Below is a brief summary of the organization of the base communities that the
Nonviolent Ways Project-Finger Lakes South District August social-justice delegation visited. It includes social background, a view of community problems, and a perspective of what the trip could accomplish.
As mentioned there are eight faith-based communities ranging in ages from 16 years of work together to about 7 years. All are impoverished within our understanding of wealth, satisfaction, production and the ability for sustainable survival and development. Illiteracy is high among the older generations, and variable among the younger. There are problems in nutrition, in obtaining education, in obtaining resources even for subsistence levels of living. There are problems in obtaining monetary resources too, and as a result, there is outmigration into cities where there is also poverty; there are people who leave the communities and their families for great lengths of time to work in the U.S. as migrant workers; and there are people who have abandoned the communities and Mexico to enter the U.S. illegally to work here, sometimes sending money back.
The communities are agrarian and the area they live in is mainly semi-arid -- many communities are dependent on the variabilities of the weather and of the rainy season itself, which starts about June and ends in September or so -- with periodic lags inbetween, especially during August. A couple of communities have the capacity to irrigate through small natural or artificial lagoons that run water via gravity through cornfields, for example, through a system of dug trenches and shuttles.
Our work since 1994 has been mainly to provide monetary and material resources for education, irrigation, agriculture, and for the construction of improved homes. We also provide a spiritual bridge between people of faith there and here via our direct encounters with each other -- what the community organizers call "Un Puente de Amor" -- a bridge of love. We are not in business of creating dependency, but rather what they call auto-gestación -- self-generation at an interdependent level.
The communities are made up of families and individuals of indigenous-mestizo backgrounds -- this means that they are mixed Indian predominately with some European blood. Many indigenous in Mexico don't know their Indian roots because of the severe forced displacement that occurred earlier in this century and in past centuries to provide labor for plantations -- the people are principally from Nahautl, Mexicali and Otomí indigenous groups with a deeper background in the more ancient Toltec group.
They live on what are called "ejidos," communally held lands that were guaranteed after the Mexican Revolution of 1910 and the Constitution of 1917. This is a structure of communal ownership of land, held by a group of people who decide how that is to be used, and up until recently these lands were held communally in perpetuity. A modification of the Mexican Constitution in 1993 changed this, so that parcels of the land could be rented or sold to outsiders, and so that people within the lands could have private tracts. One example of an abuse of this is when there is an ejido near a plantation -- the plantation owners says to workers from the ejido, "You want a job, sell me your land." Such extortion is common, especially where land is fertile or where it contains untapped natural resources such as oil, gas and uranium.
The pressures are great on the communities from several levels -- a few are mentioned here: (1) economic: no nearby jobs; what they produce they can't sell at prices that are competitive with mega-businesses that operate on economies of scale and low wages to undersell them -- these are two economic problems; one result is outmigration; another is that subsistence levels of living are common (2) social: it's hard to keep families intact because of the economic pressures -- people need to leave the community fabric to work, plus with the expectations that television produces in the way of lifestyle (there are small sets dotted throughout the communities where there is electricity or battery power), the comparisons they make about themselves and their own situation creates difficulties in the face of the realities they live with; (3) physical: the land is semi-arid, the people are strong and are steadily improving their nutrition through various interventions that don't create dependency, but it's a slow process that the economic problems affect negatively in a significant way; (4) educational: education is sporadic, teachers are hard to get, the government is lax in this area because of corruption and the lack of interest in the people's welfare; (4) political: there is no faith in a government that doesn't seek to ensure their rights or their freedom to seek to flourish in their own right.
Some aims of the mission trip:
- To understand and learn the community situation and how community members live.
- To see the Gospel at work in the shared relationship those in the community have with us and others who work with them, principally from Spain -- feet-on-the-ground Christianity.
- To provide some monetary resources for education, health and improved technology.
- To identify projects with the communities that might create future possibilities for a shared relationship.
- To enjoy and respect the community culture and dignity.
THEOLOGICAL AND SPIRITUAL PERSPECTIVE ON THE JOURNEY--
From Wes Rehberg, trip coordinator
Friends:
This is the second perspective piece on the August journey. This briefly focuses on a theological and spiritual reflection.
To begin, a quote from the North Central NY Conference UMC "Report of the Visioning Task Force":
We affirm that the church is being called to move from a perspective of supporting ministry and mission through committees and financial support to one in which the entire congregation is called to be in ministry and mission … To support this trend toward congregations as missional communities, we encourage the development of opportunities for individuals and congregations to participate in hands-on ministry and misson efforts -- local, regional, national and global. And we invite every congregation to actively participate in at least one initiative annually. (pp. 19-20)
Next, from the United Methodist 1996 Book of Discipline, Chapter V:
204: Each local church shall have a definite evangelistic, nurture, and witness responsibility for its members and the surrounding area and a missional outreach responsibility to the local and global community ...
From these two perspectives, the August mission trip is an opportunity for a local church and for others to take part in social-justice mission at a "global" level and to enhance "local" mission efforts as well by providing a "direct encounter" with Christ for congregation members at both levels.
What I mean by "direct encounter" has two parts to it, the connectional aspect of the church and the relational aspect -- two terms now in frequent use. The August trip, and others like it, embrace the relational and connectional aspects because they make "local" what we call "global" -- they provide a direct local-to-local connection in Christ that is an intimate direct relationship between a local church and the place that congregational members visit. This is the direct "hands-on" connection that the Vision Task Force statement above speaks about, opening the development of a deeper understanding of how a direct relationship in Christ exists in the world.
The church now affords an abundance of opportunities for indirect encounters in the world which are less intimate but nevertheless need to be supported. These are through the well-known and highly admirable work of the General Board of Global Ministries and their mission teams, some of whom I've worked with, particularly in Honduras, work which is also represented by missionaries from our conference.
But as admirable as this way of engaging mission is, it's not possible to directly encounter Christ where this work goes on unless one visits a site where Christ is at work among the deeply destitute, the disenfranchised, the denied -- that is, to visit with Christ working in places such as the Christian base communities that we'll visit in August. In the indirect encounter, one does not worship from such a site. One does not break bread with others at that site in celebration of the Christ that lives and intimately connects all who join in the work and worship at that site. One does not sense the struggle of Christ trying to insure that all humans have the opportunity to flourish, their inalienable right as children of God.
What the "direct encounter" does is connect this Christ to the Christ a congregation can witness and share ordinarily in our upstate New York communities -- unquestionably the same Christ. It connects the struggle of Christ at so-called mission sites with the Christ many share, for example, in the Emmaus community, with the Christ that some explore and relate with at the deepest and most expansive levels of spiritual contemplation, and with the Christ who nurtures efforts of the local church in its own environment.
Another way to describe this is to say that such a journey offers a more complete understanding of Christ and of ourselves as the Body of Christ, having the "mind of Christ," witnessing to Christ's work in the world and in ourselves, to the depth of Christ's struggle yet among us and in our midst. This depth is the same depth of Christ that one reaches in the spiritual contemplative work many undertake -- it is the same Christ, the same profound expression in mind, heart and being, but with the proactive sense of Christ working for justice in the world, for the flourishing of the children of God.
One of the common theologies one encounters in Christian base communities is that known as "liberation theology," which I re-interpret as a theology of enflourishing -- God working for justice and righteousness among humans so that they may be free to flourish, with the right to flourish insured through justice.
When one worships at such a site, engages such a site, one engages Christ at work in this way, one disciples with Christ in this work, one's discipleship is deepened in Christ, thanks to the invitation Christ offers at such a site.
