Worship in San Rabinac

The largest building, at least that I saw, in San Rabinac is the church. A long wooden building with a dirt floor, some windows that can be shut inthe evening, and filled half way with wooden benches. Length wise thebenches are in two rows... one side for the women and the other for themen. The church leaders have benches up front off to the side of thealtar, and behind the altar are various representations of the holyfamily, Jesus and of course Mary. These representations are colorful andwell cared for. Yes some education is needed regarding the importance of these but they are not central to the gospel.

One of the lies that some Methodists that came into the village told about Padre Horacio and the ILAG was that if the village converted and trusted Padre Horacio would make them take out all of their objects from the church ... trust is a precious comodity in communities here and easy to break or damage... but down here during the war the government tried to pit the people against each other by spreading false information about the different religions (considered different religions not different denominations here) and it worked... much suspicion still exists. The government also made every.... which especially with the evangelicals has continued to be a major evangelism technique church broadcast its services loudly so the government could monitor and it worked... much suspicion still exists...

Anyway... when we woke up the morning of the worship service it was going to be held at 8am... when a meeting with a government project coordinator went over... the service was pushed back a few more times... I don`t remember exactly when it started but hundreds were present when it did. The community speaks a language other than Spanish... so the service had to be translated into their language and into english from the spanish that Padre Jose Antonio spoke. Add to that the fact that this community has only recently become Lutheran and need to be taught the liturgy... and wow is patience necessary... however it is strangely beautiful to see the
patience and understanding of the people. They have been denied so long that they simply hungar for communion, for the Word. A woman, culturally significant, read the psalm. Music was provided by 4 men on the marimba. We spent almost two hours together on that hot late morning in a dark building, lit only by candles but filled with the songs of the people, the
Word of God, and a sense of community.