Collected Newsletters and Related Writings (2001).

 

This is a collection of our monthly (more or less) e-mail newsletters sent to our mailing list leading up to and during our second year of service in KwaZulu-Natal, together with some items intended for our home church's monthly newsletter or similar forums.  These are arranged chronologically.

February 4, 2001 -- "What We Did on Our Summer (Winter?) Vacation"

Hello, all -- it has been a while since we've communicated to the newsletter lists generally. We hope everyone had a good time over the holidays, and that the New Year is proving a good one.

We are back in Durban after a break over the 'festive season,' as they call it here, for a few weeks back in the United States. We got back to South Africa two weeks ago, and in the meantime have been settling in here in Kloof, a suburb/exurb west of Durban, up a thousand feet (and so, much cooler) and inland 25 kilometers or so. It takes about 20 minutes to drive in to the City, but as we're not going to have an office as such this year, we won't really be commuting. We are renting the apartment of a couple we met through the Technikon, last year -- they are in Phoenix, Arizona for a couple of years, and were willing to rent the apartment basically furnished, a real advantage for us (there wasn't much furniture in the four suitcases we brought with us!). As a major change from last year down at the beachfront in the city, we are surrounded by green -- grass, trees, bushes, flowers, and it's great, much calmer. Our neighbors in the little condominium community here keep asking whether the noise from the highway out behind the property bothers us; honestly, we hardly notice it, the periodic 'woosh' of cars going by, as compared to the fairly constant bustle and music and noise of holidaymaking humanity out our windows down by the beach, it's positively quiet!

We've taken the first few steps for our main work assignment for the coming year (working on the implementation of the "Mission Council" structure for the KwaZulu-Natal region of the United Congregational Church of Southern Africa), attending a denomination-wide 'consultation' on the Mission Councils, held here in Durban the end of the week after we got here. We have also started working with the regional committee charged with this work. It is going to be an interesting time, as there is considerable confusion about what the point of the structures really is. Fortunately, there is hope that what we'd thought to have been the real point of the exercise, getting the local churches more involved in the problems of their own communities, could again come to the fore. We'll see. On the other front, we're scheduled for a trip up to Pretoria next week, to visit with the Committee of Technikon Principals -- a trade group, in effect, for the heads of the country's sixteen technikons -- looking to work with them by making use of some of what we learned about higher education issues in South Africa, through our work at ML Sultan last year. Between those two broad efforts, it looks like we'll have plenty to do!

But we wanted to give you a short summary of 'what we did on our summer vacation.' Well, first of all, it really was a summer vacation, as that's how things work here in the Southern Hemisphere, where Christmas is closest to the summer solstice. (Of course, back home it was, then, winter. We had been telling ourselves, as the trip home approached and the temperatures started to rise towards mid-summer here, that it would be good to go back to someplace where you could be trying to keep warm rather than trying to stay cool -- well, as it turned out we got a bit more of that than we'd counted on, as it seems to have been about as cold, and certainly as snowy, in New England and, perhaps especially, Pennsylvania, as it's been for several years. And just for us!)

We had always intended to take a break over that time, to get home to the States for the holidays and to take care of personal business of various sorts during that time. After getting a sense of how things work -- or, better put, don't work -- here from mid-December through mid-January, we were relieved to have had that planned anyway, since absolutely nothing would have gotten done here, had we stayed. Of course, in the event, we were 'between jobs' with leaving the Technikon at the end of their term when Prof Goba left, and with the church and CTP work going absolutely nowhere until late January; as well as being between places to live, having to move out of the accomodation which the Technikon had provided last year, and having no place to move into until our present landlords were off to Arizona also in mid-January -- so if we'd stayed, we'd have been here with no place to stay, as well as nothing to do!

On the other hand, that would have been more restful, perhaps, than our trip home. Yes, it was great to see folks, and to share our adventures and observations, hopes and fears, directly with friends and family. But we also had a mess of personal business and related matters to take care of, from crammed in eye doctor and dentist appointments, to car inspections, drivers' license renewals, and mail handling arrangements, to all sorts of business details and cleanings up and plannings, and on and on, besides the much more pleasant chances to get to see old friends. And we also got just a taste of how much hard work there can be in these 'missionary trip home' experiences; even as nothing more than volunteers (short-term, as we've learned we are, with our two year commitment), one seeks yet to take advantage of the opportunities provided to tell the story of the work that's being done, and the places it's being done in. So in early December we gave a slide show to a Retired Men's Group with which a number of members of Trinitarian Congregational, our home church in Concord, Mass., are associated; and Jan delivered the 'sermon' [twice, because there are two services!] and Ruthann the message for children at Tri-Con; and we spoke with pictures to an evening forum of Tri-Con church members, and subjected the junior high Sunday School group to a variation on that presentation as well; and we were able to do our part towards Tri-Con's marvelous response to the Christmas Offering appeal, which the church directed this year to the work of Sinikithemba HIV-AIDS Christian Care Centre here in Durban -- all this during our two weeks in Massachusetts. There, we stayed with our neighbors and good friends, the Levines (who continue to be of such tremendous help to us in this endeavor, we want to tell them again, and again, thanks so very much!), which was great fun though kind of weird, since we were staying across the common drive from our home. Chris and Jo, the very nice British couple who're renting our house in our absence, had us all over for dinner while we were there, and while very nice, that is still kind of odd -- perhaps especially because, as they've been to Zimbabwe a number of times, they've got the place decorated with pictures of and artifacts from Africa! It has also been more than a bit strange to learn that their home in Bedfordshire, England, is being rented, while they're in our house, to a couple from South Africa -- would you believe it, from Durban!

We spent the holidays with Ruthann's folks in Pennsylvania, at the retirement community they enjoy mightily. So there were four of us in a three (fairly large, but still...) room apartment, and we think it worked out pretty well. Thanks to them for putting us up, and putting up with us. We were paraded a bit, sharing dinner with a number of the Brittany Pointe Estates community over the weeks we were there; but were very, very thankful that we were able to counterbalance the cruise-ship like atmosphere (it seemed like we were ALWAYS eating!) with frequent visits to the new and very nice workout facility. We broke away for a trip down to DC to visit our friends the Beckmans, who are planning a return visit to South Africa this year; it was great fun to go into the city with them, visiting the National Gallery for the 'Art Nouveau' exhibit. On the way back to PA, we visited Antietam and stopped by Lancaster Theological Seminary, in southeastern Pennsylvania, to visit with Prof Goba and Gwynneth and their granddaughter Nandi, just settling in to their new environment away from South Africa and ML Sultan Technikon; they had had their entire family, including their daughters who live in Chicago and Memphis, together for the holidays first time in three or four years, so were tired but happy. There was quite a bit of snow on the ground, and it was cold enough for sure, but Prof seemed to be handling the climate well enough, looking quite dapper in his leather coat and tartan cap.

As a parting bit of missionary work, on the second Sunday in Epiphany Jan delivered [twice!] another 'sermon' -- okay, admittedly a close variant of the one from Tri-Con -- and Ruthann spoke to the children, and we both met with the confirmation class, at Ruthann's home church, Trinity Reformed (UCC) in Collegeville, Pennsylvania. Rev. Martha Kriebel explained that in older days, this was the traditional Sunday for visiting missionaries to speak. It was great fun that Jan's hymn "Send Us Forth," which had been used for the earlier service at Tri-Con in Concord, was also sung by the congregation at this church where we were married, more than a few years ago.

So we had a busy time. There was the chance to re-enter the first world -- although showing up for the last few acts of the election drama was not what we'd anticipated. And we got to see some football games on the tube, and Jan got a booster shot of Duke basketball. But in the end, we were probably ready to come back to Durban to go back (or forward?) to work, to see what we can make of these new assignments, in the new and different cultural contexts which will frame our life for the next months. We will try to keep you all reasonably well posted on how those tasks, and the relationships we'll be building in working on them, develop over this year. Keep us in your thoughts and prayers.

We are looking forward, already, to our first of several scheduled visitors -- our home pastor, the Rev. Dr. John Lombard himself, is using his sabbatical to make contact with Tri-Con's missionary contingent here in South Africa. Right now, John should be in Kenya, and after visits to Victoria Falls and Cape Town, we'll get him here in KZN in about two weeks.

So, that's what we did on our summer vacation. It was clear that we were ready to be back home, as even the drive from JFK airport across to New Jersey looked good; it is odd to think that one's reaction to urban New Jersey would be surprise at how many trees there seemed to be, even in the dead of winter. But that was what struck us. It didn't look quite as nice, on the trip back to the airport -- but we wonder how it will seem at the end of this year?

To all of you who were a part of our time at home, thanks! And to everyone, belatedly perhaps, Happy New Year!

March 11, 2001 -- "At work during the dog days of March"

The heat has really picked up here for the past week; it's HOT. Don't you all feel sorry for us?! We keep hearing about the snow storms in the northeastern US. Hope everyone enjoyed their snow days at home.

During the past month we have learned something more about our main work assignment for the coming year. The original idea was that we would be working on the implementation of the "Mission Council" structure for the KwaZulu-Natal region of the United Congregational Church of Southern Africa (UCCSA). However, every time the Mission Council flag is raised, only a few folks salute, as the metaphor goes; it is clear that there are unresolved problems with the structure. The denomination has been trying to resolve these problems for at least 3 years, ever since the concept was fleshed out. Rather than continue to work on the structure and delay the mission work which is the point, the denomination-wide Consultation on the Mission Council that we attended the end of January (see our website) suggested putting the implementation of the structure on hold and instead getting going on the mission work. The Mission Council implementation, even were it pursued with full vigor currently, is going to be affected by some other restructuring underway in the South African portion of this transnational denomination, as well, so there are plenty of valid reasons for treading cautiously in building new organizational edifices. In the meantime, the goal is to get each local church involved in a community outreach project addressing one of the denomination's declared mission priorities: HIV/AIDS, or poverty, or violence (including crime and abuse issues).

( A bit about the lay of the land: Church dynamics are somewhat different here from what we are most familiar with in the States. There are about 65 congregations in the KwaZulu-Natal region of the UCCSA. There are about 25 active ministers and 4 interns. Many of the ministers have more than one congregation; many congregations have no minister at all. The Zulu congregations average about 1000 members. In an extreme version of a 'multi-point charge,' the congregation will normally have a main sanctuary and numerous 'outstation' sanctuaries or meeting houses, between 5 and 20. Once every 3 months, the congregation as a whole will worship together at its main sanctuary. However, on most Sundays, services are held in each of the sanctuaries, with the minister making the circuit to the main outstations infrequently. The lead deacon for each sanctuary makes certain that one of the deacons leads the service and gives the message, unless a minister will be present on that Sunday. There is often a large number of deacons -- perhaps 50 in a Zulu congregation. The historically white churches in the region tend to be much smaller, but generally have their own minister. The tithes and offerings at the white churches are usually sufficient to pay a minister. Unfortunately, the Zulu churches, although much larger in membership, seldom have sufficient income to be able to pay a minister. Hence, the small numbers of ministers relative to the number of congregations. So the efforts for greater mission outreach must confront the scarcity of funds, on the one hand, and the related understaffing of the churches, on the other.)

This task of getting each local church involved in a community outreach project falls to the region's Christian Education Committee, which has been designated the region's 'provisional' Mission Council for these purposes. Our role, as it is developing, will be to assist this committee in any way we can. The group's first task, at this point, will be to meet with the region's ministers and raise support for local church involvement in community outreach projects, with the ministers it is hoped being ready to identify lay members who would be interested in leading such projects within their congregations. Next will come the task of 'workshopping' to teach the lay members what can be done and how to get it done. The regional committee hopes that this second task will not be overly difficult. If lay members who want to be active can talk with those who already are doing projects at nearby churches, the hope is that all will gain from the discussion. In addition, there are local non-profit organizations who are looking for local churches to work with to address these issues. Part of the effort will be to discover these and bring them into the discussion.

All of this is taking, and will take, time. Once again, we are learning patience.

Meanwhile, we have had a wonderful visit from our pastor, Rev. John Lombard, from Concord, Mass, who came to Africa as part of his sabbatical. It has been great fun to introduce him to people we have come to know in Durban and to call friends. These included a couple of the Deans and the Registrar from ML Sultan Technikon (our work assignment last year), plus our local pastors, plus two of the most committed church women we have ever met and with whom we are working with on this year's assignment. We also shared special times with the three other missionaries in the area who are here through the auspices of the Common Global Ministries Board. We have been blessed to have gotten to know all of these good people here, and delighted to share them with John and vice versa. He was a true ambassador for Tri-Con and Concord; we are getting inquiries about reciprocal visits already!

We also went on a 5-day safari with John to the northern part of this province. We have become birders while here; this safari was mainly to see elephants and birds and was quite successful. We have now recorded 285 African bird species over the past 12 months. Considering that there are "over 2500" species in the world according to the Audubon Society, this means we have seen over 10% of the world's bird species just here. Given that we have not made special trips just to spot birds until this most recent safari, this seems quite amazing. There's several hundred species yet to go in our book of the birds of Southern Africa. (Well, maybe. A disproportionate number of the ones remaining are, as they call them here, LBJ's -- 'little brown jobs' -- the distinguishing of which is like the 'confusing fall warblers' battle at home, so we're not counting on being able to make much headway on those.) We were quite successful at getting to see the large type of elephants we'd been hoping for on this safari, as you can tell from our photopage website.

Well, that's about it from the sun and fun capital of South Africa, for the present. And while we're not shoveling out of three feet of snow, nor bundling up against icy winds, we are -- at least when not on safari with visiting friends and dignitaries -- trying to make some contributions, also this year, in this place. Thanks for your many words of encouragement and concern. They mean very much to us. Best from us both.

April 13, 2001 -- "Easter"

It is the evening of Good Friday as we write this note. For those of our faith tradition, this is the low point of the rollercoaster of religious feeling that starts with the elation of Palm Sunday, and descends through the doubt and despair of Maundy Thursday, into the terror and anguish of this day, until the wonder of the promise of Easter morning. It is of course no accident of the calendar that for those the Pope referred to, not so long ago, as our 'elder brothers (no doubt meaning to include sisters) in faith,' there has just been the celebration of Passover -- our best wishes to all of you, especially the several good and dear friends who have been and are so significant in helping us to make this mission adventure of ours possible. Each of the traditions deals at this time with a transition from doubt to hope, and that's what we'd like to touch on briefly.

We are in our second year in Durban, so we are just a bit more clear on what to expect as we roll through the calendar. This time of the year provides us again with the opportunity to feel especially connected with those at home, realizing for instance as we shared communion at the Tenebrae service yesterday evening at one of the worship places that make up the Berea Congregational Church, that with the distance of a few hours and several thousand miles, a very similar service would be taking place back home, at Trinitarian Congregational in Concord, Massachusetts. But this time also serves to remind of the differences involved in being here rather than there, and some of these are mildly disorienting, even this second year. For one thing, it is the end of summer and turning into what passes for fall: the stores have been displaying their winter clothing merchandise for some weeks; up here in the hills above the city, it does actually get a bit cool -- not cold, but cool, yes -- at night; the local pears are ripe, and the fall-ripening avocados are dropping from the trees outside our building. But it is still plenty warm, and for those who are into such things, the beaches beckon.

Amongst those so beckoned were our missionary friends serving in Maseru, Lesotho. Lois Ferguson, PZ Pezzano and their daughters Von, Nu Ella, and Min Joo, have just departed to return to the Mountain Kingdom after a few days here, each of them spent at the beach or at Water World down in Durban. As always, it was great fun to have them visit us.

As they leave the seaside, a flood of cars is pouring down the other direction, towards the beaches, from the Highveld areas of what used to be the Transvaal -- especially from what is now the Gauteng province, including metropolitan Johannesburg. Today and Monday are holidays in South Africa, and next week is a school vacation week in most of the provinces. Easter is one of Durban's big tourist times. It is the Tamil New Year, as well, so there are all sorts of secular and religious activities underway in the area.

Up here in Kloof, a bit removed this year from the hustle and bustle along the beachfront where we lived last year, it is a good time to stroll around the neighborhood and the several small nature reserves in the area, enjoying our new found birdwatching avocation. It is another reminder that we are not in New England any more, when the regular birds that you see everywhere are ibises, bulbuls, and drongos.

But we were going to talk about the transition from doubt to hope.

Last year, right about this time, we began to break out of the doldrums of our initial time at ML Sultan Technikon, when it had seemed that there was nothing much for us to do, and no great prospect of anything happening. As we have written since, we ended up being reasonably pleased with what we were eventually able to work on over the remainder of that year, and like to think that we added something incrementally to the progress of that institution.

This year has started pretty slowly as well. We have two assignments, one involving assisting the KwaZulu-Natal region of the United Congregational Church of Southern Africa in regard to its efforts to increase mission activities by its local churches, and the other having us serve as adjunct 'Special Projects Advisors' with the Committee of Technikon Principals, the organization which represents the interests of the fifteen technological higher education institutions in South Africa. Things had seemed to start quickly enough, with our attendance (reported at the time on our web site -- and it's still there, as this is written) at a 'consultation' respecting the Mission Council structures of the UCCSA; and soon thereafter with a trip to Pretoria to meet with the staff of the CTP to discuss what we might do to assist on that front. We were gung ho.

The simplest way to describe the time since then and the present, is that aside from John Lombard's visit, things have been slow. We have been working with some wonderful folks in the responsible regional church committee; and we've had some ongoing contact with the CTP as well. But we have had cause to wonder whether we'll be able to get anything much done, particularly with the CTP, in the time we have available.

But in each case, things have taken actual or apparent upturns just over the last short while, and it seems as if we may be able to hope that last year's pattern may repeat itself. With the CTP, it now looks as if we may be able to participate meaningfully in some of their work for the system in response to the just-announced proposals for a new governmental funding regime for higher education institutions, as well as the technikons' collective plans in response to the new framework for the overall direction of higher education in this country; this could be quite exciting, as it will give us a chance, as we'd hoped might occur, to employ some of the knowledge that we picked up about the workings of the system, from our time last year at ML Sultan.

With the church, we're embarked on assistance to the regional committee in putting on a series of four workshops, at various places in the province, aiming to spur local churches to get involved in community outreach projects directed to the issues of HIV/AIDS, poverty, or violence (crime and abuse issues), which are the denomination's enunciated mission priorities for this cycle. We have been working closely with the committee in the planning of the workshops, and were primarily responsible for an introductory session for the ministers in the region, held this past Tuesday. There had been some concern, all around, about how this effort would be received amongst the pastors, but we are pleased to report that all seems to have gone well. A strong majority of the pastors attended, including those who had to come considerable distances to get to Durban for the meeting, and both the younger and the older pastors, the white, the Coloured, and the Zulu ministers, were represented and seemed receptive to having the workshops in their areas. We will be involved in the first workshop, scheduled within a few weeks in Durban for the churches in the immediate metro area, and have a lot of work to do to get ready for that. This activity should also find us, in July and early August, down on the South Coast, up into the Midlands, and north into Zululand, with the remaining workshops now scheduled as part of this overall effort to get the local churches thinking in terms of community mission outreach in their own communities. We were wary about thinking things had gone well at the session with the pastors, but those who know the place and know the pastors, have told us that through this session, these efforts have had a good beginning.

And so we've moved, in the blink of an eye so it seems, from what felt like the doldrums, to what may begin to feel like the jet stream. So goes the adventure.

And that's how we feel we've moved from wondering, as one is perhaps prone to do, whether there was much of a reason for us to be here, to the sense that yes, maybe there is, and maybe we can do some things to help out. We've been through this cycle once already, so we know it's possible, and will allow ourselves to hope that it will be so.

We wish you each and all a wonderful Spring.

May 13, 2001 -- "Good News"

Yesterday, we held the first of our "mission workshops", for the local UCCSA churches in the Durban area. We cannot hope to give you an adequate sense of the experience of this day -- aside from the oddities to which we strangers in a strange land are becoming used to, it had its moments of especial wonder, hope, and a real sense of community across the widest appearances of difference -- but we'll try to give you some of our observations, nevertheless.

There are to be four of these workshops, to be held at different locations around the province over the next few months, which are intended to encourage community outreach activities by the local churches. You may recall that this matter of working to increase the mission outreach of the local churches is basically our assignment for this year; or at least it is what we -- with the approval of the regional church bodies to which we're assigned -- have interpreted our assignment to be. For that reason, and because of the natural uncertainty about how things would go in a meeting for which we were primarily responsible in an unfamiliar setting, we were quite a bit anxious going into the workshop. We had worked closely with the committee to which we're assigned, and particularly its wonderful chair, Florence Madlala, in preparing the program, but no one (and certainly not we) knew for sure how things would be received.

The regional Christian Education Committee of the UCCSA had invited all of the denomination's Durban area churches to send delegates to this workshop. The invitations went to 21 churches; representatives came from 12 of the churches, in all about 45 people. This is a actually a comparatively good turnout -- the Christian Education Committee has had anywhere from 35 to 70 people show up for other 1-day workshops, when they had invited all the churches from across the province.

We were privileged to have the opening devotional given by Rev. B.K. Dludla, one of the leading pastors among the Zulu membership churches in the province. Some of you may remember Rev. Dludla as the preacher at Scott Couper's induction service, soon after we arrived in South Africa last year. His participation is not a little thing, so far as its effect on the potential influence of the workshop on those attending, and those who will hear about it later. When we had met, a few weeks back, with the ministers of the region to explain the intention of the series of workshops and enlist their support, a central point of concern had been whether the Zulu ministers, particularly the older ministers, would be receptive to these ideas. At that meeting, it had been very significant that Rev. Dludla had been supportive. When we were planning the initial workshop session for the Durban area churches, we had discussed with Flo Madlala the importance of having the opening devotion come from one of the Zulu ministers. It might be quite difficult to get them to attend, the fact of life and death in the churches at this time being that their Saturdays are often taken up with funerals. Flo thought a bit, and wondered out loud whether "B.K." would do it. She thought he might, and she was willing to ask him. He accepted, and so our day started with his imposing countenance and strong voice reading from Ephesians. It may be interesting that Rev. Dludla has a bit of an American accent; we think this dates back to his days as a seminary student in Maine. (!)

Next, we launched into the workshop proper, with each of the attending churches reporting on the community outreach activities they were already engaged in relating to the denomination's declared mission priorities -- HIV/AIDS, poverty, or violence (crime and abuse issues). This was intended to help the churches to learn from each other as well as give us (the committee) a sense of what is already going on. We were pleased to discover that there is more happening than anyone expected. There had been a strong sense within the denomination's structures that the local churches were insufficiently concerned with their communities, that they were predominately focussed on the maintenance of their own affairs, and that it would take a major effort to alter this inwardly directed focus. There is always more that can be done, but it is good to note that the reports made by the local churches at this session, at least, showed that a number of church members are active in delivering food and clothes to the unemployed, taking care of the sick, helping to fight crime by working with the police, and many other activities of a direct, human-contact nature, in their communities. Some of these activities take place through a single church, some are through community organizations connected to the churches, some through 2 or 3 churches working together. Only one church could not report on some such activity, and they were attending the session precisely because they wanted to get started.

After the reports were given, we led a dialog concerning common issues and problems drawn from the examples of the reported projects and activities. The conversation covered many practical topics that were on people's minds, including how to have an open dialog about AIDS, and how to give an unemployed person a food package without damaging their pride. We asked a few leading questions, but most of the comments and questions came from the group, who all participated. (We had been cautioned, before the workshop, that we should not expect a great amount of participation by the lay members attending. This proved to be no problem at all.) We learned as much as anyone else, or more.

We had arranged for representatives of 3 local service organizations to speak to the meeting. We had tried to include, in the workshop, organizations active in the local area, who were interested in partnering with local churches, using their members, or providing training or resource assistance for the churches as they became more active in the community. The representative of the Sinikithemba HIV/AIDS Christian Care Centre suggested a way to open discussion about AIDS. Representatives of the Diakonia Council of Churches (an ecumenical service organization active in each of the priorities, as well as in broader peace and justice issues, and economic justice) suggested ways to raise awareness of poverty, economic injustice and AIDS, as well as programs to address crime and unemployment. These presentations were very well received. In an interesting hint of the strength of the Congregational ethos in this part of the world, there was some consternation from the floor as the delegates complained that while they had just heard that the regional UCCSA is a participant in the Diakonia Council of Churches, the local churches had not, before this workshop, been made aware of Diakonia's programs available to assist and train local church members. This is clearly a communication issue that the region is going to have to treat more seriously, going forward.

We were quite taken by several of the churches' projects. One of the local churches, in the southern part of the city, has opened its grounds for a flea market on 2 Saturdays each month. This started as an idea for a fundraiser for the church itself (the church obtains some income by renting table space to the more established operators), but over time has developed into a means to give local craftspeople a safe and successful place to market their work. Several local community organizations use the market to raise awareness of their work. As an outgrowth of this involvement, the church also has a program underway to teach crafts skills to local unemployed people, and these people are given free table space at the market. We heard that the participants can come away with sales into several hundreds of Rands, which is substantial in this context. A clear by-product of the market has been a growth in a sense of community in the area.

Church members from a township area have helped to organize an ecumenical community-based health program. It started over 5 years ago, in connection with the local medical clinic. It began by teaching volunteers to help people with TB, then expanded to teach volunteers to give home-based care to people with AIDS, and more recently has added care for people with cancer. Volunteers learn to provide the care themselves and to teach family members how to care for their sick relative. Local doctors donate medicines which are given to the patients. When a need is detected, food and clothes are also provided to the patients. The volunteers are more often unemployed than retired and the organization's leaders have noticed that the work instills responsibility and a sense of self-worth in their volunteers.

This organization has now realized that it needs to do more to generate income for the sick and unemployed. They have established a community vegetable garden and are beginning to teach sewing and beadwork skills. There is a drama group which teaches awareness and detection of TB and AIDS to the community at festivals. They are looking for funds to refurbish a vandalized building to be their center. They want to provide a day center for the sick and rooms for support groups and sewing and beadwork projects. There is a need for a soup kitchen; a local grocery store has offered day-old food. They plan to ask the area churches to be responsible for the soup kitchen. The report on this project was a source of all sorts of discussion points about how to begin, start small, learn as you go, continue to evaluate, listen to your clients, network with others who are active in the area, etc., etc.

We mentioned above that one of the attending churches had nothing to report. During the morning's brief break-out session to give the churches time to prepare their reports, they called us over and were most apologetic ... but their church, in one of the close-in rural communities to the south of the city, had no activities that they thought were appropriate to mention, but they were anxious to learn about how to get started, and was that okay? Of course it was, in fact it was the point of the day ... That put more than a little pressure on! We had hoped that one of the major results of the day would be for the churches to learn from each other, to hear about activities that their sister churches were undertaking, and to be inspired by that. We had really hoped not to be stuck in a session of consultant-speak (or our imitation of it), with the only participation being under duress. But we had cause to be concerned, from what we'd been told from several different quarters, so we were prepared to fill up the time if need be. As it happened, even though the church-to-church exchange went extremelly well as we saw it, we did have a bit of time available also to go through an exercise to suggest means to begin the development of an appropriate project for a local church's involvement in one of the priority areas, and the group's participation in that was quite lively. We're hoping that between the examples of what the others are doing, the resource points of the outside organizations, the dialog concerning all these matters, and the exercise, the church that felt it wasn't ready to report, and the rest, will have gained something of value from the day.

We were relieved, is probably the fairest word, that things seemed to have gone not exactly smoothly, but constantly in a positive direction. As we yielded up the podium to the minister handling the closing devotion, we had a bit of a group hug with Florence, who was smiling warmly. We think that people seemed truly engaged with the topics, and receptive to the lessons they were teaching each other -- including, memorably, to start small, and to be passionate about what they were doing. But we can't know for sure. We hope to be engaged in quite a bit of follow-up on these matters, in the time available in and around and after the other three sessions in the outer parts of the province. But we can think of one sign that things may have gone pretty well: One of the newer members of the Christian Education committee is a young lady named S'ma [it's short for something, but we can't pronounce it even on a good day], who is a member of the KwaMashu township church, where our friend Baphiwe Nxumalo is a member; they are both active in the youth programs there. S'ma had been our stand-by Zulu translator, which proved unnecessary at this session but will probably be necessary at one or more of the other workshops. She had been there also as a representative from her church, and had been active in the dialog. She came up to us and Flo after the closing, and was literally beaming one of those bright, full Zulu smiles that are like the sun coming up on a beautiful morning. She was excited about how well things had gone, how involved people had been in the discussions, how people were going to be inspired to be more active. We will see, but if the younger people of the churches are energized like she is, there is more than just hope, there is the beginning of a better reality. God bless her.

And God bless the people of South Africa! They are affected daily by crime, poverty, unemployment, AIDS, political incompetence and corruption. They are very aware of the magnitude of the problems that they face. That doesn't mean they give up -- it means they just try harder. As we heard time and again, the local UCCSA churches that are involved in their communities are often known as caring churches. We hope that yesterday's workshop will be seen as having a part in affirming what they are doing, showing ways to do more, and teaching those that are not yet involved, how to start.

August 1, 2001 -- "Stories from the Workshops"

For most of you, it’s true summer right now. For us, in the other half of the world, it’s the tail end of winter. It has been a harder than usual winter for most of South Africa, with talk about it being the coldest and wettest in 30 or more years. There has been snow in areas that don’t tend to see it, with attendant excitement and media hype. Every so often we get TV news video of parents taking their kids to the mountain passes to slosh around in the stuff, the obligatory ‘I’ve never seen anything like it’ quotes from the little ones, and so on. There has also been a lot more rain down at the Cape than usual, and they do tend to get a lot of rain this time of year (when it’s bone dry up in KZN where we are). This has led to significant problems with standing water in the dwellings in the ‘informal (squatter) settlements’ in that area, where the conditions aren’t very good to start with. You don’t tend to think about winter as much of an issue in Africa, but down here it certainly can be.

You heard from us most recently to announce the revision of our web site, at http://www.tiac.net/users/maplebrk. It has new text and pictures about, among other matters, our Cape Town visit (together with Ruthann’s cousin, Linda Barstow, and family), as well as some of our activity for putting together the remaining ‘local church mission outreach’ workshops we’re facilitating for the regional church body to which we’re assigned this year. Since that time, there’s been further activity on both fronts: more visits and touring, and a lot of work on the workshops. We won’t burden you with a blow by blow account of our weekend visit at the end of June to Harare, Zimbabwe to see Selby Nera (whom we hadn’t seen in nearly 30 years). Selby had become really a member of Ruthann’s family while he was studying engineering in Pennsylvania on a mission scholarship, and he it was who drove us from the church to the reception on the day of our wedding. He is an engineer, but now heads a private technical college in Harare. Nor will we deal with the particulars of the visit of Ruthann’s brother Steve, and wife Ruth and daughter Alice, and Ruthann’s guiding them around KZN while Jan was down with the (officially designated) Johannesburg Flu. But there are a few things we’d like to mention about and around the workshops.

You may recall that the first of the workshops was held for churches in the Durban area, back in May. After the Barstows departed to view the eclipse up in Zambia, we went into high gear in the preparations for the three remaining scheduled workshops. On the web site, we have mentioned our first excursion up towards southern Zululand to meet with representatives of outside organizations we were hoping to have participate in the second workshop to be held at Esikhawini, a township near Empangeni and Richards Bay in southern Zululand. We were up that way a couple of times, and have also visited with organizations in Pietermaritzburg, further west to Ladysmith, and south to Port Shepstone. It has been quite an adventure to roam the province to make contact with a number of different types of groups grappling with the multitude of issues confronting this province and its people.
There are a few stories and impressions from our meetings with these organizations, and in our discussions with the pastors of the local churches that would be hosting the workshop sessions, that we want to share with you. This is a richly complex place, and we encounter new things every day.

A legacy of violence. When we were down in Port Shepstone for meetings in preparation for the last of the four workshops, to be held near to there, we met with Rev. Dlamini, the pastor of the Gamalakhe church where the session is to be held. He showed us the church building, which sits along the main road through the kwaGamalakhe township. He pointed down the ridge in one direction, to where the teachers, doctors, and better off members of the community had their houses; people on this side of the road would tend to be ANC supporters. He gestured over the other side, towards much humbler and unorganized groupings of structures, often of people who had moved in from the rural areas. On that side of the road, the local nKhosi (chief / ‘traditional leader’) would exert influence, and perhaps control; the people there would tend to support the IFP (the Inkhata Freedom Party, which is especially strong in the rural Zulu community). During the horrific political violence that wracked KZN in the run-up to the country’s initial democratic elections within the last decade, the road along the top of the ridge was a sort of green line through the community.
The political battles are mainly over, if the formal surface signs are indicative. The ANC and IFP are in a sort of coalition government for the province; the national Home Affairs minister (in charge of issuing visas, among other matters, but that’s another story!) in the ANC-led government is the head of the IFP; and so on. And the widespread rampaging violence of the earlier battles seems safely a thing of the past. But, there’s a trial underway here presently concerning a recent political murder by one side against a leader of the other, so the end of violence is not here just yet. And the scars of that time are by no means healed.
We have encountered the problem that a community organization active in the area feels it may not now be as effective as it would like in gaining access to people in the rural areas because it is perceived, it thinks wrongly, as having been ‘pro-ANC’ during the troubles. And Rev. Dlamini tells the tale of one of his parishioners, a respected leader, who had recently died; he had worked tirelessly in his last few years on matters of education and reconciliation, it seemed as a sort of penance for his role as a kind of warlord during the violence, never however being fully at peace with what had happened and his role in it.

The overriding issue. The last two Saturdays of July, we participated in two of these ‘local church mission outreach workshops.’ The first was at Esikhawini, a gathering of the UCCSA churches in Zululand and the North Coast area above Durban. The second was at Pietermaritzburg, for churches in the Midlands of the province, westward to the Free State and Mpumalanga borders, and the area around the Drakensberg. In the Esikhawini session in particular, discussions and presentations were often in the vernacular, isiZulu - and we were scrambling to follow along helped by the bilingual members of the committee we are assisting. (The status of our Zulu language skills is another story for another time.) Each of the sessions gave us a wonderful picture of what the local churches are already trying to do in their communities addressing the denomination’s mission priorities of HIV/AIDS, poverty, and violence (crime and abuse issues), as well as an opportunity for the committee to begin the pitch for increasing these efforts and making linkages with the outside organizations active in the relevant areas, including those who came to make presentations to the churches. The delegates from the churches, the representatives of the outside organizations, and those of us with the committee, think these workshops are proving to be a good start for the regional church’s efforts.
The workshop sessions are not really about the issues of the three mission priorities, as such; they’re more about how the churches can best go about making a contribution to the efforts to address these issues in their own local communities. But it wouldn’t be expected that you could hold such a session without the particulars of the underlying concerns coming to dominate the discussion, and indeed we heard again and again about the impact of AIDS on the lives of these people and their communities. We are, here, assaulted by the evidence of the impact of this scourge, each day. We hear the statistics on the infection rates. We read about the public works department’s complaints about insufficient space in the cemeteries. We see how young the people are in the obituaries in the newspaper. And it goes on and on. But in our work towards these workshops, and in some of the reports and discussion at them, we heard a few stories which illustrate the way in which this disease is experienced in the most affected communities, stories that have struck us deeply, and that we feel we must pass on.

The little boy at Emoyeni. On our second visit investigating outside organizations to participate in the Esikhawini workshop session for the Zululand and North Coast churches, we were told about the work of Sister Priscilla, of the Holy Cross Mission, at Emoyeni, near Mtunzini, not too far from Esikhawini. This old Catholic Mission complex rises like a little castle above the waving fields of sugar cane. It was founded in the late 19th century to minister to the descendants of John Dunn - an interesting figure, an Englishman who was made a Zulu chief in recognition of service to the king, took the usual quantum of wives, and consequently has a lot of descendants. Things get a bit complicated from there; the descendants had to battle through the Apartheid era courts to gain and then maintain their right to the land that Dunn had originally been granted by the king, but are themselves now in legal (and worse) battle with squatters and competing claimants who now treat the Dunn descendants as the beneficiaries of Apartheid rather than co-victims. There’s been a fair amount of arson directed at the cane fields up that way. Anyway, the Mission itself is now mainly a primary school and a high school run by the Catholic church. However, in what were once the stables and carriage houses, there’s a remarkable general clinic, inpatient hospice facility for about 40 patients, and an orphanage and creche (daycare center) for about 120 kids ‘infected or affected,’ as they say, by AIDS. This - and a home-based care initiative besides - is run, for all intents and purposes single-handed with volunteers to pitch in, by the remarkable Sister Priscilla. She is a Zulu woman and a Benedictine nun, most impressive.
She showed us around the facility, and as we came by one of the children’s rooms, there sat a young boy, whose name she didn’t give us, who we’d guess was maybe 8 or 9 years old, with a wonderful smile but sores on his limbs and head. He has full-blown AIDS, being infected from birth, and had evidently been abandoned. Sister Priscilla told how some time back they had decided to send him to school more to give him something to do than anything, but it turns out he is a ‘brilliant’ student. It was school vacation time, and most of the kids had relatives of some kind who could take them in during this time, but this youngster had no one, so he sat around in the orphanage area, quietly whiling away the time. As to the future, he would, Sister Priscilla said giving him a little hug, ‘be with me until he dies.’

The thief. One of the speakers at the Esikhaweni workshop was Rev. Bheki Buthelezi, an Apostolic Faith Church minister in Melmoth, about an hour inland. He is one of the leaders with the interdenominational KwaZulu Regional Christian Council. He spoke about their focus areas, including health issues with the emphasis on HIV/AIDS and resulting and related diseases. He told of their focus on AIDS orphans in particular, and illustrated how much of a difference even one person could make in addressing these issues.
He told of one of the poorer communities where there had been difficulty with one particular youngster who was caught stealing, evidently more than once. A number of the adults were convinced that they needed to just kill the kid and get it over with. There is a great deal of vigilantism in the poorer communities here, in the places that the police frequent even less often than they do the well-to-do areas; one does hear of the police responding to calls to rescue suspected perpetrators from angry crowds, and how they sometimes don’t get there in time. So the notion that the way to deal with the issue was to kill the child had to be taken seriously.
One of the neighborhood women, alone, said ‘no,’ that she wanted to find out more about it before they took such a drastic step. And, Rev. Buthelezi told us, this woman investigated just a bit and found that the youngster was a 9 year old, living without parents or relatives, and that he was caring for a 4 year old sibling. Theft was how he got food, or things to sell for food, for the two of them. The woman decided to provide meals for the two, getting them to come to her home to eat. There was no further stealing, and the community’s ire has abated.

The impact on the gogos. The number of things that you can see that need doing, in response to the impact of the pandemic, seems endless. In the Pietermaritzburg session, one of the outside organization speakers was Bongiwe Nzimande of ISB / Worker Ministry, an odd sort of hybrid NGO with which she runs the ‘AIDS desk’ with an emphasis on setting up support groups for HIV positive people. She is in her 20’s, we’d guess. Almost in passing when she was discussing how so many students were dying rather than graduating, it came out that her parents had died when she was young, and that she had raised three younger siblings - and that all three had died already. She was thankful, she said, that her parents did not have to experience that pain.
Others in this session commented on the disruption to the society and its culture through the death of the young, the risk of losing whole generations in this way. And then there was the observation of the tremendous emotional stress (never mind the economic burden) on the older women in particular, the ‘gogos’ in the Zulu language, who were losing their children, and even grandchildren, to the disease, and caring again for babies and young children.
Bongiwe told the story of a grandmother who had died not too long ago from AIDS. No one could quite understand how she might have contracted the disease, the usual explanations of unprotected sex being unlikely in her particular case, her husband having died twenty years earlier. She was asked about it, and confirmed that that could not have been the case. But, it turns out, she had some time before cared for her grandchildren, three of whom had died from AIDS. And she had done so with no training in how to go about giving such care safely. She had done the best she could. And, it was clear, she had contracted the disease from her grandchildren.

All of this is wrenching to hear. But the very fact that the people of the churches are talking about it, that they are striving to begin to do their part in response to these problems, is the voice of hope, softly but firmly to be heard. Both aspects of our time here will remain with us, for our time.

Best wishes to you all, from this place in God's world.

September 12, 2001 -- "Shock, from Afar"

Hello, friends. The world has changed yet again, as we watched.

We were supposed to be working just now on a newsletter trying to describe and reflect on the amazing few weeks we've just come through -- immediately after our good friends and neighbors, the Levines, left to continue their vacation trip in southern Africa, we headed off on our way to Namibia; there, we spent a few days touring, before spending a week as delegates from the KwaZulu-Natal region of the United Congregational Church of Southern Africa, to the denomination's biennial Assembly; after which, we met our friends Bob and Mary Jo Beckman, from Virginia, for another week visiting the great Kruger Park. We're in a sort of sensory overload from the images and memories of all those experiences, from the wonderful people we met in the Assembly, to the awesome power and beauty of the Namibian desert, to the incredible animal life of the Park. But we're back, now, and rushing into the work that needs to be done over the next weeks and months as our time here in South Africa comes to a close.

We are far away, but the modern world won't let it be that far. So yes, we know, and we saw what transpired at home in the US yesterday. We are so saddened by it all. But in the midst of the horror, there was one instance of the still, small voice of hope, that we'd like to share.

Yesterday afternoon our time, morning on the US east coast, we had just come back from a brief workout at the health club here in Kloof, and Jan tuned in to the SABC to see what the parliament was up to in the live broadcast. It involved a bill to take oversight power away from the legislature in favor of ministerial authority, a recent pattern here; an opposition spokesman was just beginning a speech against the proposal, when the government broadcaster suspended its coverage to switch to the CNN international feed. There was the picture of the burning World Trade Center tower, and then the was the second plane crashing into the second tower, and then the news from Washington, and then the sights of the towers collapsing, and on and on.

So here we sat, transfixed and horrified. We shared, from afar, the sickening revulsion at the sights we were, nevertheless, compelled to observe. The thoughts as to what was happening, as to the people to whom it was happening, as to the people by whom it was done, as to what will happen now, all flooded in. And with them comes the fear, the certainty of the painful expectation that in that context, in those places, there will be someone or more that we know who is directly affected. Ruthann's nephew works in that area of Manhattan; the modern communications world that brought us the fear for his safety, also brought us some time later an e-mail that he was okay. And then the feared bad news came, but from a direction we had not anticipated, thinking as we had been of the people in the buildings attacked -- by e-mail in the early evening here, the word that Al Filipov, a great and good member of our home church in Concord, Massachusetts, was a passenger on one of the planes involved, one of those hijacked flights originating at Boston's airport. Our hearts go out to Loretta and the family; our thoughts and prayers will be there as the Tri-Con community gathers in mourning. Our minds scream at this terrible loss, amongst all the others.

So what is the small positive in this?

We are staying this year in a small garden flat complex, renting from people away in Arizona whom we met when working at the Technikon last year. We have gotten to know a few of our South African neighbors just a bit, not closely, but to talk over the washing and that sort of thing; one of them watched the apartment for us while we were away. As the events of the afternoon and evening unfolded, and as the CNN (and later the British equivalent) news feeds continued on television here, we heard from three of our neighbors. Two came to the door, one phoned, each of them wanting just to express their shock at what was occurring, to let us know their concern, that they were thinking about us as they knew we were thinking about what was happening at home in our own country. We are just two among the millions of common Americans vicariously harmed by this attack on our country; and they are just several among the millions of common South Africans looking on from afar -- but they took the time to let us know they cared, that they felt the same sense of consternation at what was transpiring, the same sense of horror.

These were simple, direct expressions. They were no big thing. But they were unexpected moments of human kindness and connection, for strangers here on the other side of the world. It was a small mercy, but it will help. The efforts to divide us from one another have not yet succeeded.

The world is again showing itself an evil place. But here was a small sign, a very small sign, that there is yet some good to cling to. As we must.

We pray for God's wisdom, grace and mercy for all those affected by these horrible events, and those who must decide what happens now. Therefore, we pray for us all, the world around.

October 10, 2001 -- "The Community Mission Outreach Activities of the Local UCCSA Churches"

We have been diligently working this past month -- we have no more trips scheduled, after our long trip to Namibia and Kruger National Park -- and wanted to share some of our work with you.

As you know, our assignment this year has been to assist the regional Mission Council of the United Congregational Church of Southern Africa (UCCCSA) in the province of KwaZulu-Natal. The Mission Council has concentrated its activities for this year on encouraging each of the UCCSA's 65 or so local congregations in the region to become involved in community outreach activities relating to HIV/AIDS, poverty or violence in their own local communities. As part of this effort, we have facilitated 4 workshops, held in various places around this province of KwaZulu Natal. While the format of each of the workshops has been generally the same, the experience at each one has been substantially different as the participants from different parts of the province focused on quite different issues. Our July newsletter gave several stories from the workshops.

This month, we have worked on preparing a report for the Mission Council that describes the workshops and details the lessons and recommendations learned. We have a fifth and final workshop coming up on Saturday, October 20, that we will need to quickly incorporate into the report. Then, on October 31, we and leaders of the Mission Council will be meeting with the region's UCCSA ministers to present the report and, in particular, a summary of lessons and recommendations concerning the manner and role of local community outreach by the churches, as derived from the experiences of the workshops.

When this work began, the impression we had been given was that the local churches were not really active in their local communities, and the purpose behind the workshops was to find a way to change this, to spur the local churches to be more involved in addressing the problems and issues so evident in this country. But the biggest surprise from the workshops has been to learn that really there is much already being done in community outreach by members of these local churches. Sometimes an entire church is involved, but it is more likely that individuals within the church are very active in community-based organizations, often without the minister's knowledge. Our workshops were originally designed to assist churches to start activities; we have learned that often it is simply that church leadership needs to become aware of and then supportive of existing activities. That is the basic 'recommendation' that the Mission Council will be presenting to the ministers at the end of this month.

A major part of the report document is a detailed transcript of the individual reports given by most of the attending churches telling about what they or their members are doing to address these major issues in their communities. We thought you might like to see the draft report's descriptive summary, as it stands through the first four workshops, of some of these existing activities:

"Overall. Of the 43 churches who attended the first 4 workshops, 36 were able to report that at least one member is involved in activities relating to AIDS, poverty or violence. Several churches noted that their activities have led to their being known in their community as a ‘caring’ church. Others noted that membership has increased due to their community projects.

"AIDS. Twenty-three (23) churches reported activities relating to HIV/AIDS. Of these, 13 have been involved in AIDS education and awareness programmes. Six churches have developed relationships with local hospices or clinics, supplying volunteers as well as food, clothing and toys.

"One church has developed its own home-based care programme, in conjunction with the local clinic. Members of four more churches are involved in community-based projects to provide home-based care. Such projects also include training family members in care of the sick member, and the provision of food and medicine to the sick. The projects require trained volunteers and a high-level of organization. Members of an additional seven churches visit those sick with AIDS and provide food, clothing and medicine, as well as spiritual guidance. Two of these churches specifically reported cleaning the home and doing the washing for the sick -- these visits must be greatly appreciated!

"Two churches are leaders in community organizations addressing the needs of orphans. These organizations are supplying food, shelter, clothing and school fees, as well as guidance and adult supervision.

"Poverty. Of the 36 reporting churches, all but one reported activities relating to poverty. Often, AIDS-related and poverty-related projects and activities intersect and overlap. Those churches which began with activities relating to AIDS have found that the sick are not cured if they are hungry. Those churches with projects relating to poverty have found that many of those requiring assistance are sick.

"Fully half of the churches are involved in self-help income generating projects, with skills taught by church members. The most common projects are vegetable gardens, which provide food for those involved as well as the potential for income from the sale of excess produce. They are also credited with improving the general health of the community. Other common skills that are taught are sewing and beadwork. Other activities include making building blocks, candles and mirrors. One particularly far-reaching project includes a poultry farm, a bakery, a vegetable garden, a sewing project and a crèche. Several other churches also support a local crèche so that children are properly cared for while parents work or attend church.

"One innovative church opens its doors twice a month for a flea market for the local community. Local craftsmen can lease a table for the day and sell their goods. Members of the church teach craft skills to others who also sell their work at the market. Local NGOs raise community awareness with exhibits. The relationship between the church and its community has been strengthened by the flea market at the same time that a sense of community has been fostered in the area.

"In addition, 16 churches seek to assist the needy with the provision of food, clothes and money, and often spiritual guidance. A few of these are limited to the assistance of needy church members. Assistance often includes help in finding employment. Four churches contribute to local soup kitchens run by community organizations or churches. In addition, two churches are involved in school feeding programmes.

"Violence. Eleven churches reported activities relating to violence. Six are involved in community forums with police as a way to reduce crime. One church member has led a community campaign against child abuse; the youth of another church have also focused on this issue. One church made a particular effort to meet with the taxi industry during a time of violence.

"In response to the isolation caused by fears of crime in the community, one church provides a safe and fun outing for the frail [the SA term for shut-in seniors] in the area. Elderly from several nursing homes are gathered for these monthly teas."

Some of these activities are truly impressive efforts. Nearly all of them are impressive in context. The local churches, and their members, who reported these and similar activities, are not wealthy even by South African standards. Many of them are poor, rural congregations. They are confronted with problems that are beyond contemplation for most of us in our daily lives. But they are good people, people who really want to try to address the substantial, often overwhelming, problems of their local communities. And they are doing so, with those resources that they have and especially with their time, and effort, and faith, and love.

It is indeed a privilege to begin to know and learn about some of these activities, and the wonderful, passionate people of the church who are working in this way. There is much more that could be done, there is much more that needs to be done, but for these people and (the Mission Council is trying to urge) for the local churches of which these people are part, the work has at least begun.

We send you greetings from Africa, where the work continues.

November 13, 2001 -- "Abby"

It has been a busy time here in what used to be called the 'mission field,' since we last wrote.

A few Saturdays back, we held the last of the series of five local community outreach workshop sessions for the UCCSA region's local churches, and then wrapped up work on the Mission Council's formal written report (entitled "Ezinkwa neZinhlanzi / Loaves and Fishes") of information from this first series of workshops. An oral version of the rather extensive written report was presented to the region's ministers during their annual retreat, at the end of last month, and it was well received. It is difficult to know what will come of the report itself and the information it shares; we hope it will have some effect. Copies are being given to people from other regions throughout the denomination, as well as the central administration -- it will be interesting to see if other regions, or the denomination, start to do something similar to the initiative that KZN has undertaken.

Meanwhile, we are beginning to prepare for a second series of workshops that we will hold in this region in February and March. The UCCSA in the region, through the denomination offices, has asked, and Global Ministries back in the US has agreed -- as have we -- to send us back over to the Durban area for those two months, next year, to conduct these follow-up sessions. In the three additional sessions which are in the planning stage, we want to focus attention on a few of the projects that were reported at the first workshops and described in the written report, to use these to convey practical lessons applicable to all, or most, local projects that our churches might get involved with. Some of this has been done already through the written report, as to broad, 'basic' lessons concerning the how and wherefore of church projects and activities; but we want to get a bit closer to real hands-on experience types of lessons, again however drawn and taught from the experiences of the churches and the members themselves.

This planning for the follow-up, second phase workshops, has us on the road around the province again, this time to visit and learn more about particular projects and activities, heard about at the first workshop sessions, that show promise as teaching examples for the second phase workshops. We've been to the Lamontville township in the southern part of Durban -- more about that at a later date -- and the Amahlongwa mission church (150 years old) about an hour down the coast to the south, to learn more about projects there.

For that reason also, we visited Underberg this past week, on an overnight trip. This is a small town, surrounded by an extensive rural population, right next to the southern Drakensberg Mountains. The town is not quite a mile high -- about the same as Johannesburg. There's a sign in the middle of the town indicating 21 km (much of which must be straight up) to the Sani Pass border crossing into Lesotho, near to the highest points in southern Africa. There was either rain or fog the entire time we were there, so we never did see the mountains, but we're assured that they're up there somewhere. Perhaps not seeing them was to the good, since it kept us to our task, and did not encourage hiking.

As we asked about the local UCCSA church's community outreach activities in Underberg and the surrounding rural area, we came to know Siniti Abigail Ntleko -- Abby --, a truly remarkable African woman in her late 60's. We want to share a bit of Abby's story with you.

Abby was born in a rural area around Harding in the southeastern corner of KwaZulu-Natal. She did not start school until she was age 14. Her mother had died when she was young and she spent her early years caring for the family and for the family's cattle. She finally decided that she wanted to learn how to read, so started school. She went to school the first day "in her beads," as she said; the teachers made arrangements for her first school uniform. She did not attend school every year, once she had started, but attended when she could based upon the family's needs. She was perhaps age 30 when she finally completed high school. Instead of stopping her education then, she continued and became a nurse. We don't know precisely what happened over the next few years, but we do know that in 1978, at age 44, she completed an additional year of study in psychiatric nursing.

In 1980 she was sent to Underberg, to be the only public health nurse for the rural area around. This was, of course, during the Apartheid era. The white farmers were told by the government health officials that this would be a temporary placement, until public health could send a white nurse, as was considered necessary under the system at that time. Abby had been told that she could expect to see 500 patients a month, and that was in fact what happened the first month. The second month, however, she saw 1000; the third, 1500. There were clearly more people living in the area to which she'd been assigned, than the government knew, and they all -- of whatever racial group -- came to rely on Abby for their medical care. She might spend a day driving into the outlying areas, only to return home at the end of the day, tired, to find a big crowd waiting for her there. After 5 months, public health notified the local whites that they had located a white nurse to assign to the area, but the white farmers had become comfortable with Abby and preferred that she remain to treat their families, as well as their workers and the people in the surrounding areas. Because of the numbers of people Abby was treating, public health opened and staffed a clinic in Underberg in 1987. Though this assistance was welcome, she continued to have a central role in the provision of health care in the area.

Abby "retired" at the beginning of this year, but she is still so integral to the public health system in the Underberg area that patients and medical staff continue to rely heavily on her. From a separate drop-in center, without heat and power, she does the pre- and post-test AIDS counselling, plus administers the HIV test. (She has trained 4 AIDS counsellors for the clinic, but they aren't yet comfortable meeting with patients on their own, so she gets these referrals sent around from the clinic.)

Abby estimates that 60% of deaths in the greater Underberg area are related to AIDS. Some of those who die there are younger adults who have left the area for employment in the cities, but come home again to seek care from their families when they realize that they are sick.

Abby dispenses "secondary" medicines to the sick; that is, medicines that ease the discomfort or treat symptoms. The government public health system does not supply medicine that addresses AIDS directly -- this failure might eventually be because of budgetary constraints or the high cost of medicines, but so far, those are not the reasons, because there has been a political refusal to authorize anti-retrovirals and 'cocktail' drugs at the national level, which means the question of cost or availability of funds has not been confronted as yet; only two of the country's provincial health regimes have been willing to defy this position, and KZN is not one of them. The public health system does supply some of the secondary medicines, and there are donations which help to meet the remaining needs for those medicines. Home-based care for the sick -- there is a policy to spare the hospitals the burden of this -- is done by community health workers employed by the clinic, and a network of 20 volunteer health workers recruited by the community health workers.

Abby has established AIDS support groups scattered around the area, 17 in all. But there are other things integral to the AIDS problem, which Abby and her helpers address, beyond the specifics of the medical condition, and she provides this guidance and assistance to other people in need as well. She helps those that are able to work to develop an income source -- from training in sewing, handicrafts, or whatever, even demonstrating the making of brooms. Nutrition is a major issue, and Abby instructs people in planting vegetable gardens and hands out a brochure on how to do this -- it is a plan for a 'door garden' the size of a front door, which when up and running can provide a healthy and adequate diet -- and provides seeds and seedlings. (Her own home, which we visited, has no grass around it, only vegetables. The drop-in center also has its own vegetable garden.)

Those people with AIDS who are unable to do small tasks, Abby helps to receive a disability grant from the government, which is available provided that the person is willing to sign a statement that says, 'I have AIDS.' This declaration is a difficult step in the context of this culture, but she has done remarkable work through her counselling. In preparation for this, the people who test positive are counselled and urged to get their government identification papers, and those of their children, in order. It is unfortunately a very common circumstance in these rural areas for people not to have ID papers -- essentially, the European type of identity documents -- and to be largely invisible to the government and its agencies. Getting the papers in order is most important for the chidren who will be left behind; orphans cannot apply for an available government grant without ID papers, and obtaining ID papers without a parent is, as one would expect, far more complicated. Abby and those working with her have worked hard at routinizing the process of getting the ID papers, through interacting with the district officials for the Underberg area, who are based in another town many kilometers away.

Abby also runs the community initiative that provides food to 181 AIDS orphans in the area -- it was in the context of learning more about this program that we met her, introduced by the local UCCSA pastor who is the chairman of the initiative's board. As a rural area, there are farms about and food is both purchased and donated. Abby sees to it that each orphan receives food sufficient for one week each month. This is provided to the orphans who are not yet receiving the government grant, as it can take anywhere from 6 months to 2 years before the grant starts. So far, Abby has been able to place almost all of the orphans in the home of a responsible relative. The exception is one family of 10 children under the supervision of the oldest child, a 14-year old girl.

Abby has a strong faith. She transports as many people as she can to church, whichever church that person wants to attend. After church, these folks are all gathered together, in an additional session, in which they share with each other what each minister preached on that day (kind of like book reports on the sermons), and sing hymns in the "happy-clappy" mode, as Abby describes it. As if she didn't have enough to do, there's also a local area church youth group that is getting started to which she has delivered talks about AIDS. She talks in the schools, too, about AIDS and child safety.

And on top of it all, Abby has fostered or adopted about 20 children over her lifetime. She never had the time to be married, but she has children of all ages. We were surprised that perhaps 5 of those currently living with her are pre-school. On the other hand, maybe we shouldn't have been that surprised: it is becoming a very common circumstance here, for young children to live with grandparents, often the closest living relatives. We met many of her present brood at her home in Underberg. One of these is a young girl who came to Abby after having been disposed of, immediately after birth, in a plastic bag in a dumpster. The good thing, said Abby, was that while the bag had been tied, it had not been tied tightly, and the child could breathe. The girl looks to be, and reportedly is, fine.

The blessings that have flowed to the Underberg and area community through Abby's presence, are too many to count. She is indomitable, a very real woman with the makings of a saint. There are too few Abby's in this part of the world, but then there are too few Abby's in the world as a whole.

She is a remarkable woman. The hard part, in meeting her and hearing her story, is not to lose sight of the fact that there are things that we can and should be doing, as well. Now, we can't hope to be Abby. And we can hardly hope even to be like Abby. But we can try to help, and that's part of what this effort over the past year has been about.

We'll long remember Abby, and her work in Underberg.

(Our best wishes, to all of our friends back in the US, for a good, and blessed, Thanksgiving.)

November 30, 2001 -- "Seasons' Greetings from South Africa"

To all those who have followed the adventure of our second year of service in Durban --

Greetings, and thanks for your concern and prayers. We have come through well, and are even willing to let ourselves think we've done a bit of good in our time here. Our two-year commitment is up in a very short while, but we're being sent back for a two-month overtime stint in February and March, for some further work with the regional Mission Council of the UCCSA here in KwaZulu-Natal. We'll need your concern and prayers yet again!

It's time for Seasons' Greetings, and as we did last year, we're going to go the virtual route with holiday cards, this year. (Once again, to those of you who have not been -- or wouldn't want to have been -- on our Christmas / holiday card distribution list, but are getting this e-mail because you're on our Durban Newsletter distribution lists, sorry 'bout that, but best wishes for the holidays, anyway!)

So once again, our "card" is posted on our website. To get it, you'll need to point your internet browser to http://www.tiac.net/users/maplebrk/xmas2001. [Ed. note:  This link is inactive.  You can now find the page HERE.]  (You will NOT be able to get there from the 'regular' web site, so be sure to click on that link, or otherwise use the full address, including the 'xmas2001' part.)

(Assembly instructions: Be sure to turn on the sound on your computer -- there's a new Christmas song, again. How well this all works will be affected by the type of audio program that's on your machine, as well -- those of you with RealAudio or WindowsMedia loaded should do fine, or at least well enough to get the gist. As with the web site music pages over the year, having Adobe Acrobat Reader on your machine will be helpful, if you want to get the written music for the song. (Acrobat Reader is available for download free at www.adobe.com.) Please note that there are three 'pages' to this year's card, so you'll have to click a bit to see the whole thing.)

Hope you enjoy the card.

We hope for peace and joy for you, your families, our several nations, and this world that God has made.

Best wishes from Ruthann and Jan.

March 11, 2002 -- "Durban (Non)Newsletter"

Hello to all. We are in Durban -- well, Kloof, the leafy suburb 1000 wonderfully cooler feet up from sealevel -- and have been for the past 5 weeks, with 2 weeks to go in our 'overtime' session of our volunteer work here in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. We had not intended to bother you with 'newsletter' e-mails during this time, since what we're about in our time back in South Africa is, intentionally, a continuation of what we'd been doing during 2001.

But we did have one or two things to note, so here goes:

We've been rather busy during our recent time here, preparing for and then holding two -- the third is this coming Saturday -- further workshops for representatives of the local UCCSA churches in the province, to assist in their community outreach efforts to address the issues of poverty, HIV/AIDS, and violence in their communities. Each workshop is different, we can attest after, now, seven done with one to go. This year's effort has been on the theme, 'Siyafunda nomunye komunye' -- 'We keep on learning from one another' -- because while last year's workshops were a discovery of what the churches in the province were doing, this year's workshops have sought to use specific activities and projects of some of the churches as examples of how such efforts should proceed, to inform others.

After we're done with the workshops, we will be working as well on producing a report and supporting documents detailing the results of this year's workshops, to supplement the well-received report on last year's efforts. And then, we get to go home to plant our own garden.

We wanted you to know that our South African based e-mail and web site addresses will cease to be operative as of the end of March. So, if you want to take a last look at the animal pictures up on http://mysite.mweb.co.za/residents/jtrahall [Ed. note: inactive], you should do so now! We'll be trying to update the main web pages (at http://www.tiac.net/users/maplebrk) [Ed. note: Changed links -- see http://durbanmsnarchive.home.tiac.net.] in due course after our return Stateside, but no promises on the timing of that. When we get back to the US, besides trying to reconsitute our home and garden, we're scheduled to take off on at least one 'itineration' trip on behalf of Global Ministries, to talk about our time in South Africa to interested churches. So it's not over even though it's supposed to be over, no surprise.

We want to thank all of you for your attention to these messages when they've arrived in your inboxes, and especially those of you who have responded with messages of comment and, here and there, encouragement. These have been most valuable.

We consider ourselves most fortunate to have had this time, especially the past year and more, to experience and, in small ways, to contribute to, the lives of our new-found friends here in KwaZulu-Natal. We will never, entirely, leave this place, however much we will be glad to be home.
 

March 17, 2002 -- Note re the responses to the TriCon clothes donations

[The following message was included in the church's bulletins in the weeks preceding our re-departure for South Africa:  "Used Children’s Clothing needed for Aids Orphans in South Africa. Children in the Church school are invited to donate one outfit to be taken to Siniti Abigail Ntleko (Abby), a nurse in Underberg South Africa, by our missionaries Jan & Ruthann Hall. Please read the Halls letter in this issue of our newsletter for the amazing story of Abby and her work with aids orphans.  When selecting an outfit to send, please take a moment to reflect on the importance of this act of sharing. Church school children are encouraged to enclose a note about themselves and a message to the children in Africa. Please bring your outfit to church school by January 27th."  We headed back with the clothes for which thanks is indicated in this message, which was for the church's monthly newsletter and website.]

Yesterday we received from Abby thank you notes to bring back with us to Tri-Con. These include a couple from adults, and several from kids. I thought you might like the 2 from adults now, in case you would like to include them in the April newsletter. The first is from Abby, the second from a caregiver.

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Dear friends and children of USA.

Re: Acknowledgement of your generous giving

I was in tears for days when I looked at the clothes that you sent us.

The clothes were NEW! NEW! These clothes were distributed to the orphans. The caregivers were shocked.

Most unfortunately most of them are not literate. Some are unable to express themselves with English. They requested me to extend their sincere thanks. They prayed over these gifts, blessing the people who gave.

GOD BLESS YOU ABUNDANTLY.

Yours in His Service,
Sr. Abegail Ntleko

[In South Africa, nurses are called sisters. -- Ruthann]

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Dear friends in the USA.

On behalf of the orphans in the area of Umgatshein which is a settlement 28 kms from Underberg village.

I would like to thank you very much for the beautiful clothes you sent us for our orphans.

We were able to clothe hundreds of children. All God's blessing on you and your loving children.

Thank you again. God Bless you all.

Yours faithfully,
Miss Fikile Irene Biyela
(caregiver to 5 orphans)
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We will be bringing these, and the notes from children (responsive to the notes accompanying the clothes), in a couple of weeks.

Ruthann