Español abajo The president of Colombia, Juan Manuel Santos, finally visited Mampuján last month. I unfortunately had another meeting elsewhere, so wasn’t able to attend, but from what I have gathered, it was a spectacular flurry of government self-congratulations. T-shirts were liberally distributed, thanking the government on the front, and on the back declaring boldly
December is the month of the family here in Mampuján. Half of the original members of the community live outside of the community, because of better employment further away, but the majority come back in December to enjoy the holidays with their families. The dynamic of the community changes dramatically- people become more laid-back, laugh
On December 8, we light candles to welcome and guide Maria on her journey to Bethlehem, and with the welcoming of Maria, we light the way for all that her journey means, at least for me. It means the start of the Christmas season here in Colombia. It means that no matter where you live
Because I am on vacation. Because it is a beautiful morning. Because life is a gift meant to be shared, here is a poem. Morning Poem Every morning the world is created. Under the orange sticks of the sun the heaped ashes of the night turn into leaves again and fasten themselves to the high
“Reparation requires messianic hope. To hope, then, is to hope for the reparation of the irreparable. It is to hope for the present. The hope is for now…It is not a question of hoping to escape time, but of hoping for new time, for a new day and a new birth.” (Weakness of God, John
We have now been living in our communities for over a year. Yikes! For the Seed website, all of us have written and reflected on our time in our communities and what we have learnt. Here is my general introduction: Every moment is a life changing moment; every moment is a moment that has never
The singular and cheerful life of any flower in anyone’s garden or any still unowned field- if there are any- catches me by the heart, by its color by its obedience to the holiest of laws: be alive until you are not… those princes of everything green- the grasses of which there are truly an
Now that the news of the reparations are finally public, I thought it would be fun to share a little of the behind the scenes activity. After all, it’s not every day that a reparations process takes place! Although, in the case of Mampuján, hopefully we will get to go through it all over again
We walked the 73 kilometres to from Mampuján to Cartagena in December of 2011 together to demand the rights of compensation for forced displacement. Then, on August 27 and 28 of 2012, I watched my friends and community members walk forward to receive their cheques of individual reparations. It was a wonderful, indescribable moment to
“…what is important is to be grateful today and to give thanks. I am more and more convinced that gratitude is one of the most sublime of human emotions. It is an emotion that reaches far beyond our own self to God, to all of creation, to the people who gave us life, love and
Anna L. Vogt 