Winter Journal
This journal page represents our own personal, subjective thoughts and feelings, and in expressing them we speak only for ourselves, and not for the Reformed Church in America or the Hungarian Reformed Church.
December 23, 2007
It is the fourth Sunday in Advent. We have just returned from Karpathia, Ukraine. We visited a Roma school meeting in a small room attached to the back side of a Roma church. We were delivering clothes for the church to distribute to those who need them most, which is a difficult thing; difficult because many watchful eyes in the camp will pay close attention to who gets what and to who may get nothing or less than some think they should. It was 4:10 p.m., pitch black and bitter cold. Relying on the light shining out through the classroom’s small window we made our way over the frozen mud, through the gate, past the church’s dark, foreboding outhouse to the back of the church where steps lead up to the classroom.
Inside, Jolan, a Roma woman who teaches at the school, watched while two young adult volunteers read a Christmas story while the children colored pictures about what they heard. One of the volunteers, Tünde, is an ethnic Hungarian from the Transylvanian region of Romania. It’s very far from her home to this remote corner of the planet. The other volunteer, Katinka, came from Freiburg, Germany, to spend these eleven months in this small village. Katinka is visually impaired and wondered what the children might think of that when they’d first met her last September. For the children it is no big deal. Nearly everybody they know has an impairment of some kind or another. It doesn’t seem to be a big deal to Katinka, either; she is a genuinely optimistic and caring person—two qualities that can be hard to find in some Roma camps.
The classroom is actually warm. It has a large, floor to ceiling ceramic furnace in it. It may be the warmest place in the entire Roma camp. In some of these little Roma schools the kids show up as early as 7:00 or 7:30 hoping somebody will come early to start the fire in the stove before school begins at 9:00. The stark, barren world here in Karpathia couldn’t be more different than the world the volunteers—and Carolyn and I—have come from. There is no glitz, no hype anywhere, no trees or Christmas lights in many of these homes; nowhere to do “Christmas shopping” (and perhaps for most, no money to shop with). The advent wreath at the church/school is a picture somebody colored and stuck on the wall.
So this morning in worship at our church in Budapest I thought about Jolan, the Roma children and the homes they come from, and about the volunteers who are giving a year of their lives in a way that many people would not understand. I thought about them all as we sang this hymn:
When out of poverty is born a dream that will not die,
and landless,weary folk find strength to stand with heads held high,
it’s then we learn from those who wait to greet the promised day,
“The Lord is coming; don’t lose heart. Be blessed; prepare the way!”
When people wander far from God, forget to share their bread,
They find their wealth an empty thing, their spirits are not fed.
For only just and tender love the hungry soul will stay.
And so God’s prophets echo still, “Be blessed; prepare the way!”
When God took flesh and came to earth, the world turned upside down,
and in the strength of woman’s faith the Word of Life was born.
She knew that God would raise the low, it pleased her to obey.
Rejoice with Mary in the call, “Be blessed; prepare the way!”
Transformed Lives
November 1, 2007
“What do we want this program to accomplish?” John asked. “What is the purpose of this Roma-Gadje volunteer program?” It’s good to ask this question from time to time no matter who you are or what you do. This time it was a “Partners’ Meeting”—a meeting of representatives from more than a dozen volunteer organizations from across Europe who work together placing Roma and Gadje (non-Roma) young adult volunteers in communities for up to 11 or 12 months.
Gyuri was sitting at the opposite end of the table from me. “Transforming lives!” he said. “We do this because we want to see lives transformed!” We talked a bit about whose lives get transformed. We certainly hope that some of the people with whom the volunteers work will be affected if not changed. But we especially hope—and believe—that the volunteers themselves will never be the same after giving themselves to others and (in the case of the volunteers in our program) serving in Christ’s name. We hope and trust they will be transformed by engaging in challenging conversations with people who are different than they, and who cause our volunteers both to look with deeper understanding of themselves and their of their God. And we have seen this happen, sometimes in dramatic ways, with volunteers who have already served.
I think this is what Gyuri had in mind. He works for the Roma Self-Government Center for Hungary located here in Budapest. He has been very helpful sending young adult Roma volunteers into service in places and with people new to them.
I nodded as Gyuri spoke about transformed lives. It is the same language the RCA president Brad Lewis used when he visited us earlier this year in the spring. We introduced him to the volunteer office staff and to some former volunteers who are still in Hungary. They didn’t say, “This transformed my life!” but after some of them shared their stories of personal experience and the challenges and strength of growing in Christ, it was clear that this (transformation) was exactly what they were talking about.
So this is why we do it: In a world of misunderstanding, deep poverty, mistrust, bigotry and racism, we want to participate in a movement of radical change—personal transformation—beginning with ourselves.
Former Journal Entires:
The Problem of Taking Pictures
September, 2007
Our website server lost our photos. What good is a website without photos?
The problem is that the longer I am here the less I want to take my camera along to anywhere I am going when in Roma communities.
Why?
Because when I am with Roma--especially on their home turf--I simply want to "be" with them and I don't want to exploit them by snapping their pictures for the sake of publicity or anything else. I don't want my time with them to seem like an opportunity for anything other than simply being with them for the sake of the relationship that we are trying to build. Too often when westerners enter these camps and villagers they come in groups with cameras galore...clicking away as if they were in at Disneyland--or the zoo--which I feel is dehumanizing. Then on they go after a short visit. And what was the meaning of this "visit" other than serving as a "photo op"? I don't mean to sound cynical. But I do want to represent something different.
It is a dilemma. Without photos it is hard to tell the story of Roma to others. But I am reluctant.
Stay tuned. New photos will come; but slowly and carefully. I hope you understand.
~~Dick
ROMA HOLOCAUST REMEMBERED
August, 2007
The wreaths line the wall outside of the Roma Self Government Centre in downtown Budapest. They come from Roma groups and other groups as well from across Hungary, Europe and beyond. They line the street as a remembrance of those who died during the holocaust of the WW II era. It wasn't only Jews who were sent to the camps and died. Some Christians were sent. And homosexuals. And of course, Roma. Perhaps half a million of them.
Half a million people we rarely if ever hear about. In a very long history of hatred from the 'outside' world this had to be one of the darkest chapters--if not the darkest. As with the Jews, they were "guilty" of only one thing: their race; their ethnicity.
Why didn't we ever learn of this when we were in school?
Why aren't our children hearing their stories in their history lessons now?
THE VOLUNTEERS' YEAR IS WINDING DOWN
July 11, 2007
We have started to say good-bye to some of the volunteers who have finished there time of service in Hungary or Transcarpathia. Some have already left; others leave soon. Some are involved in Roma summer camps and that is a great way to end the time here.
We have met some fantasitic young adults this year who could have done any number of things but chose to come here. One of them--Gérgö from Hungary who worked in a small village in Ukraine told me "It was the most difficult year of my life." Then he smiles and adds: "It was the best year of my life!" For him and others who came from abroad to volunteer with children in Roma schools, it was a time to face the challenges of immersion in a new culture. Actually it was several new cultures: A change in ethnic culture, in racial culture, and certainly in a culture of poverty. All of these cultures have their own set of (largely unspoken} rules that are often learned the hard way. In the midst of it all, Gérgö and some others are able to describe the power of personal transformation by the Spirit of God.
Sometimes volunteers come from one place to another--especially from America to another place--and they expect that the whole volunteer experience will be about what they have to offer to the "needy people" they come to. They don't always expect that what the program is really about is how the experience may challenge and change them. It is not only about what they give, it is also about what they receive from the people they came to serve.
In Hungary and Ukraine--even with many difficulties and challenges--it has been a very good year. Thanks be to God!
IT STRIKES US AS ODD...
June 26, 2007
Sitting in a flat with friends in a remote part of Ukraine recently we heard of a local woman with a severe seasonal allergic reaction. Her face and eyelids were so swollen she could not see. She was able to get to a doctor who prescibed the following remedy: He told her to pee on a clean cloth and then let the cloth rest over her eyes. True, urine is sterile, but is there any clinical evidence this will help?!? It turns out this is not such an unusual 'treatment.' But it strikes us as odd. Meanwhile, we continue to seek ways where Carolyn can be more directly involved in healthcare somehow in the face of great need with Roma people.
DIALOGUE: More than just talk
June 1, 2007
I imagine most of us human beings, including Christians, tend to think of their own culture (i.e. the culture from which they come) as the norm, with all other cultures, by implication, being something other than "the norm". We probably cannot help it. Americans, for example, tend to think of "the American way of life" (whatever that means) as the normal way life is, or at least should be, for people. It is hard for many of us, then, to understand that other people who live in other cultures live by other standards, values, and hopes and expectations--by other norms.
We do this in the way that we practice our faith, too--in worship, for example. "7-11" Christians (congregations who tend to sing the same 7 verses of their praise songs 11 times in a row) tend to think that the way they worship is the "normal" way Christians do or should worship, while "smells and bells" Christians who prefer high liturgy do the same.
Clearly, since moving to Hungary, we have discovered that our understanding of being "Reformed"--and the way we express that--is not exactly the same as how our Hungarian friends in the Reformed Church understand and practice being Reformed.
All of which underscores the value--the necessity-- of dialogue, and dialogue at increasingly deeper levels between people. It is necessary for coming to common understandings, and to beginning to understanding differences. What we are finding is that dialogue can be hard work. First, it requires of all people invloved a sincere and serious commitment to listening. This, of course, does not always come naturally. Indeed, some of us seem incapable of really listening and hearing others at all. Listening carefully, I think, challenges us to realize that many of our cultural norms and practices are not universal norms and practices. Other people live and think, believe and act, in different ways than we do. Talking about these differences helps us, first, to recognize and acknowledge such differences, then secondly, to begin to reflect on what these differences mean, how firmly we each hold on to them, and how well we come to understand and honor each other in the midst of them. More often in our talking with (or more accurately to) each other we talk right past each other. Why? Because we tend to think that our way of thinking, believing or feeling things is the norm against which all other thoughts, actions and convictions should be measured.
Sometimes--more often than I want to admit--I get frustrated with what I perceive as the inability of some others here in Hungary to enter into true dialogue. But when I step back a bit to look at this objectively, I must also ask myself how true this is of me. Is it true of you?
From May:
Volunteering: Counter-cultural and Counter-intuitive
May 14, 2007
Just as the Christian faith is more and more counter-cultural, volunteering seems to be more and more counter-intuitive. Not to everybody, of course. We have a good number of great volunteers here in Europe giving a year of their lives in service with Roma and other people. The counter-intuitive part comes from two directions: In the West, where a free market society has bred a culture where the goal is to acquire wealth and possessions, volunteering to many does not make sense. There’s no material reward. In the East—the post-communist region—a couple of generations were shaped by a culture that promised state or government provision for all basic needs. To many who come from that perspective, volunteering does not make sense because “it’s the government’s job, isn’t it?” Yet…in both East and West (and the Central region too) it looks to me that more and more people are doing “what doesn’t make sense.” Both they and the people they live and serve with—and the world at large, I believe—are all the richer for it. The Church has always played a central role helping people to value, experience, and grow through volunteering. For this we thank God. And we trust that the Church will continue to support and send volunteers for the sake of the kingdom of God—and for the volunteers’ sake too!
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