Thank you to all who have supported 'International Service Learning' through private donations, prayer, or through general encouragement as a new sessional at the college. I very much appreciate the mentorship and the genuine support I have received from people in planning and embarking on this journey. This thanks extends also to Risk Management Services, the Interfaith Chaplains as well as Education Abroad and Community Service Learning within the University of Alberta community.
As you are aware, on February 15-24, 2013 10 students alongside Father Glenn and myself travelled to Hogar Madre Anna Vitiello, an HIV orphanage in Sumpango, Guatemala. This experience has been truly life changing for some of the students and affective for all. The theological reflection reached at some points in the trip, I can truly say was deeper than any reflection I have ever experienced inclusive of my own formation during my time studying my masters. The wisdom and ability to integrate a religious experience into a "trip" by the students provided me, as an instructor, a witness that instills hope in a world that is seemingly diminishing of religious experience in day to day living.
What did we accomplish? In our 10 day journey I wish I could say we built a house, finished a classroom or had some sort of visible result to share. However, this is not the case. This experience was a journey of learning how to "Just Be" among the poor as well as cultivate a community in which one learns to rid of an "Us Vs. Them," mentality. To live with the poor and in this case to also wrestle with the tensions of children living with HIV, has been an experience that was described by a student as, "Coming to know what heaven on earth truly is." The witness and testimony of the sisters as well as Oblates who had a chance to interact with CHRTC 309 class is an experience that the students could not obtain through our faculty at St. Joseph's College or faculty at the U of A. Particularly within the witness that was provided through these people and what it means to struggle within the tensions that 'Liberation Theology' has endured within the greater church by people who faithfully practice their beliefs. (And just to be clear "Just Being" also included insurmountable amounts of dishes, cleaning, laundry, diaper changing, feeding, and general care for the children as a means to alleviate the sisters who tirelessly run the orphanage.)
During our time there, the students developed their own mission statement and action plan for returning home. The class met for mass in the morning, an hour during the day for discussion and class as well as an hour (and often more than) at the end of the evening for prayer. A comment from one of the students during our last session was that she would "Miss Guatemala, however she would more so miss the community of students that had been able to apply theological reflection to their day to day routines over the past week- that the experience had cultivated a sense of community among peers that she had never experienced before." Another student said she felt as though day to day she was "Living in perpetual adoration, feeling surrounding by Christ and holy people all day long."
As an instructor, I feel that this journey is one that must continue and edge its way into the greater University community. There is something about experiential learning and community service that cannot be ignited within the confines of the classroom. In addition to the trip, the students do have assignments, two texts on local poverty and suffering (within a theological context) and a major paper to complete on both their work in inner city local as well as Guatemala.
The overarching purpose that I believe is being achieved within this class is to light a flame within one's heart within a construct of academic theory, history and social teaching, in order for the student to be able to practically apply the knowledge that s/he is learning within the settings of his or her personal vocation.
Once again thank you.
Blessings,
Brittney