Merry Christmas to all.

Bless the Lord, ice and cold…Bless the Lord, frosts and snows…

I always smile when I think of these lines from chapter 3 in the Book of Daniel in the Bible. Because that same chapter tells us (eight times in the NRSV translation) that the young men praying these lines were in “a furnace of blazing fire.” Maybe it’s easy to think that ice and cold and frosts and snows are great blessings when one is in the midst of great heat.

But here in western Canada, where I am spending Christmas with my family, I confess that the ice and cold sure don’t seem like blessings at the moment. Ouch! I can hardly breathe outside some days. Ouch! Get me back to Mexico!

But I see that in the mountains of Mexico the people are also experiencing cold. The Mexican meteorologists are calling it “Cold Front Number 20.” It’s not as bad as 30 or 40 below, but throw in the cold rain and the fact that thousands of people are still living under plastic tarps (since Tropical Storm Manuel in mid-September), and it means that the cold is hardly perceived as a blessing.

I think of the many “displaced” people I know there: the 81 families from Tepeyac; the 145 families from Union de las Peras; the 114 families from La Lucerna; the 44 families from Filo de Acatepec; the 445 families (yes, 445—it’s not a typo) from Moyotepec…and the list could go on.

So at the same time that I feel grateful to be celebrating Christmas here with my loved ones in a nice, warm house, I think too of my Mexican friends who are struggling in very difficult situations for life for themselves and their loved ones. And I breathe a prayer of thanks to Mission Mexico—and to all the people who support Mission Mexico—for assisting them in their efforts.

It will be good to get back to Mexico on January 6. But it is great to have time now to be with my wife and two daughters and other friends here in Regina, Saskatchewan. Memories made now will hopefully “keep me going” during some tough times in the mountains of Mexico in 2014.

One nourishing memory will be the potluck dinner that I was invited to at the offices of the Archdiocese of Regina last week (thank you, everyone). I worked in those offices for four years as the catechetical coordinator, and I know the many challenges that my friends on the archdiocesan team encounter in their work. Whenever I think of these friends, I think of some words written by Pope Francis in his recent apostolic exhortation, Evangelii Gaudium (The Joy of the Gospel). In article 266, Francis writes:

…we are convinced from personal experience
 that it is not the same thing
 to have known Jesus as not to have known him,
 not the same thing to walk with him as to walk blindly, 
not the same thing to hear his word as not to know it, 
and not the same thing to contemplate him, to worship him, 
to find our peace in him, as not to. 
It is not the same thing to try to build the world with his Gospel
 as to try to do so by our own lights. 
We know well that with Jesus life becomes richer 
and that with him 
it is easier to find meaning in everything.

In a way, I like to think that this is the "spirit" nourishing not only my friends on the archdiocesan team in Regina, but also many of the people involved with Mission Mexico—including myself. We are simply striving  (as the prophet Micah expressed it more than 2500 years ago) “to act justly, love tenderly, and walk humbly with your God.”

My friends, Merry Christmas. My wish for this beautiful time of year is taken from today’s gospel: that the rising Sun will visit us “to give light to those who live in darkness and the shadow of death and to guide our feet into the way of peace.”

Our Lady of Guadalupe and "the Promise"

Today, December 12, is the feast day of Our Lady of Guadalupe, Mexico’s favorite saint. More than five million people will visit her shrine in Mexico City this week. Thousands of these pilgrims will be from the mountains of Guerrero; many of these will be there to fulfill “una promesa” ("a promise") made to Our Lady of Guadalupe.

Juan Diego and Our Lady of Guadalupe

What is “una promesa”? In general terms, it is simply a commitment made by a person to Our Lady of Guadalupe that if Our Lady helps this person achieve a goal or a favour, then that person will travel to the shrine in Mexico City to personally thank Our Lady and to leave an offering such as flowers or candles.

What kind of “goal” or “favour” is requested? These can vary. It could be a request for good health or a successful medical operation; it could be that a loved one get a job; it could be that the rainy season be a good one; it could be that a family member manage to “sneak into” the United States; it could be that a child manage to do okay in his or her studies at school.

In the Spanish translation of “Nican Mopohua,” the first document describing the appearance of Our Lady of Guadalupe to a humble indigenous man, Juan Diego, in December of 1531, one reads that Mary wanted a church to be built on the hill of Tepeyac so that she could share there her “amor, compasión, auxilio y defensa” and “oír allí sus lamentos, y remediar todas sus miserias, penas y dolores”—so that she could share there her “love, compassion, assistance and defense” and “hear there their cries, and remedy all of their miseries, sorrows and sufferings." It’s no wonder that the shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe is the most visited Catholic pilgrimage destination in the whole world.

I’ve always found it interesting that when the new Basilica of Guadalupe was being built in Mexico City in the mid-1970s (the old basilica was sinking and was unsafe to enter), one Mexican bishop, Sergio Mendez Arceo, bishop of Cuernavaca, spoke often in his homilies about “la promesa” and how the “powers that be” that controlled Mexico’s government and Mexico’s economy at that time were taking advantage of this religious practice in order to “keep the poor people in their place.” It’s one reason why, even today, one can read a plaque at the shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe that states “Patrocinado por el Banco de México” (“Sponsored by the Bank of Mexico”—which was, in the mid-70s, a government-owned bank).

Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe - Mexico City

I had the good fortune to translate for Bishop Sergio Mendez Arceo on several occasions (most memorably when he was visited in the 1980s by Henri Nouwen), and I remember his way of explaining this reality. Here is a summary of his thinking:

Bishop Sergio Mendez Arceo (1907–1992)

If the poor believe that they are poor because God made them poor, and if they believe that it is Our Lady of Guadalupe who will be the “responsible one” for helping them achieve goals that should be the right of every human being (food, water, health care, education, dignified employment, decent housing, etc.), then the governing powers are only too happy to encourage this way of thinking, in order to continue exploiting the poor. For example, if a poor mother makes a promise to Our Lady of Guadalupe that the mother will travel to the shrine to thank Our Lady if she helps the mother’s thirteen-year-old daughter successfully complete Grade Six, then any failure on the part of the daughter to finish Grade Six would seem to rest with Our Lady of Guadalupe.

Might the daughter’s success in school depend on other factors, such as:

-       was the daughter malnourished as an infant; will her brain cells even allow her to learn?  

-       is the mother literate; can she help the daughter with her homework?

-       does the family earn enough each day to eat healthily and rest securely?

-       does the daughter have to look after smaller siblings every night in a one-room house?

-       is there electricity in the home; can the daughter even study at night?

-       is the daughter out at the street corner every night selling candy or gum or flowers, just so that the family can eat every day?

-       is the daughter discouraged in school because she is bullied or made fun of because of her poorer clothing and appearance?

Factors such as these (in the words of Bishop Sergio) undoubtedly have as much to do with the child’s success or failure in school as does the requested intervention of Our Lady of Guadalupe. And the above-mentioned factors surely are as related to the political and economic situation of Mexico as they are to the loving desire of Our Lady of Guadalupe to “hear” and “remedy” the sorrows of this poor mother.

Bishop Sergio was famous for reminding the people of God’s words to Moses in Exodus 3:10: “Go now; I am sending you [to free my people].” Pope Francis, in his recent apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium, reflects those words when he writes (187): “Each individual Christian and every community is called to be an instrument of God for the liberation and the promotion of the poor, and for enabling them to be fully a part of society.” He clarifies (201): “None of us can think we are exempt from concern for the poor and for social justice.”

Pope Francis with image of Our Lady of Guadalupe

My friends, we are getting close to Christmas, the celebration of Jesus’ birth. Pope Francis reminds us (197) that “God’s heart has a special place for the poor, so much so that he himself ‘became poor’ (2 Cor 8:9).” Let us pray that each of us can have that same heart.

“Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?”

“Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?”

Living and working among the poor in Mexico and in other countries of Latin America has certainly given me a new appreciation for these words of St. Paul in his first letter to the Corinthians. It is impossible to be here and to not experience death almost daily. But resurrection is also a beautiful part of the same experience.

I can remember several occasions when I would be driving a very sick person to a hospital and I would be told by a family member that I could turn around, that the sick person had died. Continuing to the hospital would only involve paperwork and expense; why go on?

I remember giving a family a colorful blanket that I had bought thinking that it would be a great gift for my mother the next time I went to Canada. Instead, we used the blanket to wrap the body of a mother who had died in the village that day. My blanket was her coffin.

Cemetery in the background of Cochoapa el Grande

I remember being asked (because I was the tallest person around) to tear off a piece of plastic that was being used to keep out the rain on the roof of a “house” that wouldn't even qualify as a “shack” to most people. We used the plastic to wrap the body of a baby boy who had died that day. The plastic was his coffin.

I remember thinking of how “macho” many men in Mexico are purported to be. Seeing Enrique moaning on the ground of the cemetery and screaming “Why, oh God, why?” as we buried his twenty-five-year old wife didn't make him seem too “macho.”

I remember my own pain when I returned from a four-day visit to some villages and learned that Pepito, a five-year-old boy who hung around my house every day and who was my “special buddy,” had died of diarrhea why I was away. If I had been there, maybe I could have done something.

I remember so many elderly people who died slowly and painfully on old straw mats on dirt floors in their homes. Definitely, there were times when death seemed to have a very great “sting.”

Cemetery in Tlacoapa

But the people—the family members and the community members who stay behind to struggle on—never seem to lose hope or to see death as “being the victor” or “stinging.” Death is simply the passageway to the next life. It is the fate for all, and it is to be accepted as a “natural” part of life—although malnutrition and exploitation are not "natural" parts of life. After almost thirty years with these people, I think I have “absorbed” (gratefully) some of their relationship with death.

Especially “educational” for me has been the experience of living and working with people who risk death—an almost-certain death, in many cases—by struggling against the injustice, exploitation, and suffering of so many of their people. In other words, they risk their own "unnatural" death in order to assure a dignified life and a "natural" death for their people.

I remember Reynaldo. He was the eighth president of an independent, non-governmental human rights commission. All previous seven presidents of the commission had been either murdered or disappeared.

On his thirty-ninth birthday, a small party, with several close friends, was held for Reynaldo.

As Reynaldo bent over to blow out the candles on the cake that had been bought for this festive occasion, someone jokingly shouted, “Don’t worry, Reynaldo; you’re not old yet. You’re only thirty-nine; you won’t be old until you hit forty.”

Without meaning to dampen the spirits of anyone present, Reynaldo turned his head for a second toward the people around him and simply asked, “Do any of you really think I’ll live to see forty?” Then he blew out the candles, and the celebration continued. But everyone present knew that Reynaldo was right: undoubtedly, he would never live to see forty. But that didn't mean that he’d give up the struggle for justice.

I apologize for thinking of death today, on the First Sunday of Advent of 2013—a time of coming, of new life, of new hope, of renewed love. But today my mother died. She was blessed to be allowed to live eighty-five years, and she used that time to love as generously and as fully as she could. She lived her life with so much faith, hope, and love that I know that she would be the first to repeat the words of St. Paul: “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” She continues her journey, and I can only pray that I can live my earthly life with as much faith, hope, and love as she did. Thank you, Mom; I love you.

Mom's right hand at the end—no, at the beginning of something new.

Have a wonderful Advent season, my friends.