Journal Entry Day 7

Tuesday, Oct. 23, 2012

This morning before our seminar began we went to the Chicuque Rural Hospital to distribute baby hats and blankets (knit by the women of Burke UMC).

There were twins and also a mama who had lost her baby. I wept with her.

There were 6 beds in a room in the maternity. There were only 4 in the NICU. There was no incubators, but they did have one baby on oxygen. They were having to use and adult NC tube

We also visited the pediatric unit and prayed with them. There is a mosque nearby in the town of Maxixie. One of the patients we met was Muslim and preferred for us not to pray for him because if he prayed with us and said Amen it would feel for him like he was agreeing with Christianity and not Islam. We said we understood and respected his wishes and hoped that his child would heal soon.

Next month will be a year since the hospital employees have gotten paid. Yet, the still come to work everyday. Sarah asked the hospital director, “How do the employees feed their families?” His answer was, “I can only imagine. This is my greatest headache every day.”

I saw a child with a wound dressing that appear to be a combination of newspaper and gauze. The viles of medication are in glass vials with snap off caps. The surgical rooms are open air rooms with plastic sheeting hanging around the operating table. There is no air conditioning in the hospital. They also experience a lack of electricity when the town has no electricity because they no longer can use their generator.

We joined the ladies for the last day of our seminar and were able to listen as each woman shared a challenge from their ministry that God helped them to overcome. It was a blessing to hear them share with one another because some women had overcome the very challenge that others were currently struggling with in their setting. Getting water and electricity for their ministry setting, or being rejected from their congregation for some reason. We all found strength and encouragement from hearing how God helped other women overcome some of the challenges in their ministry.

We closed our time together with a time of prayer and blessing for one another as we remembered our baptism which connects us to Christ and to one another.

After the time of sharing for our seminar was over we welcomed a speaker from the Chicuque Rural Hospital. The District Superintendent had requested we allow some time for him to speak to the gathered women. We sat in a small cluster with our interpreter and observed the speaker. It was a fascinating discussion to see him sharing information about health and helping the pastors understand what can be considered “normal.” In some of the communities the pastors shared that when a person is never ill they are considered to be abnormal. There was some back and forth about the information he was sharing because the lived experienced of the pastors in their communities didn’t always line up with what he was hoping they would be able to do and say in their parishes.

-Lisa & Sarah

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