Siempre Hay Esperanza

Somebody once said that, “ we can live 40 days without food, 8 minutes without air but just one second without hope ” and y’know, there is something that rings very true in that. Christmas is a time of great Christian hope and expectation, the hope that one day we will live in perfect Love, Justice and Peace.
But hopes and expectations differ. The circumstances of life can very often dictate the extent and limits of our hopes and expectations. If you were the eldest of a family in 1950’s west of Ireland, your expectations were more often than not coloured by thoughts or the necessity of emigration, the boat-train to Camden Town via Crewe where, if work was not pre-arranged, you would fall in line outside the Crown in Cricklewood, in the hope that Murphy, McNicholas or McAlpine would recognise your talents for digging. Trucked every day to a bleak, cold and wet building site, often from a bleaker, colder and wetter bed-sit, all in the hope that Mum and Dad could begin to provide for your siblings in the “auld” country and they, in turn, could begin to expect something a little bit better from life. Today, a trip to Camden by that same west of Ireland teenager would most lightly occur during holiday time from school or some other educational facility and would almost certainly involve the purchase of exotic music or wildly coloured clothing from the famous Camden Market.
As I write, I have the privilege of working in a large parish outside the city of Guayaquil, Ecuador, just south of the Equator. In the parish there are thirty-six communities, most of which are accessible by road but a number are accessible only by mule. Each community living an existence unthinkable in modern Ireland is very independently minded and each with the hope of one day having their own chapel and other facilities.(many of which we are working on at present) Eighty-five percent of the population of the parish are descendents of the Canari tribe who dominated the period before the Incas in this part of Latin America. They have maintained many of the ancient customs, they speak kichwa, wear beautiful bright colours (their own creations) and rear very large families. Unfortunately, the conditions they live in could not have been any worse for the Canari tribe eight hundred years before. They live often in atrocious conditions, dying very often from easily preventable diseases.
Expectations in most of these poverty-stricken communities are tragically low, especially for females which generally steer towards early pregnancy (15-16), subsequent marriage (if he stays around), often to a much older man. From there expectations nosedive into domestic violence (which sadly, is accepted as part of life), premature illnesses, familiar breakdown and often, the husbands emigration leaving her in a vicious cycle of poverty and hopelessness. When asked “when is he coming back ”, you are almost always met with a rather hope-less, “I don’t know” and sometimes worse.
Magdalena is a seventeen year old girl from one of the communities in the parish, Pomatoglla. Recently she has joined the catechesis team in her community and has offered to be catechist in a special programme for the 5-10 years old. It is a very basic programme but worthwhile and she is enthused about it. She is a very dedicated and faith-full person. Recently in conversation I enquired as to when she had finished her schooling. She told me she was about to turn ten when her mum asked her to leave school. She left because her father “emigrated” to the United States and left her mum with six children, all her junior. She left to care for the children and do the house chores while her mum looked after the hamsters (which they kept for food) and a very small number of sheep. Later, I was surprised (most do not value education) to learn that she had always retained the hope of returning to education to learn to read and write but her family never had the money. I asked her the cost and she told me - $25 to enrol and $21 for the three books for the year and I thought of the cost of the wrapping paper (not to mention the contents) that will be discarded this Christmas in homes in my native place. It cost $49, $46 for enrolment and books and $3 in buses but I will never be able to repay her for that look of utter joy as she screamed, “ I start in January ”. Thankfully now, she too can expect something better.
I write this facing Christmas away from home and loved ones, not to mention the turkey overkill but I write it too in the hope that together, you and I, can lift expectations; in the hope that together, we can help Magdalena and the many like her in my parish break the vicious cycles of poverty, violence and disease and simply come to expect more from life. I am forever haunted by the old Hebrew proverb which says, “ Those who close their eyes to the needy will one day themselves cry and not be heard ”. Hopes and expectations can differ this Christmas…but only with your help.