In the afternoon, we have the opportunity to attend a service and get to know the people of San Miguel Arcangel in Quezaltepeque, a small city west of San Salvador. We have been working on developing a companion relationship with this church over the past three years. This has been partially successful in that we have communicated with them and given support to several small projects that they have undertaken. We have also sent them pictures and letters from the kids in our church school, a video, craft materials, and some other things. The problem has been, however, that the parish has had four priests during this period and it has been very difficult to maintain effective communication with them.
One of our primary objectives for this trip has been to become acquainted with Padre David Alvarado, the current priest, as well as other key members of the church. In addition, our work project, which will begin tomorrow, will consist of teammembers from both San Miguel and Saint Gabriel's working together at a third church, San Esteban Martir, in nearby Sitio de los Nejapas. In this way we hope to strengthen the bond between our churches.
The church has changed greatly since we last saw it: the exterior is painted and fixed up, and best of all, a two-story school has sprung up there. (I'm not sure who funded this beautiful facility, but God bless them!) The school is in operation with a kindergarten and first grade. They hope to add second and third grades, but have no furniture for the classroom at the moment.
We worshipped with the friendly congregation, sang together, and Father Geoffrey (from our team) celebrated in Spanish his second Eucharist of the day, causing a slight stir when he absolved us of our "fish" (pescados) rather than our sins (pecados)! It was graciously overlooked until the end of the day when we couldn't stand it any longer, told him, and had a proper laugh!!
After the service there was a festive gathering with the parishioners, who showed us warm hospitality and served us savory tamales, salad, juice and ice cream, all passed around on trays. We shared our pictures with them and got to know most of the "pillars" of the church. Leaving reluctantly at 5:30, we returned to the guesthouse at San Juan for another great dinner: chiles rellenos, rice, beans, salad and other good things.
It was a day of mixed emotions and enormous admiration for the energy, fervor and commitment of the clergy and laypeople that we have met. We have much to learn from each of them.
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