Continuing On With The Mission

Greetings to all on this 4th of July weekend. The celebration here is not the same as in the States but I will be going away for the weekend. A group of students from the Language School, some of the short term volunteers and myself will be visiting the Jesuit Missions this weekend. Those who have seen the film "The Mission" will have a sense of the visit. The film is set in Paraguay but similar missions were set at the same time in Bolivia and other countries. Several of the missions in Bolivia, near Santa Cruz, were restored in the 1980's and have become a place of pilgrimmage for many who want to have a sense of the history of the missions here in Bolivia. we leave Saturday morning and return on Monday night.
The mission continues to go well here. With the arrival of several short term volunteers here there has been a change of focus in my ministry and time here. Much more time in taken up in working with the volunteers and providing hospitality for our many guests. My culinary skills are growing by leaps and bounds. It is good to be able to show others what we do here and allows me to appreciate all that is going on here.
I had a meeting last night with the leaders of the barrio association of La Costanera, one of the barrios where I serve. We are trying to see what the needs of the various barrios are and how the chapel can serve them. I was very impressed by the 2 priorities that they have: the formation of a Mother's Club to work with the women of the area and also the need to provide health care for their children. The area we are working in now has about 1,000 people and will grown to about 2,000 over the next few years as the barrios continue to grow with the internal migration in the area. It looks as though we need to build a center of some sort for the barrios which is the one thing I did not want to do in my time here. However, we try to meet the needs that we encounter every day.
Please continue to keep us in prayer as we try to serve the poor and introduce others into mission.