Most Americans think of Mexico as the warm winter getaway, where they can swim, surf and have fun at the beaches of our neighbor to the south. I had the luck of being in Mexico during the winter months from October 28th 2004 to March 1, 2005. My stay was far from being like the advertisements for Mexican tourist resorts.
For four months, I was sent to work in the Sierra Tarahumara region of Mexico. I went as a newly ordained deacon and was not quite sure what to expect. Two months before I arrived at my new home, I did a lot of research and reading about the area where I was to be destined. It was the home of the famous Copper Canyon, Tarahumara Indians, Mennonites and one of Mexico's largest states.
In short, my experience was focused around pastoral and social outreach ministry in the Sierra Tarahumara region as well as my home base town of La Junta, Chihuahua which is the center of a parish that covers a geographic territory the size of Manhattan, Queens, Brooklyn and part of the Bronx. We attended to fairly modern communities as well as far flung mountain chapels which were made out of old log cabin corn storage sheds.
The Augustinian Recollect Friars have been attending to the needs of this far flung parish tucked away in the southwestern most part of the state of Chihuahua. We have been there since 1970 carrying out missionary work among the people. There is much more work to be done, but not enough laborers and sometimes with little funding to carry it out. Nonetheless, we worked within the means that were given us. However, the work of God's kingdom in that area can be potential zed much more, and that is one goal that we have, but it requires some venturesome and self-sacrificing souls to do this.
As a deacon sent to work there in the missions, I can only say that words are not enough to capture the experience. What I say can only give a glimpse to the reader. Nonetheless, God worked his blessing by using the experience to fortify this deacon and to truly make him well founded in his vocation as an Augustinian Recollect friar, who aspires to follow the proud tradition of his brothers before him, who have selflessly dedicated their lives to the foreign missions entrusted to them.
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