Compañeros: Two Communities in a Transnational Communion

Compañeros

Two Communities in a Transnational Communion

Joe Gatlin, Nancy Gatlin, and Joel H. Scott

Compañeros

Two Communities in a Transnational Communion

Copyright © 2017 Joe Gatlin, Nancy Gatlin, and Joel H. Scott. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical publications or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher. Write: Permissions, Wipf and Stock Publishers, 199 W. 8th Ave., Suite 3, Eugene, OR 97401.

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paperback isbn: 978-1-5326-1981-6

hardcover isbn: 978-1-5326-1983-0

ebook isbn: 978-1-5326-1982-3

Manufactured in the U.S.A. January 24, 2018

Vamos Todos al Banquete by Guillermo Cuéllar Copyright © 1988, GIA Publications, Inc.All rights reserved. Used by permission.

Photo Credits Introduction—Dawn Noelle Smith Beutler Chapter 1—Joe Gatlin Chapter 2—David Janzen Chapter 3—Joe Gatlin Chapter 4—Joe Gatlin Chapter 5—Joe Gatlin Chapter 6—Dawn Noelle Smith Beutler Chapter 7—Dawn Noelle Smith Beutler Chapter 8—Joe Gatlin Chapter 9—Rodrigo Godoy

Table of Contents

Title Page

Preface

Introduction: Two Communities, the Chasm, Communion, and the Table of Creation

Section 1: The Great Chasm

Chapter 1: The Witness of Romero

Chapter 2: Beginning a Friendship

Section 2: Practices of a Transnational Communion

Chapter 3: Suffering

Chapter 4: Giving Thanks

Chapter 5: Sharing

Chapter 6: Remembering

Chapter 7: Proclaiming

Section 3: The Table of Creation

Chapter 8: Lessons Learned

Chapter 9: Looking Forward: Our Call to Action

Discussion Guide for Those from the North

Bibliography

To the memory of Jorge Molina,

A friend and facilitator of our transnational communion,

and Executive Director of Habitat for Humanity El Salvador for eighteen years

Preface

We were several years into writing this book before we discovered what we were doing.

At first we thought we were helping a community of Salvadoran campesinos (fieldworkers) capture their history in written form. Their breath-taking and tragic account of fleeing their country with government death squads literally on their heels needs to be told and preserved in circles much larger than just those of their small community in El Salvador known as Valle Nuevo of Santa Marta. Their stories include generations of subjugation on the estancias (ranches) of the northern department of Cabañas, a night-time flight along rocky, mountain paths in 1981, the massacre at the Lempa River as they tried to reach safety in Honduras, their growth in solidarity despite destitution and disease through eight years in United Nations sponsored refugee camps in Honduras, and the return to their homeland in 1989 as a disenfranchised yet determined people.

It is a remarkable saga, and the elders of their community tell it with pathos and conviction. Their accounts are replete with vivid images of a bullet-ridden chair, a shrapnel garden, a pillar of light that led them in the night, a base community reading Scripture in a hidden cave, a teacher with only a second-grade education, a champion high-school swimmer who magically appeared when they were trying to cross the swollen river, and Christ hanging on the cross of free trade. Since their repatriation, they have built a community in the Salvadoran countryside and persevered through hunger, depression, death, mental illness, discrimination, alcoholism, illiteracy, the destruction of their farm-based economy by free trade laws, and the exploitation of their land by foreign corporations.

Our progress on the manuscript, however, was slow. Every year we found ourselves backing up and starting over as we tried to capture new concepts and insights discovered through our visits, phone calls, and adventures. With the passage of time—as we moved past the twenty-year anniversary of Shalom Mission Communities’ first visit to Valle Nuevo—our relationship deepened and matured and our perspective changed, and we could not escape the feeling that we were missing something in our writing.

About four years ago, as the three of us sat in a Waco coffee shop musing over the reasons for our fits and starts, the realization hit us that the story we needed to tell was not just their story, but our story, the story of two communities, one in El Salvador and one in the United States, building a relationship. There was immediate clarity; writing about our relationship was what we should be doing. Several developments supported this new direction.

One, the elders of Valle Nuevo had become less desperate in sharing their experience of suffering and loss. Maybe the turning point had come after the hundredth re-telling. It seemed they had relaxed and begun, albeit slowly, the process of healing from the trauma. Their offspring had embraced their history and made it their own. Their friends from the north were not going away; year after year they were returning and still listening. And there was a locally organized effort underway to capture and preserve their oral history.

A second reason for shifting the focus was that those of us from the United States were better able to articulate what this relationship meant to us. We realized the story we told about our friendship with the Salvadorans was about our own transformation. We were not in this relationship to record a deed of mercy or to set right a wrong, but instead to find forgiveness, wholeness, and redemption for ourselves.

A third reason, we had found it is just not easy to describe this experience to others. Those of us from the north are asked, Why are you going to El Salvador again? Whose pictures are these on your wall? Standard categories of north-south encounters are short-term mission or exposure trips with relief, development, or study as an objective, but none of these apply. We struggle to find a way with just a few words to explain our relationship and justify the effort and expense we invest in it.

Conversely, our friends from Valle Nuevo also have told us of their difficulties. They are often asked, "Who are these gringos that keep showing up? Why are they so special to you?" Their answer that they are friends and practically family is met with quizzical looks and outright skepticism. So, with stories and reflections, we attempt in Compañeros to paint a picture that can better explain this relationship we’ve come to call our transnational communion.

While we do commend this type of relationship to others, we are quick to say we have not created a how-to-manual for other communities south or north. It was never our intention to do so. There are no checklists, no sequenced steps, no articulated theory of change, no benchmarks, no measures of success provided herein. For those who are interested we have just these few pieces of advice: 1) resist evil’s power to draw boundaries, create borders, and dig chasms in this world; 2) listen to the Holy Spirit; 3) work out your own salvation with fear and trembling (Phil 2:12).

And we offer a blessing and hope, Christ prepares a table where language, culture, and national politics no longer have the power to divide.

How This Book Was Written

Through the decades many individuals from Shalom Mission Communities have written and shared journal entries and articles about their trips to Valle Nuevo and reflections about the rare occasions when campesinos have been able to visit the Shalom communities stateside. Most of these pieces have appeared in Shalom Connections, our associational newsletter that is available on the Shalom Mission Communities website. In keeping with the Shalom Mission ethos, we have treated these intellectual perspectives and spiritual insights as communal property. Direct quotes and excerpts are credited within. Special acknowledgement is given to Dawn Noelle Smith Beutler of Church of the Sojourners and David Janzen of Reba Place Fellowship for contributions to the text of the book.

Because the campesinos of Valle Nuevo have more of an oral than a written tradition, we have recorded about seventeen hours of their stories and remembrances of the community’s history and its relationship with Shalom Mission Communities. We have also captured a number of quotes from various conversations and meetings in the last several years. In addition, some of the university-educated young adults from the community have written reflections that appear in this book.

The concept of the book has been developed through many discussions during Shalom Mission associational meetings and conversations on the verandahs of Valle Nuevo homes. The last several years we regularly have a designated time for theological reflection with the directiva (the governing board of elders) during our Valle Nuevo visits. There we simply read one of Jesus’s parables, a narrative, or another verse of Scripture and then ask, Who are we in this story? or We’ve been struggling with this Scripture back at home, trying to understand what it means for us; what do you think? An hour or two of discussion always follows with rich insights of how the Scripture reads in our respective contexts as well as our relationship. These sessions have given shape to the ideas and metaphors in this book.

Once a draft of each chapter was finished, we would translate it and send it to Valle Nuevo for their input and review. Reminiscent of how epistles were shared in the first century church, a large circle of people would gather on one of their verandahs and listen to the current installment as it was read out loud. At every step along the way we have stopped to listen to the feedback so we could make sure we faithfully and honestly are capturing the spirit and details of our common story.

The Importance of Words

As explained herein, the Spanish word ‘compañeros’ carries more relational substance than its English counterpart, ‘companion’, and thus our choice of title. Our friends in Valle Nuevo are sensitive to the gender-exclusivity of this word, so the Spanish edition is titled accordingly Compañeros y Compañeras.

From this point forward we will no longer use the word ‘we’ to refer to the authors of this book or to those of us from the United States. This is a communal effort to explain a communion of communities; there is no further place in this account for a we and a they. The first-person plural will be used for the collective voice of both Valle Nuevo and Shalom Mission. The reader will need to discern the we in quotes or reflections of specific individuals.

The next section will introduce the community of Valle Nuevo and its relationship with the larger village of Santa Marta. Valle Nuevo, Valle Nuevo of Santa Marta, Santa Marta, "the campesinos, and occasionally the Salvadorans" will all generally refer to the same community.

Shalom Mission Communities is the name of a small association of Christian communities in the United States. The next section will introduce the individual groups. The association is referred to as Shalom Mission Communities, Shalom Mission, or SMC. The Shalom Mission communities (lower-case ‘c’) is used in reference to the identities, activities, or actions of the individual communities.

One additional matter of style, because Central America is part of North America, we do not use North American to distinguish the people of the United States from the people of El Salvador.

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible unless otherwise indicated.

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At the midpoint of the span over the great chasm where our two peoples have met, we are encountering God’s grace, forgiveness, and wholeness. Although the void below us is still plainly visible, we have been given hope that the chasm will one day be filled.

On behalf of the contributing members of Valle Nuevo and the communities of Shalom Mission, it is our prayer that this book will stir hearts including our own toward a more holistic, inclusive examination of our humanity and the Spirit’s work in the world.

Shalom—

Joe Gatlin, Nancy Gatlin, & Joel H. Scott

Members of Hope Fellowship, a member of Shalom Mission Communities

Introduction

Two Communities, the Chasm, Communion, and the Table of Creation

The Chasm

Between you and us a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who might want to pass from here to you cannot do so, and no one can cross from there to us.

(Luke 16:26)

Communion

For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.

(1 Corinthians 11:26)

The Table of Creation

Let’s go now to the banquet,To the table of creation,Where each one with their own chair Has a place and a mission to share.

(Translated from the Misa Popular—Vamos Todos al Banquete)

Margarita Avilez, Juana Lainez, and Carol Youngquist rest on the way to the Lempa

Two Communities

On a Thursday morning in late June we always go down to the river. A couple dozen of us, half from Valle Nuevo and half from the United States, squeeze into Carlos’s two micro-buses for a bumpy ride along the rocky, red-dirt road that hugs mountainsides, dips in and out of ravines, and passes isolated campesino houses. We eventually cross one final stream and then pull left onto a rocky bank where everyone piles out, stretching to reboot bodies that have turned numb.

A few head off to find bushes suitable for bathroom needs while the rest fill water bottles and chat and wait. Salomé Ascencio, with his machete, cuts walking sticks for the elders to help them keep their footing on the steep and rocky path. There is no hurry and no impatience because togetherness is the primary goal of this outing as well as the entire, week-long Shalom Mission Communities delegation to Valle Nuevo. When all are back together we cross the road and skinny between two posts that create a narrow v-gate in the barbed-wire. Then it is down the footpath, through the cow pasture, under or over a couple of fences more. We will stop to rest at the halfway point while we maneuver everyone over a four-foot high stone fence.

From there we get our first view of the river as it makes a sweeping bend through the surrounding hills. It is beautiful and peaceful; the line that is drawn down the middle of it to separate El Salvador from Honduras is imperceptible. It is difficult for those from the states to imagine that day when it was a chasm of terror and death, but for the campesinos who were there on a Thursday morning in March, 1981, the sight of the Lempa stirs a very deep sadness. One or more may hum a mournful song, and, if she is with us, Juana Lainez will lead out in a softly sung ballad about their journey through the chasm.

When we finally are sitting with our feet in the river, stories are inevitably shared as the people of Valle Nuevo identify rocks where they attempted