Day Two...7 June 2013

For those who thought day one was a full day, day two most defininetly takes the cake so far for a day replete with depth and meaning and interaction. 

Our day at the Center began with shared prayer and reflection with the entire staff of the Cultural Center of Batahola Norte. 



John Norman, along with McNicholas students Megan Mottola, Kristen Rehl, and Tommy Wegener, led the reflection on the theme of Care for God's Creation. The morning involved a viewing of this video, lectio divina, small group prayer and reflection, and the creation of individual works of art that were joined to create a beautiful arco iris [rainbow] that now adorns a hallway here at the Center.  With the help our best efforts to speak Spanish, and the willingness of bilingual translators, we were able to bridge the language gap and communicate the ways our Catholic faith and our concern for all that God has created are intimately linked, both in word and in art.

We then participated in an English language class that takes place Mondays through Thursdays, and which is taught by Friends of Bathola volunteer Sam Estes.  We gathered in small groups to speak in both English and Spanish to share our names, ages, basic information about our families, as well as the things we are most proud of and some of the dreams and aspirations that each of us carries.  It was a profound opportunity to cross the boundaries of nationality and language to connect so deeply with people that we had only just met.

After enjoying another delightful lunch with our host families, we were privileged to be visited by McNicholas Spanish teacher Senora Carla Wessels, along with her mother, who are presently visiting their coutnry of origin.  We spent an hour with Jesuit priest Father Ernesto Cardenal, who was insturmental in leading one of the most effective literacy campaigns in human history during the early 1980s.  He challenged each of us to consider what sort of responsibility we have to the world and how we might each find our own sense of lasting fulillment in discerning God's will for our lives as we seek to serve others.

We then visited the neighborhood known as Jorge Dmitrov, a community that is characterized by extreme poverty and which has an intimate knowledge of the sort of domestic violence that results from a culture of machismo mixed with the sort of despair accompanying the rates of unemployment that are common there.  We witnessed the initiative of the CCBN staff to faciliate groups of women to value their own sense of dignity, to seek to have their rights as persons respected, and ot seek to denounce and transform the sorts of cycles of violence that so many of them and their children have come to see as normal.  We played games, danced, listened to a story, reflected together, and produced symbolic works of art to communicate the sorts of healthy family relationships we desire.

Our day then closed with an exquisitie musical and artistic performance by many of the children who live in the Batahola Norte community and enjoy the sort of hope and joy that the Center has to offer.  The community‐wide celebration served as both a commemoration of International Children's Day, which is celebrated almost universally throughout the world at the beginning of June, and as an official welcome to our delegation of visitors from Cincinnati.  We enjoyed a privileged seat among the hundreds who were gathered in the chapel at CCBN, watching various groups of children sing, play flutes, guitars, and marimbas.  We also were able to enjoy the beautiful dances that preserve the legacy of traditional Nicaraguan culture through the efforts ot    While the temperature was, of course, sweltering, we were smiling from ear to ear through the duration of the presentation, and we joined the proud applause of parents and grandparents.


We went to bed very tired and yet full of inspiration as a result of the meaningful time we spend with our Nicaraguan brothers and sisters in Christ!