How does one stay motivated after more than five months of language and cultural immersion? I woke up this morning with reluctance. I did not want to get out of bed for class. It’s not the first or last time I have felt this way. If no one else around me feels this way, still I feel that it is time to close the book on Bolivia. The book is fairly written. But I have three weeks of immersion to go, so I ask God to find ways to surprise me or startle me into awareness, concentration, and enthusiasm. I stretch out a hand to Jesus, my master, and I hope he will recognize me and extend a hand toward me. Does he know me as his disciple? Or will he send me way to gnash my teeth? I suppose I want the truth from God, but regardless of the truth, regardless of the judgment, I need that hand to reach out for me. I do not want to look back on this endgame with timesickness in my heart. So I pray that the love of God will bring my body, spirit, and soul back together. At least, refresh a tired mind. When it is time to do this work, let me do this work. And God bless my teachers for hanging in there with me. Profesoras Liliana and Viviana earn their pay and more than that for working patiently with me.
I have not written about Santa Cruz yet: another casualty of low motivation. Maybe tomorrow?
Meanwhile, I have a rising curiosity about life back in the United States and how it will be back in New York City and Church of the Good Shepherd. (I have been browsing the bulletins available through the parish website.) A week from now, will it be a raging curiosity?
Today, I watched the movie Our Brand Is Crisis, based on the Bolivian elections of 2002. Political campaign strategists from the United States brought their marketing tactics into the election and tilted the outcome in a manner favorable to prevailing neoliberal interests. Think privatization of natural resources and indenturing the nation to the International Monetary Fund. And here I was worried about the United States intervening in this year’s presidential elections. Silly me: we’ve already been there and done that! I also had an interview with Silvana Martinez to give my assessment of the language program. Note to my Capuchin brothers: keep coming to Maryknoll in Cochabamba to study Spanish. Is there a better language immersion program for religious with a missionary vocation?
Tomorrow at Maryknoll: the weekly conference will be all about the coca leaf, as strong a symbol of Bolivia as any there is. Our guest presenters will take us through the myths and realities and help us separate fact and fiction. I hope we do not run out of time for discussion. In the evening, there will be a colloquium on how the Church in Latin America does (and does not) engage with LGBT persons. Like the colloquium on sexual abuse in the Church in Latin America, I imagine that much of what the presenters say will go over my head. But then so have many of the homilies I have heard on most evenings at Templo San Francisco, so maybe a change of venue and a change of conversation will do me good!
Then, on Thursday: a field trip with the students and teachers to the Carmelite monastery of Santa Teresa in the heart of Cochabamba. I have seen many of the historic churches in the vicinity of Templo San Francisco, but this jewel of Spanish baroque Catholic piety has eluded me until now. More motivation to get my dispatch on Santa Cruz done before I write to you about the Carmelite convent! Jesus, guide my hand, and unblock the writer who wants to be your disciple.
No comments:
Post a Comment