Nueva...

After leaving Santa Elena, we drove north into the Peten in order to visit three more of the ILAG parishes. These parishes had not attended the National Council Meeting and were feeling forgotten... Padre Horacio had not been able to visit for six months because of his heart.

We arrived in Nueva Guatemala and once again were in the middle of nowhere, I had no idea how common of a place nowhere was and just home many people live there. Padre Horacio unbuttoned his shirt and showed the men gathered the scar the runs down the middle of his chest, telling them that he would have visited them if he could... but he is here with them now and Christ has never abandoned them. That being said, the men told their pastor their fears and pain...

They only returned from Mexico four years ago and already many are talking about moving. A damm is being put in near their land which could either won’t have water or the fields will be flooded... either way their crops will not survive. The idea was to sell together and buy new land together so they would have more power, but some have begun to sell and buy on their own so fear reigns. Their children are also not being provided an education so these people need to appeal to the government to uphold its promise of education.

This congregation is the parent congregation to Aurora 8 de Octubre and Santa Elena 20 de Octubre, yet it is struggling the most...

Tiempo de la esperanza... adviento! Padre Horacio dijo que, “Todos hijos de Dios no olividara a Uds!” No matter what God will be with them. Padre Horacio told the men gathered to go home and tell their wives and neighbors that we would be having mass together later that night... the men did not think many would come... Padre insisted that they would come...

The four of us, Padre Horacio, Esther, Horacio and I each went to separate houses for dinner because the people were too poor to feed more than one extra mouth... and when we returned to the church an hour later it was full, full of people who craved the Word, the promises of our Lord for them... and that is what they received.