy or fascination here and there, but moving from sale to sale with unexplainable drive and boredom.

Oh how I love the wonderful blessing of where I have come from!  The US (and most of the western world) overflows with abundance and I am grateful for the the place God allowed me to be born.  However (hey, you know that was coming, right?), and this certainly comes as no surprise to most who read this, we are so spoiled by surplus, so lulled by luxury that we have come to expect it as normal.  What's worse, is that our blessing has become burden because of our overindulgence.  Just like eating too much, we can overdo the really good things all around us.  We keep shoveling it in because of the momentary pleasure, but in the end we become culturally obese -- burdened by the weight of managing all the STUFF in our lives.  We complain about our kids being entitled but we feed them entertainment pieces worth hundreds of dollars and hardly blink when a 3 year old picks up someones costly smartphone and pages through photos.

I say "we" because I am realizing how entangled I am.  Even after living in a place where I see and know poverty all around me, I feel nearly helpless to resist the lure of the binge when I return to the States, and I'm not sure what to say about all this except that I am disgusted with myself.  Disgusted not that I spent time deepening important relationships but that I am so easily enticed by all that glitters and am so quick to gobble up shiny bits in the gravel, like a barnyard hen.  Disgusted that I am not yet in a place where my contentment is better rooted in Christ's FULLNESS, where I know I find real satiation, but don't live like it.

This week I found myself by the sink at my old chore of washing dishes in warmish soapy water, dipping in bleach water, and placing the first plate in the dish rack, followed by two cups, a spoon, another plate… and I realize that for the first time in weeks I felt completely content.  It would be more fun to be visiting an antique shop, sitting for a cool blueberry pomegranate smoothie at LuLu Beans, or even getting groceries in air-conditioned comfort.   I do not particularly like doing dishes, especially not as the sweat beads, gathers, and then trickles down my hairline toward my back, but in this single moment I feel a return to simple routine that grounds me.  There is little more to want or need, little more to think about, only my own breath and the clinks and clunks of the dishes in the pan before me.  And I realize I have been awakened by a holy moment -- a God-space… a place where he meets me and teaches me to be content not with stuff but with things unseen, to be in a space where I can sense His nearness, and in that space I am aware that he has me right where he needs me to be to teach me.  Right where he can get my attention, reign in my desire, disrupt the binge, fill me up with Him so I will quit hungering for that which does not satisfy.

Perhaps one of Satan's greatest stronghold's in the West is consumption.  There is nothing innately wrong with having and wanting things (or activities or entertainment or education or busyness, etc), but all out obsession with options and gadgets and endless stuff to fill our homes, occupy our moments, and protect our future, is not of God.

I saw a quote today by Timothy Keller.  "A sure sign of the presence of idolatry is inordinate anxiety, anger, or discouragement when our idols are thwarted. So if we lose a good thing, it makes us sad, but if we lose an idol, it devastates us."

So I need to think about what gets in the way of me being fully satisfied in Christ.  What makes you and I anxious or angry or discouraged to think about doing without?  I may have felt slightly smug at being able to give up my home and many of it's contents to move to Haiti -- certainly self-righteous, but I realize now that while that may have been a wonderful grace-filled moment of trust in God, I am far from immune to the desire to refill all those places of "loss" with more stuff instead of with Christ.  And I do feel anxiety and anger when I think about having to "give up" certain things or areas of my life.  I think I have some internal housekeeping to do…

The Bible addresses the many layers of our wanting and seeking after stuff.  Most of Luke 12 talks about trusting God and not storing it all up for ourselves and sums it up in verse 35 by saying,
"For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."

So, I am asking God to to move my heart in another direction.  It's not what my weak will wants right now, but in my faith-filled moments,  I want to treasure the things Jesus did and live like I know it.  I am most certainly a work in progress and will be until the end of my earthly days, but I want contentment and I don't want to put idols before God.  I know such vices exist in all places and cultures and I can find other things to flaw my character with, but right now I will submit to the working of the spirit in my heart, stay where I am, and see what our good God has in store for me.

A Death in Lagossette

(photos by Wilson Chery)

Late afternoon today, I slipped on my best black formal dress and my only heels.  From my house I could hear the crowd in the street waiting to leave, and wails rising above the voices as the hearse begins to move slowly down the road. Wilson pulled up in front of the house and beeped the moto horn to let me know he was ready to leave.  With a quick kiss to the kids, I grabbed tissues and my umbrella and hurried out the door.  I hopped on the back of the moto, adjusting my skirt to accommodate as modest a ride as possible.  I am not yet used to skirts on motercycles, and certainly not formal dresses, but I am trying to jump into cultural norms here in Haiti.  Riding a moto to a funeral when no other ride is available is one such occasion to dive in deep.

Wilson maneuvers out the gate, down the driveway and into the heart of Lagossette where a sea of mourners are starting the procession to the the funeral in a neighboring town.  Already the scene is surreal and foreign to me with SUV's, Land Rovers, open trucks, tap-taps, and even a repurposed school bus, spilling over with people going to honor the life of Tante Tata (Aunt Tata).  Nearly everyone, save the local school children in their navy bottoms with red and white checkered shirts, wear black or white and are dressed in their very best.  Men in formal suits, women with freshly styled hair, stockings, hats, jewelry, and handkerchieves in hand, or wiping cheeks, make their way to the waiting vehicles.  The sounds of raw sorrow permeate the scene and something deep and mournful lodges in my chest.  My community grieves.

The news came early on Monday when Magalie arrived late for work with tear-stained cheeks, that Gran Tata (Grandma Tata), her grandmother, had died.  Even those who had no direct relation to her referred to her at Tante (Aunt) Tata because she loved whether you were her own blood or not.  Milouse stood in my kitchen the next morning and paused with hands dripping over the dishpan to say, "she was much loved by many because she loved so many, so much".  And so started the week of mourning and remembrance for one "much loved" from Lagossette.

No expense was spared for the funeral of Gran Tata.  Her body was taken to the morgue, embalmed and placed in an elaborate casket.  Though the family had little to spend they scraped up all that was needed for the proper honor due their matriarch.  Throughout the week everyone in town prepared for today's funeral.  Money was earned or borrowed for funeral-appropriate clothes, tears flowed with remembrance, and last night the wake lasted for hours as the many who loved her paid tribute to her life and celebrated hard.  The music was like a dance party through the night, praising Bondye (God) for her life and comforting those afflicted with sorrow.

The ride to the church is short, but is full of one-way traffic, unlike most days on the rural country road.  Motos race and challenge one another for placement on the smooth outer edge of the road.  We wait for a tractor with 6 wagons loads of sugar cane following behind like a wobbly train.  It takes a wide corner ahead of us and the waiting motos line up to follow and then pass.  They avoid fresh puddles from this afternoon's rain, preserving the sharp dress pants and finely shoed feet and the we arrive at the site of interment.


The crowd is already surging into the church when we get there.  Wilson disappears into the crowd to find his family and  I find friends, Dan and Holly.  Dan and Holly have two Nannies who call Tante Tata "Mom" and they are here to support them as well as the many others we know who are affected by this loss.

The church is made of simple block construction with tin roof but is a larger church than many around.  Varnished boards make up benches for most of the sanctuary and on the platform a plain podium sits with the items typical of a Catholic church sanctuary, all in unadorned form.  Unhindered arched widows, with shutters aside, allow the clouded light into the now packed space.

We squeeze, side by side, onto a bench that had been brought in from the school to accommodate the crowded church.  Lagossette school kids stand in the isles as no more seating is available.  Even with a light breeze from the open door-way, sweat leaves my hairline and slides down my neck, and past my color bone.  My dress feels too clingy, too low, too constricting and I re-adjust uncomfortably.  My sticky palms belie my discomfort.  I do not know how to predict what will happen next and my unfamiliar surroundings draw my shoulder muscles up in tension.

Even before the service starts, the wailing has returned.  Above the din of voices, the calls of sorrow rise and fall in painful cadence.  Woman flail and fall against the bodies of those bearing their weight of grief.  People around us stand up to better see who laments next, and then sit again when satisfied with the information gleaned.

Next the band starts up, bass strings and drums leaning into the tune and the choir rises.  The music is rousing and joyful and stands in odd contrast to the wails and cries of the daughters grieving before their mother's closed casket.

The priest prays, exhorts, preaches.  He reads the passage of the Bible in Matthew 25 about who will enter the kingdom of God.  It talks about those who do and do not attend to Jesus when is hungry, thirsty, a stranger, in need of clothes, sick, or in prison and that when we take care of the needs of "the least of these" with these needs, we are taking care of Jesus.  Taking care of these is a mark of those who belong to God's eternal kingdom, and Tante Tata did those things for many, many people around her in her little village of Lagossette, and beyond.

There is eulogy and more singing, and the wailing continues to rise.  The sounds of sorrow now include men's cries, as well.

Sitting in that simple Catholic church I feel completely bewildered.  The is so much noise and commotion, so much loud proclamation of grief.  The priest's voice carries on through the sighs and cries as if he is preaching a Sunday morning sermon, without pause or distraction. My mind is wildly bent on trying to focus on the meaning of the Creole words methodically continuing over the loudspeaker, the rising and falling of the choir and their voices, and the cries of friends I know, who grieve so gravely, so freely, so fiercely.  My mouth feels stale and I must swallow back the ocean of empathy lest my cry join those climbing up and through the tin roof above.  One moment I feel as if I might giggle at the absurdity and then another wave of sorrow washes up and over my pounding heart.  My village grieves on for one who "loved well and loved many" and the weight is enormous.

The priest is now dispersing incense over the casket and saying final prayers, as the cries reach their final pitch.  Daughters and son, grandchildren, and others now sorrow in earnest, knowing the body of their beloved will soon be laid to rest in the cemetery outside the doors of the church. The spicy smoke of the incense wafts throughout the large room.  It constricts in my throat and catches the lump of sadness more decisively.  Water rims my eyes threatening to flood their lidded banks.  I look up at 2x4's and the constant wave of tin that makes up the roof in order to diffuse my own emotions and attempt to distance my mind from the pressing sorrow around me.  I do not wish to wail and sorrow as those who love Tante Tata.  I do not want to fall and be held and carried away in my grief, I do not want to lose control in the ocean of tears where waves of grief control.  I want to run from this deep place where my own rawness and nakedness threatens to become exposed.

Relief comes as the crowd begins to rise and disperse through the open doorways at the side and back of the sanctuary.  The mass of misery now shuffles past.  For those whose sorrow is too heavy, they move past, half conscious.  They are supported by the arms of loved ones girding up from around the middle and under limp arms.  They are wrapped in the love and support of those who tend to them in their moments of greatest weakness.  .  They are carried along when they are too frail to go on.  The lean on each other  when they cannot stand alone.  They are held with the strength of their community, and I realize that though my culture's way of grieving is not the same, the result is.

In both places there is a time and place for saying good-bye and for great sorrow.  There are expected behaviors and customs.  The house of God and the word of God are places and sources of great comfort and truth and the community is there to hold us in our times of need.

I have now made my way into the courtyard in front of the church.  The marching band is playing as the casket is carried into the graveyard and the guests mill around giving hugs and condolences.  In the vastness of this crowd, I find myself standing next to Milouse.  She has quiet tears in her eyes and I hug her close while she wipes her nose.  "She was much loved by many, because she loved many, so much."  I feel her sadness and it draws us close to one another in a shared experience of grief.

The funeral is ending.  On the ride home I am settled by the steadfastness of the mountains around, the rain in the distance, the palms slender upward reach, the coolness of the breeze against my bare arms -- I thank God for these little gifts.  I realize that I am becoming part of this foreign place and these people I can slowly claim as mine.  I am learning to call Haiti home, and the Lord willing, will continue to learn from her people.