This weekend, I got a very physical, tangible, intimate look at the hurt and heart of Guatemala’s history.
This beautiful, incredible country is very, very familiar with pain. The heartache here is real, even if it’s not taught in classrooms (be it here, or in the states).
I’m going to be honest up front, this post is a hard one for me to write. It’s going to be raw and honest, even to a point of some very transparent narration of the things I’ve seen and the things my country has done.
I'm an internal processor, so in order for me to understand and decompress part of what I saw, I had to write. And that's lent itself to some very lengthy ramblings that very transparently bear my heart. I didn't do a whole lot of fact checking, but I based all of the facts directly from the notes I took during the weekend.
I’m putting this all in one monster, marathon post because maybe it’ll help convey the weight of it all. It's been written over the course of a week, so if any of the gramar is slightly confusing, that's why.
Also, I’m very, very intentionally writing this in English. It’s going to be messy and it’ll probably hurt your heart. In all sincerity, if you don’t feel something inside of you aching for change, if your heart doesn’t yearn for justice, if you are not at all moved, please make your way to the nearest emergency room: you’re probably dead. It’s that real. Its humanity struggling and suffering, but still fighting because of the hope that better is possible.
Guatemala hurts. It’s breaking me. God has put the phrase “break my heart for what breaks Yours” onto my heart and into my prayers for the past week, and it’s been dangerous, because that’s what He’s done. I have seen and smelled and glimpsed and studied parts of the horrific injustice here. But its awareness that is the first step to change, and these are hard conversations that I so deeply believe need to happen.
This beautiful, incredible country is very, very familiar with pain. The heartache here is real, even if it’s not taught in classrooms (be it here, or in the states).
I’m going to be honest up front, this post is a hard one for me to write. It’s going to be raw and honest, even to a point of some very transparent narration of the things I’ve seen and the things my country has done.
I'm an internal processor, so in order for me to understand and decompress part of what I saw, I had to write. And that's lent itself to some very lengthy ramblings that very transparently bear my heart. I didn't do a whole lot of fact checking, but I based all of the facts directly from the notes I took during the weekend.
I’m putting this all in one monster, marathon post because maybe it’ll help convey the weight of it all. It's been written over the course of a week, so if any of the gramar is slightly confusing, that's why.
Also, I’m very, very intentionally writing this in English. It’s going to be messy and it’ll probably hurt your heart. In all sincerity, if you don’t feel something inside of you aching for change, if your heart doesn’t yearn for justice, if you are not at all moved, please make your way to the nearest emergency room: you’re probably dead. It’s that real. Its humanity struggling and suffering, but still fighting because of the hope that better is possible.
Guatemala hurts. It’s breaking me. God has put the phrase “break my heart for what breaks Yours” onto my heart and into my prayers for the past week, and it’s been dangerous, because that’s what He’s done. I have seen and smelled and glimpsed and studied parts of the horrific injustice here. But its awareness that is the first step to change, and these are hard conversations that I so deeply believe need to happen.
Dr. Rev. Hector: The Reality & History of Guatemala
(Supplemental Guatemala history from Paul, because I just started writing and my heart took over)
Dr. Hector was born in Guatemala and educated in the states. We asked him what one thing he would say to people from the states and it sunk in to me: We are to learn the real history of Guatemala, not the fake stories and fabrications. Learn it, believe it, and tell it unapologetically.
Why is this a stretch? Because the real history of Guatemala makes the U.S. look like a bunch of violent, selfish, ignorant jerks (to put it lightly). The U.S. doesn’t teach this history because we’d be exposing a past that’s very not okay, and Guatemalans don’t teach it in school for any number of reasons not entirely identified – it’s painful, it’s dangerous, it’s hard.
In the 1950’s, Guatemala was moving forward incredibly. It was on its way to becoming a developed nation and a global competitor. President J. R. Barrios (affectionately known as ‘The Reformer’) was working for the reunion of a single, Central American country (what we know as Central America is now five countries that used to be united, with Guatemala as their capital). Education was improving, people were gaining rights, and a new idea for land reform was beginning to gain support.
Meanwhile, United Fruit Company (also known as Chiquita in the states) had been occupying a large portion of the country’s land. UFC had been drastically under-declaring the value of the land they occupied. When the Guatemalan government wanted to buy back the land as a part of land reform and redistribution (vastly helping the Mayan pueblos and indigenous groups), they had the right to do so at the under-declared value. The United States government didn’t like this idea, as they’d be losing a ridiculous amount of money and fruit prices would likely skyrocket. Consequently, the CIA (conveniently headed by one of UFC’s owners) sponsored a military coup under the pretense that Guatemala’s democracy was at stake (though it never ever was, and every decision the country made was backed by standard, legal electoral process) and the country was on the verge of becoming a communist state (again, was never a threat, as democracy in Guatemala was truly thriving).
This military overthrow, backed by the U.S., is what started the ‘Armed Civil Conflict’ that lasted for 36 years in this country.
Guatemala is the approximate size of the state of Tennessee, however the government was backed by a military and officials for a total of about 80,000. The guerrillas, however, never totaled more than 3 or 4,000 and were divided between a handful of independent groups. There was no need for a violent war, as the guerrillas did not pose a significant threat, even by a longshot.
However, conflict did break out. From 1960 until 1996, Guatemala suffered under a Civil War / Armed Internal Conflict / Military Coup D’état / Genocide (no official name has been given to what happened).
I can’t explain this conflict other than to simply spew out facts and let them speak for themselves:
- a total of between 200,000 and 250,000 people were killed
- this was a death of more than 5% of the total Guatemalan population in 1960
- more than 90% of these people were civilians
- something like 93% of them were Indigenous Mayan Populations
- 50,000 kids were taken, tortured, and killed for being ‘suspects’ in the spread of communism
- a ‘scorched earth’ policy was taken up, entirely flattening indigenous villages
- more than 1 million people (1 in 5) were displaced by the conflict and forced to leave their pueblos
- less than 3% of total casualties were government and affiliated soldiers
- entire families or pueblos were executed for being suspected of helping or harboring guerrillas
- mass graves have been found, the largest of them on a military base, containing 528 bodies
- 2,000 bodies have been identified and returned to their families by the Forensic Anthropology Foundation of Guatemala (less than 1%)
What does that mean for Guatemala today?
There is a shortage of teachers in the entire country, with an immediate need for 5,000 teachers at an elementary level alone. Nurses are also in extreme shortage, and, even if you get to a hospital, the chances of that hospital having the necessary medications are about as slim as your ability to pay for them.
This year, the country celebrates 20 years since the peace accords were signed, legally ending the armed conflict. However, why should we celebrate this? Progress has not happened. Guatemala is currently no further advanced than they were before the conflict began.
Instead of all that it could (and should) be by now, Guatemala is struck with extreme poverty.
Again, we’re going to let the facts speak for themselves:
- Guatemala is ranked #131 out of 187 countries in the human development index
- the PPP is $4,610 a year (this number shows how much money an average person makes in one year, adjusted for the cost of living)
- Guatemala has the 6th highest inequality levels globally
- 60% of the population lives below $2 a day (the global definition of poverty)
- 20% live on less than $1 a day (the global definition of extreme poverty).
- between 10 and 20% of the population can afford ‘luxuries’ like running water, a car, or a stable job
- 2% of land owners own 65% of the land
- Agriculture has 55% of the workforce, but only 22% of the nation’s income
- 4th highest in undernutrition (the inability to consume sufficient calories, regardless of the type)
- 50% of the population in total is undernourished
- 59% of indigenous Mayan individuals are undernourished
- Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador are all in the top 6 countries with the highest murder rates, Guatemala is because of the high gang activity and drug trade
This is the one that gets me the most:
- 31% of Guatemalan women ages 15 and older cannot read or write at a 3rd grade level
- 59% of indigenous Mayan women of the same age cannot read or write
It’s no long stretch to say that the poverty and inequality here are extreme, but also go unnoticed in the general affairs of the world. I do not intend to make this an overly political post, but can you blame people for risking everything to come live in the States?
Less than 1% of people here get a college degree. Guatemalans have become 2 million international refugees and undocumented workers, who have no. other. chance. at survival.
Dr. Hector talked to us a little about our upcoming presidential elections, and, in terms of offering any hope to Guatemala, all candidates are equally damaging. No one has any plans to offer any aid or assistance or change policy at all. Still, he has hope.
Not hope for this election, not hope for immediate, tangible change within a certain number of years, but he is hopeful. Why? Because it’s my generation that’s growing up to learn about this. We are the future lawyers, doctors, teachers, psychologists, politicians and voters. The work of a few can ripple out and bring an increase in awareness, changing hearts, and changing policy. It’s in the not terribly distant future that we will be the ones writing policy, campaigning, and casting votes. If there is to be any hope at all for Guatemala, it stands on our shoulders to bring the light and be that change.
Dr. Hector was born in Guatemala and educated in the states. We asked him what one thing he would say to people from the states and it sunk in to me: We are to learn the real history of Guatemala, not the fake stories and fabrications. Learn it, believe it, and tell it unapologetically.
Why is this a stretch? Because the real history of Guatemala makes the U.S. look like a bunch of violent, selfish, ignorant jerks (to put it lightly). The U.S. doesn’t teach this history because we’d be exposing a past that’s very not okay, and Guatemalans don’t teach it in school for any number of reasons not entirely identified – it’s painful, it’s dangerous, it’s hard.
In the 1950’s, Guatemala was moving forward incredibly. It was on its way to becoming a developed nation and a global competitor. President J. R. Barrios (affectionately known as ‘The Reformer’) was working for the reunion of a single, Central American country (what we know as Central America is now five countries that used to be united, with Guatemala as their capital). Education was improving, people were gaining rights, and a new idea for land reform was beginning to gain support.
Meanwhile, United Fruit Company (also known as Chiquita in the states) had been occupying a large portion of the country’s land. UFC had been drastically under-declaring the value of the land they occupied. When the Guatemalan government wanted to buy back the land as a part of land reform and redistribution (vastly helping the Mayan pueblos and indigenous groups), they had the right to do so at the under-declared value. The United States government didn’t like this idea, as they’d be losing a ridiculous amount of money and fruit prices would likely skyrocket. Consequently, the CIA (conveniently headed by one of UFC’s owners) sponsored a military coup under the pretense that Guatemala’s democracy was at stake (though it never ever was, and every decision the country made was backed by standard, legal electoral process) and the country was on the verge of becoming a communist state (again, was never a threat, as democracy in Guatemala was truly thriving).
This military overthrow, backed by the U.S., is what started the ‘Armed Civil Conflict’ that lasted for 36 years in this country.
Guatemala is the approximate size of the state of Tennessee, however the government was backed by a military and officials for a total of about 80,000. The guerrillas, however, never totaled more than 3 or 4,000 and were divided between a handful of independent groups. There was no need for a violent war, as the guerrillas did not pose a significant threat, even by a longshot.
However, conflict did break out. From 1960 until 1996, Guatemala suffered under a Civil War / Armed Internal Conflict / Military Coup D’état / Genocide (no official name has been given to what happened).
I can’t explain this conflict other than to simply spew out facts and let them speak for themselves:
- a total of between 200,000 and 250,000 people were killed
- this was a death of more than 5% of the total Guatemalan population in 1960
- more than 90% of these people were civilians
- something like 93% of them were Indigenous Mayan Populations
- 50,000 kids were taken, tortured, and killed for being ‘suspects’ in the spread of communism
- a ‘scorched earth’ policy was taken up, entirely flattening indigenous villages
- more than 1 million people (1 in 5) were displaced by the conflict and forced to leave their pueblos
- less than 3% of total casualties were government and affiliated soldiers
- entire families or pueblos were executed for being suspected of helping or harboring guerrillas
- mass graves have been found, the largest of them on a military base, containing 528 bodies
- 2,000 bodies have been identified and returned to their families by the Forensic Anthropology Foundation of Guatemala (less than 1%)
What does that mean for Guatemala today?
There is a shortage of teachers in the entire country, with an immediate need for 5,000 teachers at an elementary level alone. Nurses are also in extreme shortage, and, even if you get to a hospital, the chances of that hospital having the necessary medications are about as slim as your ability to pay for them.
This year, the country celebrates 20 years since the peace accords were signed, legally ending the armed conflict. However, why should we celebrate this? Progress has not happened. Guatemala is currently no further advanced than they were before the conflict began.
Instead of all that it could (and should) be by now, Guatemala is struck with extreme poverty.
Again, we’re going to let the facts speak for themselves:
- Guatemala is ranked #131 out of 187 countries in the human development index
- the PPP is $4,610 a year (this number shows how much money an average person makes in one year, adjusted for the cost of living)
- Guatemala has the 6th highest inequality levels globally
- 60% of the population lives below $2 a day (the global definition of poverty)
- 20% live on less than $1 a day (the global definition of extreme poverty).
- between 10 and 20% of the population can afford ‘luxuries’ like running water, a car, or a stable job
- 2% of land owners own 65% of the land
- Agriculture has 55% of the workforce, but only 22% of the nation’s income
- 4th highest in undernutrition (the inability to consume sufficient calories, regardless of the type)
- 50% of the population in total is undernourished
- 59% of indigenous Mayan individuals are undernourished
- Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador are all in the top 6 countries with the highest murder rates, Guatemala is because of the high gang activity and drug trade
This is the one that gets me the most:
- 31% of Guatemalan women ages 15 and older cannot read or write at a 3rd grade level
- 59% of indigenous Mayan women of the same age cannot read or write
It’s no long stretch to say that the poverty and inequality here are extreme, but also go unnoticed in the general affairs of the world. I do not intend to make this an overly political post, but can you blame people for risking everything to come live in the States?
Less than 1% of people here get a college degree. Guatemalans have become 2 million international refugees and undocumented workers, who have no. other. chance. at survival.
Dr. Hector talked to us a little about our upcoming presidential elections, and, in terms of offering any hope to Guatemala, all candidates are equally damaging. No one has any plans to offer any aid or assistance or change policy at all. Still, he has hope.
Not hope for this election, not hope for immediate, tangible change within a certain number of years, but he is hopeful. Why? Because it’s my generation that’s growing up to learn about this. We are the future lawyers, doctors, teachers, psychologists, politicians and voters. The work of a few can ripple out and bring an increase in awareness, changing hearts, and changing policy. It’s in the not terribly distant future that we will be the ones writing policy, campaigning, and casting votes. If there is to be any hope at all for Guatemala, it stands on our shoulders to bring the light and be that change.
Forensic Anthropology Foundation of Guatemala
Our trip to the Forensic Anthropology Foundation of Guatemala (FAFG) was something I looked forward to coming into this semester. Though our time there was short, it was powerful. I still haven’t entirely processed everything that I saw, and I struggled to put words to it…
So, most of this blog post comes from my journal, with elaboration after the fact:
FAFG was hard. Not just on the surface, but the more you let it sink in, the more real it became. 200,000 people killed with more still missing, likely laying in unmarked graves. One mass grave at a military base had something like 528 individuals. Some blindfolded, hands tied…some suffocated, others starved.
Hallways lined with boxes stacked 5 or 6 high, each containing the remains of one individual person – fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, friends. None of them will have a trial, the main idea is to identify the parts of them that remain and reunited them with their families for a proper burial to end (according to Mayan religious beliefs) the constant suffering of the deceased and their families souls. None of them will have a trial because the government would almost certainly be found guilty.
Laying out on the table were three or four bodies, all adults except for the remains of a newborn baby, estimated to be about a month old. Usually, these small skeletons can’t be recovered, but this one had been wrapped in a blanket and thrown in haphazardly near its mother. I think the hardest part for me was this body…the child had no skull, just flakes of bone laying above the tiny vertebra of his little spine. You cannot see that and not feel a hurt that shakes you to the core of your being.
Posters hung on the walls of the circular room showing the bone development of children, helping the anthropologists age the thousands of skeletons in their possession (and the new ones they continue to encounter; FAFG has identified about 2,000 bodies, or less than 1% of total casualties.) Tens, almost hundreds of thousands of civilians.
DNA samples are taken from families with missing or displaced members, and FAFG uses molars and femurs of the deceased to make or confirm identities. However, families are still afraid to come forward.
The process of the work of FAFG is a hard, complex one. First, families must go to the Ministero Publico (public ministry, or government) and place a formal missing person’s report. Most of the people that come forward do so because they personally witnessed their families being taken or killed. After paperwork is filed, the FAFG is notified. They then send out two teams to the rural villages. First, the social anthropologists go and collect stories and eyewitness testimonies of the events leading up to their family member’s disappearance. Then the forensic anthropologists come out and survey the land, mapping out the likely locations of bodies and graves. The site is then systematically excavated, treated with the same care as a recent crime scene. Layer by layer, piece by piece, body by body, things are uncovered and discovered, packaged, labeled, and sent back to the lab for analysis, where a third team has the monumental task of identifying and returning the bodies of the civilians to their familes.
And how does FAFG do what it does? The short answer is: Switzerland. Their genetics system is from the states and is the same system that was used to identify bodies after 9/11 and the Paris subway bombings. A vast majority of their funding is from the Swiss, evidently a country with a conscience. The Guatemalan government has cut all funding because many of their own are one behind the genocide (and all have full immunity).
Only one person involved has been stripped of his immunity; he was a high ranking general when many of the mass executions were carried out, but—even stripped of immunity—no charges have been brought against him. Where is the justice here?
You can’t tell me that the world is just and fair. You don’t get to complain about Hitler and WWII and the concentration camps and point fingers at the atrocities of the world without acknowledging the Genocide of Mayan peoples in Guatemala.
So, most of this blog post comes from my journal, with elaboration after the fact:
FAFG was hard. Not just on the surface, but the more you let it sink in, the more real it became. 200,000 people killed with more still missing, likely laying in unmarked graves. One mass grave at a military base had something like 528 individuals. Some blindfolded, hands tied…some suffocated, others starved.
Hallways lined with boxes stacked 5 or 6 high, each containing the remains of one individual person – fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, friends. None of them will have a trial, the main idea is to identify the parts of them that remain and reunited them with their families for a proper burial to end (according to Mayan religious beliefs) the constant suffering of the deceased and their families souls. None of them will have a trial because the government would almost certainly be found guilty.
Laying out on the table were three or four bodies, all adults except for the remains of a newborn baby, estimated to be about a month old. Usually, these small skeletons can’t be recovered, but this one had been wrapped in a blanket and thrown in haphazardly near its mother. I think the hardest part for me was this body…the child had no skull, just flakes of bone laying above the tiny vertebra of his little spine. You cannot see that and not feel a hurt that shakes you to the core of your being.
Posters hung on the walls of the circular room showing the bone development of children, helping the anthropologists age the thousands of skeletons in their possession (and the new ones they continue to encounter; FAFG has identified about 2,000 bodies, or less than 1% of total casualties.) Tens, almost hundreds of thousands of civilians.
DNA samples are taken from families with missing or displaced members, and FAFG uses molars and femurs of the deceased to make or confirm identities. However, families are still afraid to come forward.
The process of the work of FAFG is a hard, complex one. First, families must go to the Ministero Publico (public ministry, or government) and place a formal missing person’s report. Most of the people that come forward do so because they personally witnessed their families being taken or killed. After paperwork is filed, the FAFG is notified. They then send out two teams to the rural villages. First, the social anthropologists go and collect stories and eyewitness testimonies of the events leading up to their family member’s disappearance. Then the forensic anthropologists come out and survey the land, mapping out the likely locations of bodies and graves. The site is then systematically excavated, treated with the same care as a recent crime scene. Layer by layer, piece by piece, body by body, things are uncovered and discovered, packaged, labeled, and sent back to the lab for analysis, where a third team has the monumental task of identifying and returning the bodies of the civilians to their familes.
And how does FAFG do what it does? The short answer is: Switzerland. Their genetics system is from the states and is the same system that was used to identify bodies after 9/11 and the Paris subway bombings. A vast majority of their funding is from the Swiss, evidently a country with a conscience. The Guatemalan government has cut all funding because many of their own are one behind the genocide (and all have full immunity).
Only one person involved has been stripped of his immunity; he was a high ranking general when many of the mass executions were carried out, but—even stripped of immunity—no charges have been brought against him. Where is the justice here?
You can’t tell me that the world is just and fair. You don’t get to complain about Hitler and WWII and the concentration camps and point fingers at the atrocities of the world without acknowledging the Genocide of Mayan peoples in Guatemala.
Shorty & His Crew: Gangs in La Limonada
Shorty grew up in La Limonada, involved in the gang scene, using and dealing drugs...he’d been one to mock and assault evangelists, getting to a point of a very near suicide attempt where he gave up entirely and decided to give one last attempt at living, during which he became a Christian.
By no small miracle, Shorty was able to escape the gang lifestyle, get himself off of drugs, and turned his life around completely. Someone guilty of such horrors and atrocities is now a massive tool for Christ’s kingdom. He’s gone back to La Limonada, a city just outside the capital, known for its intense gang activity. He now walks those streets and alleys as a pastor, but maintains his rough exterior. The guys trust him, and, soul by soul, he’s offering ways out of the gangs.
He brought four of ‘his crew’ with him to talk about the realities of this place. Of these three, only one had hope of ever returning to his family. The other three could never speak to anyone from their former life again. Gang culture is so strong there that, as early as seven years old, kids are working as hit men, dealing drugs, and working up the ranks. They’re told that young that if they refuse the gang, their families will be killed. As soon as they make any effort to defy or leave the gang, they, and often their families, become targets. I can’t share any of the guys’ stories, because their lives are still very much in danger. They’re hiding out with Shorty in relative safety and are turning their lives around, some quickly, some inch by painful inch. Coming off drugs, dealing with their own weighty actions of the past, and having no idea if a future is even possible for them.
We chose five of our best Spanish speakers (myself being one of them) to lead prayer for each of the five men who had spoken with us. I had a chance to lay hands on and pray over, out loud and in Spanish, a man who society would immediately condemn. He’d never be welcome in our conservative little churches. He looked like he couldn’t have been more than 16 or 18 years old, and the contrast between the innocence and hopelessness in him cut straight to my heart.
Maybe I should have been, but I was not afraid. I didn’t see a criminal or a monster in him, I saw a hurting kid that had run out of roads to run down. He'd had no other options, and that hurt my heart.
Shorty does an incredible job of demonstrating the very concrete, physical love of Christ. He’ll tell you that he’s as much a sinner as any of his crew or any of the gang leaders in La Limonada, but Christ saved his life for a purpose, and he’s discovered that his purpose is loving on those who are where he was. They guys gave testimonies of his grace and his compassion, his faith in them, and his perseverance. The way they spoke of him made it so clear the love that Christ has for us, his church. We’re all messy, we all have blood on our hands, but His grace abounds and He’s always there to sit with us through the darkest nights and speak truth over us, even when we believe we’re too far gone.
By no small miracle, Shorty was able to escape the gang lifestyle, get himself off of drugs, and turned his life around completely. Someone guilty of such horrors and atrocities is now a massive tool for Christ’s kingdom. He’s gone back to La Limonada, a city just outside the capital, known for its intense gang activity. He now walks those streets and alleys as a pastor, but maintains his rough exterior. The guys trust him, and, soul by soul, he’s offering ways out of the gangs.
He brought four of ‘his crew’ with him to talk about the realities of this place. Of these three, only one had hope of ever returning to his family. The other three could never speak to anyone from their former life again. Gang culture is so strong there that, as early as seven years old, kids are working as hit men, dealing drugs, and working up the ranks. They’re told that young that if they refuse the gang, their families will be killed. As soon as they make any effort to defy or leave the gang, they, and often their families, become targets. I can’t share any of the guys’ stories, because their lives are still very much in danger. They’re hiding out with Shorty in relative safety and are turning their lives around, some quickly, some inch by painful inch. Coming off drugs, dealing with their own weighty actions of the past, and having no idea if a future is even possible for them.
We chose five of our best Spanish speakers (myself being one of them) to lead prayer for each of the five men who had spoken with us. I had a chance to lay hands on and pray over, out loud and in Spanish, a man who society would immediately condemn. He’d never be welcome in our conservative little churches. He looked like he couldn’t have been more than 16 or 18 years old, and the contrast between the innocence and hopelessness in him cut straight to my heart.
Maybe I should have been, but I was not afraid. I didn’t see a criminal or a monster in him, I saw a hurting kid that had run out of roads to run down. He'd had no other options, and that hurt my heart.
Shorty does an incredible job of demonstrating the very concrete, physical love of Christ. He’ll tell you that he’s as much a sinner as any of his crew or any of the gang leaders in La Limonada, but Christ saved his life for a purpose, and he’s discovered that his purpose is loving on those who are where he was. They guys gave testimonies of his grace and his compassion, his faith in them, and his perseverance. The way they spoke of him made it so clear the love that Christ has for us, his church. We’re all messy, we all have blood on our hands, but His grace abounds and He’s always there to sit with us through the darkest nights and speak truth over us, even when we believe we’re too far gone.
Tita & her work: Kids in La Limonada
Tita is a good friend of Shorty’s. While Shorty’s call is to work with the gang members, Tita works in prevention. She talked to us about failed attempts at getting young kids out of gangs, but elaborated a lot on the system they have to prevent gang involvement. The four schools she’s opened have about a 95% success rate in keeping kids out of gangs.
Prevention starts at 3 years old, when kids are first sent off to preschool. From the ages of 3 to 7, kids enrolled at her schools spend half of their day in traditional public schools and half of the day in one of her 3 (soon to be 4) schools. They’re loved on, they’re taught about Christ, and they’re given a meal. {Tita said that they make sure their meals are the biggest on Mondays and Fridays, because there is no way of knowing if these kids ever get food outside of what’s offered them at school.} These kids get vitamins as physical food and the love of God as spiritual food, and the balance that they keep is incredibly important for the success of the program.
Why this age group? Because by the time they turn 7, these kids are aware of their own intense poverty and they’re already being recruited by gangs. At 7 years old, kids are running drugs and being initiated into lower levels of the gangs that run La Limonada. And these kids can’t just say ‘no.’ Their lives, as well as the lives of their families, are in danger if a gang leader even thinks that a child might be resisting them. Gang culture is just the reality, and the only hope these kids have is education that comes early and often with the hope that their parents will support them.
Tita’s been at this long enough that some of the children she first worked with when she came to La Limonada are now growing up and having their own children and sending them to her schools. It’s things like this that give me hope…and that give hope for the future of this entire country.
Tita has such a soft and tender heart and her ability to maintain that in the midst of the danger and mess she faces every day is beautiful. Her faith is also rock solid, and that’s what holds her. We asked about things like her immediate safety, and immediately she said that “[her work] is not safe, but there is no safer place to be than following God’s plan.” Her call is to come alongside and meet physical needs as well as to help shoulder the burden of the reality in which these people live.
This woman has something like 37 team members and cares for kids at three different locations because these kids can’t even walk to the other side of their neighborhood because of gang turf wars. So her three (soon to be four) schools are placed strategically within gang lines to allow for safe passage.
Situations like this aren’t uncommon. After the civil war, the population distribution of Guatemala was thrown off. More than 36% of the population is under the age of 15. For comparison, in the US this number is less than 20% (and together, all US citizens under 24 years old still make up a smaller percentage of the population of those under 14 in Guatemala). This means that there’s a lot of kids, especially in relation to the number of adults to care for them. This is just another piece of the puzzle that explains the pull of gangs here: they offer a place to belong when family structures fall apart and, as happens far too often, children are abandoned. For these kinds, gangs offer a place to come home to, and that's more than they'll ever receive from their families.
But there’s hope in La Limonada. There’s hope in Guatemala. Not without hard work and tears and lives being daily put on the line, but there is hope here, and it’s beautiful.
Prevention starts at 3 years old, when kids are first sent off to preschool. From the ages of 3 to 7, kids enrolled at her schools spend half of their day in traditional public schools and half of the day in one of her 3 (soon to be 4) schools. They’re loved on, they’re taught about Christ, and they’re given a meal. {Tita said that they make sure their meals are the biggest on Mondays and Fridays, because there is no way of knowing if these kids ever get food outside of what’s offered them at school.} These kids get vitamins as physical food and the love of God as spiritual food, and the balance that they keep is incredibly important for the success of the program.
Why this age group? Because by the time they turn 7, these kids are aware of their own intense poverty and they’re already being recruited by gangs. At 7 years old, kids are running drugs and being initiated into lower levels of the gangs that run La Limonada. And these kids can’t just say ‘no.’ Their lives, as well as the lives of their families, are in danger if a gang leader even thinks that a child might be resisting them. Gang culture is just the reality, and the only hope these kids have is education that comes early and often with the hope that their parents will support them.
Tita’s been at this long enough that some of the children she first worked with when she came to La Limonada are now growing up and having their own children and sending them to her schools. It’s things like this that give me hope…and that give hope for the future of this entire country.
Tita has such a soft and tender heart and her ability to maintain that in the midst of the danger and mess she faces every day is beautiful. Her faith is also rock solid, and that’s what holds her. We asked about things like her immediate safety, and immediately she said that “[her work] is not safe, but there is no safer place to be than following God’s plan.” Her call is to come alongside and meet physical needs as well as to help shoulder the burden of the reality in which these people live.
This woman has something like 37 team members and cares for kids at three different locations because these kids can’t even walk to the other side of their neighborhood because of gang turf wars. So her three (soon to be four) schools are placed strategically within gang lines to allow for safe passage.
Situations like this aren’t uncommon. After the civil war, the population distribution of Guatemala was thrown off. More than 36% of the population is under the age of 15. For comparison, in the US this number is less than 20% (and together, all US citizens under 24 years old still make up a smaller percentage of the population of those under 14 in Guatemala). This means that there’s a lot of kids, especially in relation to the number of adults to care for them. This is just another piece of the puzzle that explains the pull of gangs here: they offer a place to belong when family structures fall apart and, as happens far too often, children are abandoned. For these kinds, gangs offer a place to come home to, and that's more than they'll ever receive from their families.
But there’s hope in La Limonada. There’s hope in Guatemala. Not without hard work and tears and lives being daily put on the line, but there is hope here, and it’s beautiful.
Guatemalan National Cemetery
Liz Hererra was our expert guide for the tour of the cemetery, and I loved her right from the get-go. You know how some people you just immediately want to be around and listen to and take in as much as you can? Liz was one of those people for me. She reminded me a lot of my friend Anne, who’s a pastor and professor in Egypt. That Sunday was among the hardest days I've had in Guatemala, and, as painful as it was, I learned so much. If you want a glimpse at extreme inequality mixed in with some culture shock, the original ‘General Cemetery’ is the place to visit, which is still in use for those who live there and can afford it. There’s a lot of things very different about the cemeteries in Guatemala and the United States. Most notably is that, while we bury our friends and family members in the ground, the terrain and traditions of Guatemala are better suited for variations on mausoleums, in which sometimes one or two, but usually an entire family, are buried in small, house-like structures that line the roads of the cemetery. The inequality here was beyond belief. While a few members of the Castillo family (one of the handful of families that all-but-rule Guatemala because of their incomparable wealth) are buried in what looks like a massive, ornately-decorated pyramid, thousands are buried right next door in little crypts built until walls that run for blocks upon blocks in the little cemetery-city. Unless you have a crazy amount of money, you can no longer buy land for a mausoleum to bury your family together, so most families are left trying to scrape together the $50 a month it costs to rent a niche in which your family member is stuffed and cemented in. While some can afford the Guatemalan equivalent of headstones, many cannot and are forced to remember their loved ones by some numbers and letters scrawled in the cement that seals them off. As soon as that $50 fine cannot be repaid, the niches are broken into and the bodies are (if a family is fortunate enough) given back to the families to be buried in their pueblos or, more often, simply thrown into one of the mass graves conveniently left nearby. We looked at the inequality and history of Guatemala as displayed through the cemetery, and then we carried on to the back of the cemetery for one of the hardest parts of our weekend. |
Guatemala City Dump
The cemetery abruptly ends where a steep cliff dropping off into a wide ravine begins.
I have seen desperation and poverty and I have read statistics and testimonies, but that place got through to my heart in ways that no facts ever could.
We visited on a Sunday, so, legally, no one should have been working. However, a few dozen men and women still ran around in the bottom of the ravine, literally working in bags and piles of trash and waste trying to pull anything that resembles the type of the material that they’d obtained licenses to collect (such as cardboard, paper, plastic, or aluminum).
The smell was horrible, even when so few people were working. Even with so few, we saw the hierarchies and the discrimination, even there within the dump.
It hurt, but it was too much to take in all at once. My heart was in shock and I just sat and started writing on our bus ride back to comfortable little Antigua, and I think this reflection also sums up my experience that morning:
My first glimpse was the vultures
Hundreds circling, the swarm on the overlooking cliff, overwhelmingly eerie
The first overlook was impossible to grasp
Like the start of a rags-to-riches story
But without the hope of redemption you know comes at the end.
-- The city dump --
It was the second vantage point that got through to me.
Dozens working in the mess and stench,
Illegal to work on a Sunday morning, risking their work permits
Hoping to bring in the $2 of a good day’s wages.
What hurt my heart most was the solidarity between the workers and the vultures,
Taking turns picking up and sorting through,
The beautiful souls learning the engrained mentality that they are not just metaphorically but literally trash,
The children’s highest aspirations are to be a first-round picker
(one who gets first ‘dibs’ on a truck and gets to go through the contents first to get
the most valuable items)
Their only self-worth based on the trash in which they work.
When you work in trash, you are treated as trash,
Your identity becomes trash, seeing yourself, innately less valuable nearly worthless junk the sell.
These are a people who need the gospel,
But who physically cannot grasp it.
The creation story is worthless make-believe when you live in a dump,
An everlasting God is useless when you’re trying to survive day by day,
The Living Water is absurd when you work without relief in stench and stifling heat…
Imagine the hilarity of the promise of an easy yolk and a light burden when all you know is struggle.
But do you know what does get through to them?
What pierces the wall of relevance and comes crashing into their world?
Jesus hurt. Jesus bled. Jesus was disgraced and treated like trash.
This is the true good news of the gospel:
That Christ understand what those of us ‘others’ on their ‘outside’ cannot.
Jesus does not stand clean and safe on the edge of the Guatemala city dup.
Jesus is not the one unloading bags of garbage like cheap handouts and easy fixes.
Jesus is the third round picker.
He’s smelly and stained, dehydrated, exhausted.
His own people abandoned him.
And that’s the hope that we have.
Not the fluffy promise we cannot believe,
But a fellow body in the dump.
He knows, he smells, be bleeds, and He understands.
I have seen desperation and poverty and I have read statistics and testimonies, but that place got through to my heart in ways that no facts ever could.
We visited on a Sunday, so, legally, no one should have been working. However, a few dozen men and women still ran around in the bottom of the ravine, literally working in bags and piles of trash and waste trying to pull anything that resembles the type of the material that they’d obtained licenses to collect (such as cardboard, paper, plastic, or aluminum).
The smell was horrible, even when so few people were working. Even with so few, we saw the hierarchies and the discrimination, even there within the dump.
It hurt, but it was too much to take in all at once. My heart was in shock and I just sat and started writing on our bus ride back to comfortable little Antigua, and I think this reflection also sums up my experience that morning:
My first glimpse was the vultures
Hundreds circling, the swarm on the overlooking cliff, overwhelmingly eerie
The first overlook was impossible to grasp
Like the start of a rags-to-riches story
But without the hope of redemption you know comes at the end.
-- The city dump --
It was the second vantage point that got through to me.
Dozens working in the mess and stench,
Illegal to work on a Sunday morning, risking their work permits
Hoping to bring in the $2 of a good day’s wages.
What hurt my heart most was the solidarity between the workers and the vultures,
Taking turns picking up and sorting through,
The beautiful souls learning the engrained mentality that they are not just metaphorically but literally trash,
The children’s highest aspirations are to be a first-round picker
(one who gets first ‘dibs’ on a truck and gets to go through the contents first to get
the most valuable items)
Their only self-worth based on the trash in which they work.
When you work in trash, you are treated as trash,
Your identity becomes trash, seeing yourself, innately less valuable nearly worthless junk the sell.
These are a people who need the gospel,
But who physically cannot grasp it.
The creation story is worthless make-believe when you live in a dump,
An everlasting God is useless when you’re trying to survive day by day,
The Living Water is absurd when you work without relief in stench and stifling heat…
Imagine the hilarity of the promise of an easy yolk and a light burden when all you know is struggle.
But do you know what does get through to them?
What pierces the wall of relevance and comes crashing into their world?
Jesus hurt. Jesus bled. Jesus was disgraced and treated like trash.
This is the true good news of the gospel:
That Christ understand what those of us ‘others’ on their ‘outside’ cannot.
Jesus does not stand clean and safe on the edge of the Guatemala city dup.
Jesus is not the one unloading bags of garbage like cheap handouts and easy fixes.
Jesus is the third round picker.
He’s smelly and stained, dehydrated, exhausted.
His own people abandoned him.
And that’s the hope that we have.
Not the fluffy promise we cannot believe,
But a fellow body in the dump.
He knows, he smells, be bleeds, and He understands.