Una  Fraternidad soñada por Daniel.         

 Normalmente todo mundo supone que un sacerdote catolico vive solo. Tal vez seria mas preciso decir que lleva una vida solitaria, marcadamente individualista. Este estilo de vida, llevado con residumbre por muchos sacerdotes lleva a situaciones sin salida, de salud o emocionales, que a mediano plazo impactan negativamente en el servicio pastoral. Durante los años que Daniel estuvo asignado a la Parroquia del Santo Niño, en el Palo Verde, lanzo la iniciativa de vivir fraternamente con otros dos compañeros sacerdotes; sin ningun tipo de jararquia (nadie seria parroco, ni habria vicarios, etc). Una experiencia similar he visto en la Diocesis de Rochester, donde dos o mas sacerdotes colaboran en una area pastoral y viven juntos: les llaman co-parrocos.

            Daniel Landgrave, Reyes Yepiz y Luis Enrique Sinohui vivian juntos: Una comunidad sacerdotal, fraterna, apoyandose mutuamente y colaborando en la evangelizacion. “La comunidad de amor”, como llego a llamarseles, no fue aprobada por todos. Sin embargo recogia anhelos e intuiciones muy validas. Como vivir con equilibrio las tensiones emocionales y afectivas, en medio de las demandas pastorales? Podria el sacerdotes vivir como un signo de comunion autentico, sin hermanos concretos y refugiado en una soledad individualista?. Ese equipo fraterno simbolizaba mas de lo que lograron vivir; era un gesto profetico que anunciaba lo limitado de un servicio pastoral que se basa en las capacidades de una sola persona, o en sus dones e incluso su desarrollo espiritual. En logica con lo que Daniel descubrio de los pobres:  vivir en alguna forma de relacion con otros pobres. Esta relacion supone la aceptacion realista de la propia dependencia. Una de las dimensiones menos asumidas por los sacerdotes es la de saberse y sentirse dependiente, por la pretencion de ser lider, pastor y guia. Creo que es una de las cosas a la que nos abrio la experiencia de los compañeros. Entrar en el camino de los pobres, no como “redentores”, sino como “sanador herido”: vivir las dimensiones frustrantes y realizadoras del servicio, pero junto con otros hermanos, ayudandose mutuamente a reconocer y aceptar las propias heridas. Este proceso, eventualmente, nos lleva a aportar riqueza humana y espiritual, desde nuestra propia herida y no desde nuestra autosuficiencia, por mas que pueda ser respaldada por capacidades y virtudes personales.

       No se trataba de volver idilicamente a los tiempos del seminario, ni mucho menos se trataba de transplantar la experiencia comunitaria que tiene la vida religiosa.

       Mas tarde, Daniel y otros encontrariamos en el camino varios medios, que una espiritualidad impulsada por varios sacerdotes diocesanos viene practicando, precisamente en esta experiencia farterna. El estudio de evangelio es una disciplina personal, pero su riqueza se plenifica en el compartir fraterno. Igualmente la atencion a la vida y a la realidad. La vision de una sola persona puede ser muy aguda, pero no deja de ser la mirada de uno solo. El contemplar conjuntamente la vida y la realidad permite reconocer llamadas especificas y desafiantes del Espiritu, que finalmente nos acercan a las cosas como las quiere Dios.   

 

 

Daniel Landgrave: Los pobres pusieron sabor a tu busqueda.

          Un joven de buen nivel socio economico, de un dia para otro decide ensayar una ruta no convencional para su vida. El seminario de Hermosillo era un espacio de busqueda. El ambiente fraterno, con la herencia de “La parcela” dejada por Don Juan Navarrete y en la epoca mas creativa del post Vat II, algo se respira: Los jovenes seminaristas de ese entonces sospechan que hay una Buena noticia por descubrir y no pueden creer que esa Buena noticia esta escondida en su propia vida y en esa misma vida se pueda hacer carne.

Daniel encabeza esa busqueda, es entusiasta y tiene espiritu para animar a otros.

Al rededor de los 70’s, los estudiantes de teologia, entre ellos Daniel, estan abiertos a la reflexion teologica. El aula es una invitacion, saben que hay algo que vale la pena en el “saber teologico”, pero a la vez experimentan con desazon que lo que pasa en el salon no presenta desafios interesantes. Quienes recien entrabamos al seminario veiamos y oiamos que algo estaba pasando entre los mas grandes. Casi al terminar el ano nos enteramos de que un equipo coordinador de teologos planeaba no regresar al siguiente ano si no se implementaba un plan concreto para renovar y mejorar la planta de maestros. Aquel equipo esta dispuesto a cumplir y presionar si no habia respuesta.

El movimiento tuvo impacto. Don Carlos Quintero y el equipo del seminario deciden enviar estudiantes a Roma, para fortalecer el grupo de maestros. Un grupo de companeros abren el camino para estudiar en la Gregoriana y convivir con companeros de todo Mexico en el Colegio Mexicano. La primera estancia de Daniel en Roma, la seguimos varios con atencion: las cartas que escribe, especialmente a Nacho Valdez, son una nutrida bitacora de esa aventura de estudio y redimensionalizacion de la conciencia en una Roma, donde la Universidad Gregoriana es ya un laboratorio de globalizacion, por la rica diversidad de jovenes llegados de todo el mundo.

Con una licencia en Sagrada Escritura regresa para ensenar en el Seminario de Hermosillo. Para esa epoca los que habiamos visto con perplejidad las protestas de nuestros companeros telogos hacia 5 u 8 anos estabamos ya en teologia. Acogimos con entusiasmo al biblista recien llegado. Las jornadas biblicas con Daniel, tenian contenido y transmitian el saber de los ya legendarios maestros de la escritura como Luis Alonso Shockel… exploramos, conducidos por Daniel, horizontes nuevos para acercarse al antiguo testamento. Consiguio inspirar en nosotros una perspectiva critica de la biblia y una inquietud por dejar que la Palabra hiciera impacto en nuestras vidas.

Esa Palabra habia ya tocado su vida. Aun sin tener la experiencia de proceder de una familia pobre…algo encontro en Jesus y su evangelio que lo hizo trastocar sus valores y replantearse todo desde el mundo de los pobres.

Roberto Resto

Nos encontramos en el caminar. Las luchas que valen la pena se comparten con ocasion de encuentros no intencionales: Sin proponernos, sin dejar de caminar conocimos a Roberto Resto.
Un heredero de Puerto Rico. De esas personas que llegaron al marxismo entendido como teoria y como practica, despues de varias luchas sociales en su propia patria de origen y en los movimientos de los trabajadores en los Estados Unidos.
Crei que esta filosfia y este pensamiento dinamico, no podria ya animar a personas concretas, salvo los que dedican su vida al estudio de las formaciones teoricas. Pero no era este el caso de Roberto, el encarnaba en formas concretas su vinculacion con la teoria marxista.
Llevaba en su propia memoria los absurdos de la guerra de Vietnam, era veterano de este confilcto inutil sostenido por los Estados Unidos y cada vez que era oportuno Roberto se unia a cualquier marcha de los veteranos.
En Rochester cuando se anunciaba una manifestacion a favor de la paz, o por la dignidad de los trabajadores y ultimamente a favor de los inmigrantes sin documentos, todo mundo sabia que era Roberto quien encabezaba la organizacion y la manifestacion misma.
Habia quienes de entre los hispanos veian con suspicacia su militancia (y su identidad marxista). Pero la gente migrante nunca supo su orientacion ideologica...y Roberto, comprometido en el apoyo al movimiento pro-migrante, pudo sintetizar bastante bien su frente de lucha socio-politica con la sensibilidad fraterna para ofrecer en muchas ocasiones su servicio personal y oportuno a gentes migrantes que necesitaban apoyo....
Despues de los intensos esfuerzos a los que nos sumamos muchas personas en USA para presionar hacia una reforma migratoria, vivimos una experiencia de agotamiento y frustracion:
No tenia caso dedicarse a participar en las manifestaciones, mientras se nos dispersava la energia que necesitavamos para acompanar y sostener a familias y personas de nuestra comunidad migrantes sometidas a situacion de persecucion.
Roberto nos estuvo buscando...nosotros evadiamos las reuniones. Varias ocasiones teniamos ya fecha y hora para reunirnos y ver que hacer juntos...pero nunca se realizaron.
Unos dias antes de su muerte. Roberto y su companero incondicional nos alcanzaron en Marion: El unico espacio para una reunion ahi, en el pequeno templo recien dedicado a Nuestra Senora de Guadalupe, eran las bancas frente al sagrario.
Esa tarde Roberto estuvo conversando sobre la importancia crucial de la poblacion migrante para revertir el sistema dominante y buscar formas mas dignas y justas para quienes se ven forzados a vivir en las sombras...sin tener nada que ver con la criminalidad.
Yo le decia a ambos que no podiamos tener otras agendas que comprometieran nuestro tiempo y nuestro animo para acompanar a las personas de nuestras comunidades.
Roberto insistia que nuestro servicio, aunque fuera inspirado en la experiencia de fe, era una tarea que incidia en la poblacion: "Ustedes estan con las bases..."
Dos dias despues leia en el periodico que Roberto Resto habia muerto en un accidente.
Sin duda un testigo.

Everett Hobart, Reflections...

April 11 1999 Cycle A Easter Time

A few years ago, we came across a migrant labor camp about a half mile into a orchard in Orleans County. At the end of the dirt road, was a cinder block barracks building with a communal kitchen. There were about 25 people from Mexico and
Central- America, who had come to harvest the apples. I returned to that camp several times during the summer to facilitate a bible study group. Among the workers, there was a young man, Carlos, who turned out to have been trained to lead prayer and liturgies of the word in his home village in the mountains of Honduras since a priest could only get there on horseback about once a year to celebrate sacraments. One evening, Carlos said a prayer in which he thanked God for having provided them a work in a safe place where nobody bothered them, for, the friends, which they had made at the camp, and for the church that had reached out to them in this place so far from home.
On the evening of November 1st, Fr. Ivan Trujillo, a Bolivian priest living in Batavia, came to the camp to celebrate mass of All Saints’ Day. The readings, centered on beatitudes, were especially powerful when heard in that humble place.
When we hear of the disciples meeting behind locked doors for fear of the authorities,
yet celebrating the resurrection of our Lord and breaking bread, I can’t help but think of that camp and the good people in it living in fear of “la migra” – the agents of immigration- and yet celebrating their faith and breaking bread together in their communal kitchen.
The next summer, I got a phone call from Carlos, “Me and my eleven friends have just finished picking blueberries in New Jersey. Is there work for us in New York State?”
I was a little taken back and told him to call me back on the following Thursday. I called Sr. Mary Jane, Director of the Ministry, and said that she would check around. The next day, she gave me the home phone number of a Spanish speaking man in the State Labor Department who would be expecting Carlos’ call on Thursday. Wednesday evening. I got
another call, “We are in Williamson!”. I gave him the phone number and suggested that he contact other organization. On Sunday, he called again, “We’re at the motel in Albion; our money is running out; the State Department of Labor say there might be something in a few weeks; the orchard where I worked last summer can only take two of us and I can’t abandon my friends. What can I do?” I was flabbergasted, what could I do? I called Sr. Mary Jane and she said that she would pray for a small miracle. That evening, I drove up to Albion to see Carlos and his friends. As I entered their room, Carlos said, “With one more, we’d be the twelve disciples!” Next evening, I went to the home of Sylvia Davis, one of my coworkers in the migrant ministry. We went out into her garden filled a bag with jalapeños and tomatoes and then went over to visit a woman at Sodoma Farms and her husband, the crew chief. After a bit conversation, we broached the subject of 11 Hondurans looking for work. A funny look crossed the crew chief’s face, then he said, “That’s strange, 12 Mexican left this morning”. Sr. Mary Jane’s small miracle had happened! I talked to Carlos and his friends a number of times during the season. When I asked how they had had the courage to come up here with absolutely nothing, they replied quit simply: “We knew that God would provide for us”. In Peter’s letter to the “chosen sojourners of the dispersion” he said, “Although you have not seen him you love him; you rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy as you attain the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls”.
The next summer, I went to visit another camp one evening. As I was walking through, I heard a voice call out “Hermano Pablo”. It was one of my Honduran friends back for another season (they call me Pablo since Everett is tough for a Spanish speaker to pronounce). That season, Sylvia and I facilitated a RENEW group among Hondurans. The insights that they shared with us were very powerful. When we finished the series and the men were getting ready to leave, we could not keep ourselves from saying to them: “We have seen the face of Jesus in the face of each of you”. In a small way, we shared in Thomas’ exclamation “My Lord and my God”

Everett Hobart: Reflections on Migrant Ministry


January 17 1999 2 A Ordinary


Have any of you ever met our Lord Jesus? You probably have.
Even though we may encounter Him from time to time, we have trouble recognizing Him. We all are familiar with that passage in the scripture where the righteous asked “When did we ever see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? When did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? And our Lord replied, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me” (Mt 26,35-40).
John the Baptist was fully aware that his entire reason for being was to prepare the way for the Lord. But even he didn’t recognize Jesus until the Spirit came down. Most of us van look back and recognize occasions when we have had an overwhelming sense of the presence of our Lord. That’s when the Holy Spirit was speaking to us.
Eighteen years ago, I had never been outside of the Northeastern US, except for brief business trips, when I was assigned the role of liaison between a laboratory in Torreon, a city of some 200,000 people in North Central Mexico, and the New Jersey laboratory where I worked. After a crash course in Spanish, I headed south of the border. On that first trip, of many, I arranged to spend a weekend in Mexico City. Sunday morning, I was walking around the center of the city when I came upon the Metropolitan Cathedral, founded over 450 years ago. I asked when and where the next Mass would be celebrated and was told: “At noon in that chapel”. Soon, a lively young priest appeared to instruct us in the responses: “Remember, Alleluia is like Ole at the bull fights”. He taught us a song to be sung as we went in procession to the main altar where the Cardinal was to celebrate Mass. Suddenly, I found myself to be the only “gringo” in the midst of a sea of smiling and welcoming Mexican faces marching down the main aisle of the Cathedral of Mexico singing, “Juntos como hermanos”, which roughly translates to: “Together we are brothers and sisters, members of the Church marching ever onward to our meeting with the Lord”
That was one of those overwhelming moments that I mentioned before. As Paul pointed out, we “have been called to be holy, with all those everywhere who call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, their Lord and ours”. Isaiah had prophesied, “I will make you light to the nations that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth”. Well, this experience in a world entirely new to me certainly helped me to realize the truth of that prophecy.
In late 1992, my wife and I moved to Spencerport from New Jersey. The next summer, Sr. Mary Jane Mitchell came to St. John’s to describe her work with the Hispanic migrant ministry. After Mass, as I walked out past her, I said: “Buenos dias, como puedo ayudarla?” And I was hooked. Ever since then, I have been involved with the ministry, visiting the camps and helping to organize the work. I can certainly testify to the truth of the statement of Bishop Fizpatrick of Brownsville, Texas who said:
“ The apostolic Christian’s approach to the Mexican-American farmworker must not be one of bringing Christ to the farmworker family, but of finding Him there.”
Each year some 2500 migrant workers come into the region between Buffalo and Rochester to tend our crops along with permanent core community of some 300 persons. Without these workers the farms couldn’t survive. The great majority of them are from Mexico and Central America, their cultures thoroughly saturated with the Catholic faith. Unfortunately, they exist on the margins of society; isolated by language, prejudice, fear of abuse by authorities, and unjust laws. They work long hours, often over 10 hours per day, six or seven days per week without overtime pay. They live in remote camps, often with no transportation.
The Catholic Church has a great responsibility to provide the spiritual well-being of these visitors. We have to make them feel welcome, provide opportunities to celebrate their faith, help them to deal with their problems and advocate for them both to legislative bodies and to the Anglo community in general. The Hispanic Migrant Ministry sends teams out to visit the camps, spread information about services available to the migrants and welcome them into the area in the name of the Church.
We have formed renew small groups in Spanish in several of the camps during the summers and in Nativity Church in Brockport for the permanent residents during the off-season. We arrange to have Spanish Mass every week at Nativity Church. Padre Ivan offers Mass at a number of the camps, whenever he can. We prepare parents and sponsors for Baptism and children for first communion. We celebrate special feast days such as the Day of the Dead (All souls day) and the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Each June, we collaborate with the Brockport Ecumenical Outreach Committee to have a “Bienvenida”, or welcoming celebration with Mass, dinner and dance for the workers. This letter from one migrant worker says that we must be doing something right:
“I think that it is a great work –the valuable time which you have shared with us, make us feel important in a Country so big…no one will pay you, your treasure is building up in haven and only God will repay you. Keep moving ahead as apostles of Christ.”

Everett Hobart

On January 20, 2008, our friend Everett ended his journey among us. His death is once more a witness of hope and solidarity. It never stopped being one in reality.
Some months before his death, Everett left me as a legacy a volume of homilies that he had been giving in different parishes during the three liturgical cycles. The purpose of his homilies was to promote in the consciences of the Anglo communities a correct vision of the dignity and mission of the migrant population among us.
The Hispanic migrant community of Brockport valued very much the closeness and apostolic availability of Everett.
Those of us, who shared in the efforts to fulfill to the pastoral needs of the community, knew first hand his evangelical quality, his deep sympathy for the members of our community.
During this year and the next one, we would like to honor the memory of Everett publishing, little by little his reflections. Now, that I have been reading them, his humility and commitment are becoming more transparent to me. I listen to his stories and his faith experience in his encounters with the migrant men and women of our community.
Believers like Everett have undoubtedly already been resurrected by the Lord that he constantly proclaimed.
He showed the sensitivity of a true disciple, and the teachings that he left to those that appreciated him are worth being collected and followed due to their simplicity.
People like Everett, are the proof of how a local Church opens to embrace those that arrive from other cultures and other traditions to become part of the same and only Church. I believe that his testimony is already a fertile seed that is spreading the multicultural Gospel of justice, solidarity and the kingdom of fraternity that Jesus started.

Thanks, Everett.

Madona de Guadalupe Tonantzin

The Mexican people who cross our border pack among their scanty belongings a picture of the Virgin of Guadalupe.

The face of the Virgin and the story of her meeting with Juan Diego (the young Aztec man recently declared a saint by Pope John Paul II) symbolize the powerful and dramatic birth of a community.

Caught between two cultural worlds and arriving at a border marked by violence the indigenous people of Mexico discover the face of the “God through whom we live.”

With her dark skin and facial features combining both races, the white and the brown, Guadalupe liberates the capacity and the courage in the hearts of indigenous people to travel the path of rebuilding a community butchered and raped of its human dignity.

Every migrant has to learn that only the strength of poor people can change the direction of world history. Yes, whoever has power can lord it over many things. Yet the truly profound human transformations happen when “flower and song,” as the indigenous say, are united— when a people who aren’t even aware of their own rights and dignity dare to lift themselves up, to believe, and to set out on the road. Those people have indeed become, each one, a Juan Diego. They feel new strength, they have a “mother” who encourages them and has faith in their capacities. “Am I not right here and now your own mother?”

The transformation of what was impossible is under way.

Chabeto: Un discipulo...amigo.

No, no era un modelo imitable de apóstol. Chabeto era un “verdadero discípulo”, un hijo del campo y del desierto de Sonora.
Demasiado coherente, como para haber vivido mucho. Creyó en la pobreza, como despojo y como libertad para compartir y compartirse.
Desarrollo una sensibilidad profética que le permitía pasar largo tiempo escuchando a las personas mas pobres de los lugares donde servia.
Asumió el sacerdocio católico, no se si porque no conoció otras opciones de vida o por que en nuestros pueblos el sacerdote católico representa una imagen respetada y acogida por la gente sencilla.
Su vida y su estilo no encajaban en lo “normal” de un presbítero.
La gente que lo trato sospechaba que aquel animador, flaco y cargando siempre su guitarra, llevaba la buena noticia…porque el la descubría primero en el corazón y en las vidas de las personas que encontraba.
A juicio de su Obispo, el ministerio de Padre Chabeto no concordaba con lo que la Iglesia esperaría de un Párroco. Lo suspendió, temporalmente en el ejercicio de su ministerio. Durante esas ocasiones aquel profeta frágil se refugio en su pueblo, volvía a su familia. El ambiente de la vida de la sierra, la simplicidad de sus vecinos, le devolvía a la autenticidad de discípulo.
Un apasionado por la justicia. Dondequiera que obreros, campesinos, habitantes de suburbios se organizaran para defender sus derechos...siempre se hizo presente Chabeto. Animando con su palabra, entusiasmando el esfuerzo de los hombres y mujeres que buscaban el cambio social, la justicia y la dignidad.
Campesinos, hombres y mujeres, de varios pueblos de la Diócesis de Hermosillo, recuerdan la calidez de su abrazo, el tiempo sin reservas que pasaba con cada quien, como si solo a esa persona estuviera dedicado. Y no era en plan de trabajo, ni siquiera en plan de trabajo pastoral, sino en una transparente presencia amistosa, en una cercanía e incondicionalidad profundamente humana…que le daba otra dimensión al encuentro.
Me impresiono mucho esta manera cotidiana de hacer acontecer la trascendencia que Chabeto conseguía.
Que hizo posible esta sacramentalidad de su vida?