Mountains and more mountains...

The past month has been a whirlwind tour of the beautiful mountain villages of Honduras. Near the end of November we began training local youth to lead mission trips to the mountains. The training week was packed with talks, team building, prayer and practical training. At the end of the week they all packed their stuff and prepared to go to our first aldea (mountain village).

The first parish was the parish of El Rosario, three different groups served the villages of Loma Larga, Huertas, and el Horno. Over the week the youth visited homes in the mornings and led programs for kids, youth and families in the afternoons and evenings. It was beautiful to see the simplicity of the families and their lives in the mountains. Their generosity was overwhelming. Every home we stepped into it seemed no matter the level of poverty welcomed us and showered us with gifts of bananas, vegetables, sugar cane and coffee (some of the best because its mountain grown and ground fresh right there).

Their love and appreciation was apparent, but even more so, their faith. For most of the communities Mass is a rare gift as their Priest is assigned to dozens of aldeas. To have the gift of Mass three times in one week, along with confessions and adoration it was a very blessed week for them and for us. At the end of the week the different aldeas met in the central aldea for the closing night. It was an amazing experience walking together with our community singing songs and praying together along the way (almost and hour walk).

The second week we traveled even farther into the mountains of Minas del Oro. After taking buses to La Libertad we climbed into the back of four different pickup trucks and drove 3 hours to the aldeas of Ojo de Agua, Pimientia, and Socorro. Again we encountered very simple lifestyles. None of the aldeas had electricity and many groups had to bring water up from the streams to bath and wash our clothes, but the people were as generous and loving as ever. Accepting us into their homes, feeding us, and praying with us. Because the aldeas were even more remote, the sacraments were even less frequent. Mass is said once a year in their village. You could sense the hunger in the people, longing to be supported and fed in their faiths. One woman upon hearing that a priest was coming to her home (she lived about an hours walk away from our aldea far from almost everything) she began to cry. It was so convicting as to how much we take for granted: materially, physically, spiritually, all the opportunities and privileges we have that we consider rights. Overall it was a very challenging but very blessed experience.

Over the last weekend we traveled to yet another part of Honduras to lead a retreat for the youth of the parish Florida. Almost 200 youth spent the weekend with us there listening to talks, sharing in small groups, singing, praying, playing and most of all spending time with Jesus in the Mass and Adoration. It was great for the youth, many of whom had been with us in the previous weeks of missions to the mountains. God was really moving in them throughout the whole weekend and their openess was so apparent. While there is an abundance of youth ministry and retreats in the US, it was a rare opportunity for them. We hope to be able to offer one there every year in the future.

It is incredibly hard to desribe what the past few weeks have been like, how beautiful the mountains are, the intensity and grace in our experiences, and it is impossible to speak for everyone because each person has had their own experience, but what is for certain is that Gods love has no limits.
God Bless.....