During the storm, I received emails and texts from friends
in the missions around the world who, by the miracle of technology, were tracking
the storm, watching Boston and sending prayers our way. One in particular came from Father Gabriel
Msipu, pastor of the sub-parish of Mary, Mother of God in the Diocese of Chipata,
Zambia. Father’s location was one of the
last that I visited in June 2011.
Through local labor and donations, and help from the Propagation of the Faith, they had
built a place of worship, an outdoor meeting space and a block of offices and
classroom spaces. What they lacked to become a full time parish was a rectory;
what they lacked to build a rectory was indoor running water.
It was ironic to me that what we were all rushing to the
store to buy in bottles due to the hurricane was something that Father Gabriel
and his people could not get in their homes and parishes on a daily basis.
In his email, Father assured me of his prayers and reminded
me of his own hope to go deeper into the African bush to serve the indigenous
people of his rural diocese in a place called the Luangwa Valley.
The residents of this area are people on the move – they
travel with the seasons. While their crops grow, they live with them,
protecting them from local wild animals – elephants, hippopotamus and
baboons. During the rainy season, they
are literally isolated; the rains flood them in and keep them from travelling
outside their own villages from our late fall to late spring. That means they go without faith formation,
sacramental preparation and, most importantly, Eucharistic celebration for up
to five months, generally missing Christmas and Easter because no priest can
reach them.
While we watched the wind and rain blow in from Sandy,
knowing that some would lose power, praying that no lives would be lost, my
thoughts and prayers were also with Father Gabriel and the people of the
Luangwa Valley knowing that through the support of all the Pontifical Mission
Societies, one day the Diocese of Chipata may have more priests to spare to
serve all their people no matter the weather.
-Maureen Crowley Heil
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