Hello everyone! As I write this ¨Todd Update¨ I am sitting on the porch above the kitchen gazing out onto the property of the foundation of which I work with. A dirt (mud, right now) road leads up from the Pan-American Highway directly to this site where we have many buses, tractors, trucks and many other pieces of machinery. My first impression of this place was, ¨wow, what a bunch of junk!¨ Sure lots of things are sitting on blocks rusting away and the house in which I live may look delapitated to the eyes of a foreigner, but there is something more here. It is what´s behind the junk here that matters. All of this equipment enables many things to get done here and for people in the community to have employment. The foundation does a little bit of everything to better the community of Wacuco and it´s neighbors. Here we grow rice and beans, repair buses for the school system, build roads, construct aquaducts for clean drinking water, build schools and churches and many other things.
So, in the midst of a great deal of unemployment in cental america in general, there is hope here. Hope to bring clean water to the homes of many, so illness will no longer prevail. The hope of employment and job security so families will be fed and their children placed in schools. And the hope of good roads and bridges so people can have safe travel to work and to school. So, despite all the great desparity in the world, there is hope. And that hope helps me realize that what I work for is not in vain. And what I have been discovering more and more lately is how some of us may be called to go volunteer in other countries or the inner cities of the USA, but what is just as important is the work that is being done locally in our home towns. Each one of us can work for justice in one way or another.
Organizing a fundraiser, volunteering in a homeless shelter or soup kitchen, visiting the imprisoned and the sick and many more things can be done on a local level to try to alleviate the suffering of so many in our midst. And even more vital than the temporary alleviation of the suffering of the poor is to work for changing the systems and institutions that cause this suffering in the first place. Letter writing to congress, working with groups to promote awareness of the plight of the poor, protesting injustice, boycotting unfair business practices are all examples of this. Any action that will work to eliminate the root causes of social problems should be taken. There are 800 milion people in the world today on the verge of starvation and about a third of the world does not have adequate drinking water or sanitation. But, this planet has the resources to provide for everyone. It is the distribution of the goods that is lacking. Us, being Americans, have a great amount of influence in this world. It is a great gift and priveledge to be American, but we need to use that gift for good.
I challenge you to think about how you could be a part of the system of change that is needed so much in the world. And this can start now in your neighborhood, in your hometown. Please contact me if you would like to talk about this and maybe work together to find some projects to get involved in if you would like suggestions. I by no means claim to have all of the answers, but I would love to talk it out with you and maybe give some ideas. Thanks all for reading and taking part in what is on my heart and mind. I pray you are all well and I look forward to hearing from you. ¡Que Dios te bendiga!
Here I am in Portobelo, located in the northern part of Panamá. I visited here with the family of the one of the nuns who works here in Wacuco. She is from Colón which is a city near Portobelo. I stayed with her and her family for three or four days and had the opportunity to experience the culture of Colón which is much different than Wacuco. In Colón there is much more of a mix of caribbean culture, spanish culture and a little of the native culture. In contrast, Wacuco or Guacuco as it was originally spelled, has more indigenous (Kuna Indians). So the cultures, food and traditions tend to differ.
Here is the view that I have from my porch overlooking part of the workshop of the foundation in Wacuco. I talk about it in the following section as my ¨junk.¨
