“You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.”
-Mary Oliver
When I was preparing to come to Kenya, my mother told me, “You will be the only missionary in a bikini.” When I was staying with the brothers and meeting many seminarians they all used to ask me, “Which Teresa are you? Avila? Therese of Lisieux? Mother Teresa?” So here I am, somewhere between Mother Teresa, Teresa of Avila, and Therese of Lisieux…in a bikini. Perhaps I'm simply Little Teresa of the Philippines. :) Each day, I discover more and more how each of us is a unique manifestation of the spirit, and we must seek our callings, our passions, the desires planted deep in that soft and wild place in our souls. This is something I struggled with in my first year of teaching, trying to be what I thought a teacher should be rather than being me, using phrases that jarred my ear and masks that I prayed my students wouldn’t see through.
The same issues have come up with being a missioner in Kenya. I started out thinking, “How would a missioner answer that question?” rather than, “How would I answer that question?” What does simplicity mean to me? How does solidarity with the poor authentically manifest in my life? This sounds clear if you’re St. Francis, the man our school is named after, who literally went blind from so many harsh years of choosing to live in poverty. Sometimes I think that it was easy for Francis and I just wasn’t built to be brave. I’m too soft, too used to my creature comforts to really fully engage with the life around me, to suffer with those who are suffering. And yet, I think we sometimes forget the humanity of the saints. Francis loved beauty and decadence; he was at one point early on quite the wild child. And it is not that he stopped seeing beautiful things or engaging with the delicacies and wildness of life, it’s just that the objects of his admiration evolved as he went deeper into himself and deeper into the world around him. Francis learned to see the beauty, the God, in everything. And that was his call, to show the holiness and sanctity of poverty.
Someone recently dumped piles and piles of sharp rocks on the dirt path leading from the causeway to my school in Kibarani, presumably to make a road at some point. Even with my hiking sandals, it can be a tough trek, especially when it’s raining. One day, I am negotiating (and cursing) these tiny, poky burdens when I see a 4 year old without shoes walking on the sharp rocks that have been baking in the hot sun all day...and I feel this odd combination of shame and pity and something akin to despair.
It’s the same feeling I get when I see Ananias, a skinny little boy in 4th grade, running around in his little sister’s bright pink water shoes. There is no shame in his face, no embarrassment because at least he has something on his feet. And then I come home and look under my bed at my 2 pairs of hiking sandals, 4 pairs of casual sandals, and 2 pairs of running shoes and I wonder about my commitment to the poor, my commitment to dear little Ananias. Ananias who over his month-long vacation went to the ocean and brought me a cowrie seashell. I wonder how I can look him in the eye when I have eight pairs of shoes under my bed, some of which I haven’t used since arriving here. And I can justify it so easily: “They’re used to it, and you actually need all eight pairs of shoes. No, you can’t get rid of that one because it matches with this outfit.”
However, I must engage and must be changed by these sights and sounds. I must stretch and be a bit uncomfortable while also being authentic. And that is a balancing act. That means mistakes will be made, and I will fall over to one side or the other, giving inauthentically or not perhaps engaging enough. This is something I struggle with everyday. One of my boys, Hamisi, lived in the informal settlement of Kwapunda with his 17 year old brother. Someone has apparently bought the land illegally and early one morning a couple of weeks ago, the police hired some men with sticks and knives to rouse the people and harass them out of their houses so that the bulldozers can come knock the houses down. Hamisi’s one-room house was one of those knocked down. Now Hamisi is living on the beach and has been having many bouts of malaria because where do you hang a mosquito net when you are sleeping outside? This is a child I adore, who I would happily give my bed to. But then what? Most of my children share a bed with at least 4 other people in their homes. Shouldn't I give all of them beds too? When there is so much need surrounding you, how do you choose who to help? I have no answers, however I rest in the idea that perhaps it is enough to put ourselves in the way of grace, to be willing to touch the suffering of others and, subsequently, the suffering within ourselves. And maybe even the suffering of the cross. We become mutually transformed, because real relationship always leaves us changed, always leads us closer to Love and Truth. So, dear friends, let us hold this tension in our hearts and be content with not having answers, not having solutions, but having enough love ask hard questions of ourselves and compassion for when we fall short.
The same issues have come up with being a missioner in Kenya. I started out thinking, “How would a missioner answer that question?” rather than, “How would I answer that question?” What does simplicity mean to me? How does solidarity with the poor authentically manifest in my life? This sounds clear if you’re St. Francis, the man our school is named after, who literally went blind from so many harsh years of choosing to live in poverty. Sometimes I think that it was easy for Francis and I just wasn’t built to be brave. I’m too soft, too used to my creature comforts to really fully engage with the life around me, to suffer with those who are suffering. And yet, I think we sometimes forget the humanity of the saints. Francis loved beauty and decadence; he was at one point early on quite the wild child. And it is not that he stopped seeing beautiful things or engaging with the delicacies and wildness of life, it’s just that the objects of his admiration evolved as he went deeper into himself and deeper into the world around him. Francis learned to see the beauty, the God, in everything. And that was his call, to show the holiness and sanctity of poverty.
Someone recently dumped piles and piles of sharp rocks on the dirt path leading from the causeway to my school in Kibarani, presumably to make a road at some point. Even with my hiking sandals, it can be a tough trek, especially when it’s raining. One day, I am negotiating (and cursing) these tiny, poky burdens when I see a 4 year old without shoes walking on the sharp rocks that have been baking in the hot sun all day...and I feel this odd combination of shame and pity and something akin to despair.
It’s the same feeling I get when I see Ananias, a skinny little boy in 4th grade, running around in his little sister’s bright pink water shoes. There is no shame in his face, no embarrassment because at least he has something on his feet. And then I come home and look under my bed at my 2 pairs of hiking sandals, 4 pairs of casual sandals, and 2 pairs of running shoes and I wonder about my commitment to the poor, my commitment to dear little Ananias. Ananias who over his month-long vacation went to the ocean and brought me a cowrie seashell. I wonder how I can look him in the eye when I have eight pairs of shoes under my bed, some of which I haven’t used since arriving here. And I can justify it so easily: “They’re used to it, and you actually need all eight pairs of shoes. No, you can’t get rid of that one because it matches with this outfit.”
However, I must engage and must be changed by these sights and sounds. I must stretch and be a bit uncomfortable while also being authentic. And that is a balancing act. That means mistakes will be made, and I will fall over to one side or the other, giving inauthentically or not perhaps engaging enough. This is something I struggle with everyday. One of my boys, Hamisi, lived in the informal settlement of Kwapunda with his 17 year old brother. Someone has apparently bought the land illegally and early one morning a couple of weeks ago, the police hired some men with sticks and knives to rouse the people and harass them out of their houses so that the bulldozers can come knock the houses down. Hamisi’s one-room house was one of those knocked down. Now Hamisi is living on the beach and has been having many bouts of malaria because where do you hang a mosquito net when you are sleeping outside? This is a child I adore, who I would happily give my bed to. But then what? Most of my children share a bed with at least 4 other people in their homes. Shouldn't I give all of them beds too? When there is so much need surrounding you, how do you choose who to help? I have no answers, however I rest in the idea that perhaps it is enough to put ourselves in the way of grace, to be willing to touch the suffering of others and, subsequently, the suffering within ourselves. And maybe even the suffering of the cross. We become mutually transformed, because real relationship always leaves us changed, always leads us closer to Love and Truth. So, dear friends, let us hold this tension in our hearts and be content with not having answers, not having solutions, but having enough love ask hard questions of ourselves and compassion for when we fall short.