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Little
Elvis Jose and his aunt, Marie Amelia. We'll tell more about
this story later. This little boy died 2 days later. He
was an AIDS baby who survived to age 5.
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It was my
first trip to Mozambique some four years ago. She had approached
our van while we stopped for gas off a dusty, red dirt road. I
first noticed her eyes, white with blindness staring straight
ahead. She didn't say a word, just held up the bag hung on her
arm. As I looked I could see her hands were gone, clean at the
wrists. Then as I looked down at her feet I realized they were
gone too. She was walking on hardened heal-like stumps. I learned
later that in war, cutting off hands and feet is a common practice
of intimidation. We watched her shuffle away and sit down
on the ground to eat her meager meal. As we drove away none of
us spoke. It was all too much to fathom. On one end there
was the injustice and suffering she and surely others here must
have endured, and on the other end the indomitable human will
to live and go on, despite these kinds of burdens. I could only
offer her a loaf of bread. I have never felt so inadequate.
It began to dawn on me then how little I really knew about poverty
and suffering. From our air-conditioned car we had watched
stick-thin women walking with huge burdens of wood for fuel or
heavy water jugs balanced on their heads. Babies were tied to
their backs and swollen-bellied children holding on their skirts.
The scattered houses were tiny huts of mud, sticks and long grass.
War, land mines, disease, birth defects and injuries have left
a large number of adults and children handicapped. It seemed everywhere
we looked there were adults and children with crippled bodies
struggling with a crude stick or just crawling awkwardly along
the ground. In the city the blind and maim are led by young
children whose job it is to spend the day begging for food or
coins. Orphaned children with siblings tied to their backs
wander streets in search of food in the scattered piles of garbage
and sleep in abandoned buildings. You can only see these
things for so long before you close down or your hearts breaks.
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Cindy
and Care for LIfe volunteers on her first trip to a remote
village |
That night,
after the encounter with the woman, I couldn't sleep. I
hadn't wanted to go to Africa, at least not at that time in my
life. I had other important things to do. Now I was
lying in my bunk in the shared dormitory trying to comprehend
this "other world" that, from the perspective of my
sheltered life in middle America, I never knew existed.
Sure, I had glanced at the Newsweek articles on the troubles of
Africa, but I chose to "pass by on the other side" justified
by the fact that there was nothing I could do anyway and I didn't
want to feel sad.
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Cindy
comforting a baby dieing of AIDS |
I got up about
3 AM and went outside to sit under a tree. Finally, sitting there
alone in the dark, I was able to cry. I let the sorrow, the guilt,
the weight of what I had seen and experienced in these first few
days spill out in racking sobs. Finally when I was spent I sat
quiet. Questions filled my mind. Why was I here? What I
was supposed to do with this? Was there a place here for
my paltry offering of a few loaves or fishes? Why had God allowed
his children to come to this kind of existence? I had brought
my scriptures outside with me and I opened them in search of comfort
and answers. As is usually the case, I found them. As I read some
favorite words of Isaiah, I knew that in a future time this woman
would be compensated for all she had endured. The Lord God
will wipe away tears from off all faces, and that Heavenly Father
had sent his Son to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty
to the captives and comfort those that mourn, to give unto them
beauty for ashes and the oil of joy for mourning.
Answers Begin to Come
I still did
not have the answers to why I was here, but they began to come
a few days later on a trip to a remote village. When we arrived
in Mozambique we knew no one, but within the first week we had
many doors open to us in miraculous ways. We randomly met someone
on the street that introduced us to the National Minister of Health.
Learning I was a midwife, Dr. Cossa encouraged us to plan how
we could use our resources to assist in training trainers of traditional
birth attendants. He also asked for help in obtaining simple,
life-saving supplies for the 80% of births that occur outside
of heath care facilities. He explained that a bar of soap, a piece
of plastic, a clean umbilical cord tie and a one-sided razor blade
could literally save thousands of lives of mothers and babies
where infection from unclean birth conditions is a major cause
of death.
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Cindy
carrying Linda on her back; a metaphor of Cindy's feelings
for all of Africa's orphaned children. |
He asked us
to travel to a distant village where they thought this training
was taking place, and to observe it first hand. We drove for two
days on washed-out dirt roads that led to washed-out bridges.
After long delays and dubious detours, we found our way across
the swollen rivers. Alongside the roads we could see the relocation
camps from the recent floods. Many fields were still underwater.
We reached our destination of Majagaza late in the afternoon.
We were impressed with this immaculate little town that seemed
to suddenly appear just as we thought we'd never see civilization
again. We learned it was mostly women who lived there, many of
the men having died in the war. The residents swept the streets
daily. The leaders greeted us with great respect and we showed
them the introductory letter from the Ministry of Health. They
carefully poured water over our hands to let us wash up. We met
in the simple whitewashed town building across from the center
square, and through our Portuguese translator we explained the
purpose of our visit.
As we talked,
darkness began to set in. I waited as long as I could then,
rather obviously, glanced at the ceiling and the single light
fixture as if to remind them it was time to turn it on. Then,
as though they had just realized it, they matter-of-factly explained
that they hadn't had any power in the city for over a year, since
the first floods, and they didn't expect it to be restored since
no one in the government was working on it. Having said that,
they returned to the ongoing discussion. It was a moonless night
and without even a candle we were soon sitting in complete blackness.
We had only the direction that the voices were coming from to
know who was speaking.
The Lord
Had a Plan
It seemed strange and surreal, almost like I could see the scene
from another vantage point. The thought hit me, "How
in the world did I get here in the middle of nowhere, in the middle
of Africa so far from the world I knew?" Then came
a strong impression that I have relied on constantly since. This
was no accident or coincidence. The Lord loved these people
and wanted to help them and desired to use us to be that link.
As I listened to their simple requests of pencils and seeds, and
most of all knowledge, it seemed what they were asking was so
easy, so doable. I could get pencils and seeds and it would
make a difference. I had friends who would help. It was then,
sitting in the pitch darkness in that small meeting that I knew
I would be back. There was something I could do.
I had no idea how or what but I knew the Lord had a plan and that
was enough.
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Cindy
with CFL health volunteers talking to Traditional Birth
Attendants. |
A few nights
later I was reading a few scriptural references on poverty in
the Topical Guide. I came across a scripture that I didn't
understand. 2 Corinthians 8:14, in speaking of the poor, says,
"Out of our abundance we will supply their needs and out
of their abundance they would supply our needs."
I was aware of the abundance I had to share with them, but what
did they have an abundance of that we needed? The answer
came the next day in a little village called Chicagolo. We stopped
to visit there because it was where our native translator traveling
with us was from. I don't think they had ever seen
white people and they ran when they saw us until they recognized
Senhor Bilea. There were a few dried up corn stalk scattered
around but no other sign of food anywhere. They were clothed in
rags with one woman's blouse literally just a few shreds of cloth
around her torso. We sat down with them on the ground as Bilea
got reacquainted and we tried to learn a little about what life
was like for them. Within a few hours of being with them
we were in love with these beautiful, humble and gracious people.
They explained their crops had all been destroyed yet, they offered
to share with us their one scanty daily meal of ground mandioca
root. "We asked if they had a school nearby and the children
pointed to a large tree . 'There is our school' ( under that
tree ) 'except when it rains, then we all run home'. When I asked
what they used to write with they demonstrated by picking up a
stick and writing in the dirt. "
As we were leaving my daughter, Annie, and her friend Erin, walked
hand-in-hand with a new friend each had made. Arriving at
the car they wanted to give them something. Annie found an orange
and offered it to Anita. Anita took the orange, carefully
peeled it and then walked back to a small group of children and
gave one piece to each of them, keeping one for herself.
Those who didn't get any didn't complain, they just watched excitedly
as those who did happily ate their portion. Erin gave a
small handful of almonds to her friend. This girl, too,
gave one almond to several children and saved one almond for herself.
That was when I remembered the scripture in 2 Corinthians: "Out
of their abundance they will supply our needs."
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Linda's
adoption has been approved by the courts in Mozambique.
She is excited to have new parents |
This way of
sharing and being was a way of life to them. It came so naturally.
What they had that they could share with us was something we lacked
and needed. They had an abundance of humility, meekness,
patience, charity and unselfishness that in our material world
we struggle our whole life to develop and often never can. Maybe
the reason we were in Africa wasn't so much about what we could
give and teach, as it was for what we needed to receive and learn.
I remembered my friend Mary Ellen asking the question, "Who
is rich and who is poor?" Maybe the Plan was designed
this way so we could help each other fill in the gaps - each sharing
of their
abundance and being changed and blessed through the process.
Care for Life
Now, some
four years later we have a non-profit organization called Care
for Life. We have a school, a health clinic, orphan support programs
and a teaching farm in Mozambique, Africa. We also have
a new, beautiful brown four-year-old daughter who recently adopted
us. She fits in well with our nine tow-headed grandchildren.
Sometimes in life things just start falling in your lap, and before
you know it, you wake up to find yourself someplace you never
dreamed of but clearly where it seems you were meant to be.
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A
typical Mozambican woman and child. |
"Why
Mozambique?" everyone asks. "Good question!" is
our usual answer. The bottom line, I guess, is because that
is where we were sent. My husband keeps pointing out there
isn't anyplace further away from our home on the whole planet.
Oppressive colonization, a 15 year civil war that ended in '92,
followed by devastating floods has left Mozambique one of the
poorest countries in the world. With very little infrastructure
it makes working there difficult at best. There is no mail system
and few paved roads and little or no healthcare. Only 30%
of the children attend basic school and only 2% attend secondary
school. 75% of women can't read or write. Life expectancy is 36
years. A woman has a lifetime chance of dying of a pregnancy-related
complication of 1 in 9 (compared with one in 8,700 in Switzerland).
In the province of Beira, where we work, there are 50,000 orphans
and 1 in 4 people are HIV positive. In the bigger picture of all
sub-Saharan Africa, there are currently 34 million orphaned children
and that number is expected to rise to at least 42 million by
2010. According to the Human Development report that ranks
poverty in the world, 27 of the first 34 poorest countries are
in Africa. The Human Suffering Index ranked Mozambique as
#1.
But statistics don't tell the whole story. The numbers are
real people to me now, and I see their faces in my mind every
day. Last year I watched a little 5-year-old boy, Elvis
Jose, die after his life long battle with AIDS. Currently I am
waiting for word about a courageous young man who I love like
a son who is now also dying of AIDS. A valiant young missionary,
he got sick and was sent home after 4 months having tested positive
for HIV. I recently sat with Naomi, a 13-year-old orphan who is
caring for her 4 younger siblings. Their parents had died and
they live alone together, getting a little support from a mother's
organization. When asked what her biggest challenge was
she replied, "hunger."
Our Mission
The mission
of Care for Life is to alleviate suffering, foster self-reliance
and instill hope. In our tiny free health clinic we see hundreds
of patients a month. Malnutrition, malaria, cholera, tuberculosis,
worms, skin ulcers, and burns (from outdoor fire cooking) are
common problems. Our school focuses on Portuguese literacy
for women and children, health, and economic development programs
such as sewing, agriculture, English, computers, and budgeting.
Intervention programs such as Valor por Trabalo provide widows
and orphan chldren who are heads of households help with immediate
needs such as food or medicine. The Accompanhmento Program offers
training and financial assistance to help them become self-reliant.
We work closely with two local orphanages. We provide monthly
financial and volunteer support for the Central Provincial Orphanage
that cares for the orphaned babies in the province as well as
other at-risk children with financial and volunteer support. Currently
we are developing a large teaching farm to provide food for the
orphanage and cash to provide on-going financial support.
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CFL
volunteers on beach after morningside testimony meeting
with Church missionaries in Beira Mozambique. President
and Sister Fitch of the Johannesburg South Africa mission
are in middle next to Cindy. This photo is from summer 2002.
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Before I went
to Africa the first time I spoke briefly with a sister who had
served a mission there. She shared with me a saying that
we have come to appreciate more as time goes by. It is this:
"Once you've seen the sun set in Africa, your life will never
be the same again." There are many days I think it's
just too hard, maybe impossible! What are we thinking? Then something
happens that quietly re-confirms that this is what we are supposed
to be doing, and if we let Him guide us it will unfold as it should.
Most of the time I'm just profoundly grateful that, despite my
reluctance, God turned my life down this road.
For more information
about Care for Life visit their website here.
