From Enemigo to Amigo: Lessons from Guatemala

It is hard to believe that it has been over twenty days since I returned from our Sister Parish in Guatemala. The last time I visited there was 2020, days before everything shut down because of Covid. 

I shared in a homily following my return my number one takeaway from the trip: noticing while at prayer one morning the relationship between the Spanish word for “enemy”- enemigo, and the word for “friend”- amigo. I mentioned how, during prayer, it occurred to me that by simply changing a few letters, the meaning of the word changes. For me it spoke that out of our enemies can come our friends. 

My second takeaway was the changes that I saw in our Sister Parish. We stay at a convent, where the Sisters serving our Sister Parish live. The women often stay with the Sisters in the Convent and the men stay in another building. Since I was there last, the people in our Sister Parish have built a dormitory. It is named in honor of Saint Clare, companion to Saint Francis of Assisi. The dormitory is quite an upgrade from the rooms we previously stayed in. There are three rooms in the dormitory. Each room has a fan, a window with a screen, and there is an adjoining bathroom with a shower. The showers now offer warm water. All of these may seem trivial, but in the old rooms, one had to sleep under a mosquito net, windows could not be left open because there were no screens, there were no fans, and the bathroom was outside. While the bathroom had a shower, the water was whatever temperature the water in the tank happened to be that day. 

The week I was at our Sister Parish, we focused on providing medical care. We were blessed to have three doctors with us who were all native Spanish speakers. The only time a doctor visits the village where our Sister Parish is, is when we bring one or more there. During our time there, our clinic was open five days, and we saw over 225 patients at the clinic. These were some long shifts for our doctors. I worked in the pharmacy, counting out pills and filling the prescriptions that the doctors wrote. Almost every person who saw a doctor required one or more prescriptions for what ailed them. Many of the people we saw had diabetes. This is not a surprise, since the staple of their diet is corn tortillas. While they taste delicious, especially when they are warm (and with a bit of peanut butter), they are high in sugar. Many other patients were experiencing respiratory problems. This is a result of their cooking over wood fires inside their homes. For all of the children who come to the clinic, we provide thirty days’ worth of vitamins. 

Both Father Dan and I offered Mass while at our Sister Parish on more than one occasion. Father Dan also heard Confessions. I offered more than a dozen people who were homebound the Sacrament of Anointing of the Sick. After I offered them the Sacrament, one of the doctors would provide a medical check.

We sent two groups to our Sister Parish this year. We hope to continue to send two trips. One of our goals is to have two new people travel with each group each year. So start thinking now about next year. The groups typically travel during the months of January, February, or March. It is not necessary to speak Spanish. No experience is necessary to visit our Sister Parish. Watch for more details about upcoming trips next fall.