Encounter

“Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person, which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction.”

- Pope Benedict XVI

Three months have passed, and the blank canvas with which I arrived has started to take form. Though I can’t predict the next stroke of the brush or the next color from the palette, it is clear that the Painter has been at work from the very beginning…


It is Sunday, January 29th, and after leaving my wintry home in the US, my seemingly cold feet have just landed on the warm and inviting Peruvian soil. A kind woman meets me at the airport to usher me to my next destination: the patient house in Lima where I rest for a few hours before continuing on my journey to my new home in the Amazon.

"There is only one way to be happy: to live for others," reads a mural at the patient house in Lima. Prior missionaries are depicted in Santa Clotilde amidst the diverse and magnificent Peruvian landscape. 

As I enter the three-story building, I learn that the patient house is occupied by persons, both young and old, who have come to the capital city for more specialized medical care. They have traveled over one thousand miles by foot, boat, and plane from their familiar home in the open rainforest to a “foreign” and congested city where they await further evaluation and treatment for diseases that cannot be treated closer to home. In my brief stay I meet a young, malnourished infant with cleft lip and cleft palate who is undergoing a series of surgeries to correct the defect which has delayed his growth. A middle-aged woman also greets me with a smile- she is receiving dialysis as she awaits a much-needed kidney transplant. I learn that each patient is accompanied by a family member and everyone works together to make it “home away from home” as they share meals, take turns cleaning, and live a common experience of hope amidst their unique trials and afflictions. Without delay I am told there is a couple who wants to meet me. I work my way upstairs where I am introduced to the older couple- they sit quietly side-by-side as if they’d been expecting my arrival. After a brief exchange of introductions, they begin to share with me their story…

They both are suffering from advanced cancer and they both are receiving treatment. Though their faces express an attitude of humble acceptance and faithful trust despite their suffering, their words reveal to me that in their respective bodily battles she is winning and he is losing. The stark contrast is noted in his pale skin and the frail build of his body. They tell me about their home in Santa Clotilde and the beautiful community of which they have been a part for so many years. They tell me about the hundreds of houses he has built for the poor and vulnerable of their community. They recount his construction of an even greater house- the house of God in which people gather every Sunday to meet Jesus in the Eucharist. This church, whose cross-topped steeple can be seen overlooking the Napo River, does not go unnoticed even to this day. They share their joy and pride in the raising of their three children and the recent birth of their grandson. They are excited to welcome me to Santa Clotilde and promise me that when they return home, we will see each other again. As I get ready to leave, they gift me a bottle of Pisco, the local liquor used to make Peru’s national cocktail- the “Pisco Sour.”

***

Two months later I find myself knocking on the door of their home in Santa Clotilde. Their daughter, a nurse at the hospital, informs me that her father has not been feeling well. I pay him a visit, remembering their promise to me that we would meet again. He is lying in bed, unable to move due to the severe pain from the cancerous lesions invading his bones. These same bones, all too visible through his thin and fragile skin, also testify to the cancer’s voracious appetite which overshadows any trace of normal human hunger. His previous ability to speak in full sentences is now replaced by an unspoken need to stop for air in between his terse and carefully-chosen words. From an ingrained physician instinct, I begin to think of and offer ways to make him more comfortable, but he insists that my presence is enough. In a surrendering exchange, we settle for a change to his pain medications. Deep down, I sense we all know he has only a short time left in this world. As I prepare to leave, his wife appears in the doorway- and with generous hearts, they gift me a bottle of wine. I am left to wonder how people who appear to have lost so much continue to give so freely.

Five days later it is Good Friday. As I routinely peer over patient charts at the hospital in the morning, I receive news that our dear friend has just died. The next time I go to greet him, the sun is giving way to dusk. In the impending darkness, the silence numbs any sensation of life and his solitary body lies motionless on a rigid table…

But shortly after entering his family’s home, a new and unexpected force permeates the senses. The darkness in the room is illuminated by the candlelight reflecting off the white drape over his body. The emptiness is filled with a crowd of people gathered inside and outside of his house who have come to support his family. The solitude is replaced with the solidarity and intimacy of dear friends, family, and co-workers present to remember his life. The silence is drowned out by the prayers of our religious sisters and the songs of the church choir. The rigidness and motionless are softened by the movement of hearts to compassion, hope, and love. And as I walk back home for the night, the rain begins to pour down. Despite my efforts to resist the deluge with a meager umbrella, I arrive home soaked, my clothes heavy, and so too my heart.

***

Two days later it is Easter Sunday- the family has returned from burying the remains of their beloved husband-father-grandfather. His wife tells me that a few days before his death he had told her it would be an honor to die on Good Friday. In so occurring, his memory and death would be forever overshadowed by the sacrifice and death of Jesus Christ. And in these words I realize the significance of each heavy and burdensome rain drop, each trial and affliction that weighs us down. For only the rain can wipe away our lingering stains and give way to new life. In the rain, a weary soul momentarily weighed down becomes a renewed soul forever lifted up.

In the end, I am reminded of the timeless interrogatory adage, “Why do bad things happen to good people?” Anyone who has ever tried to tackle this age-old question knows very well that there is no easy or sufficient answer. I wonder if this is partly because the question is actually our attempt to justify why bad things should not happen to good people, a misdirected focus on ourselves as the protagonist of our own and incomplete story. That despite our efforts in a broken world, we continue to experience this broken reality. Instead, I am challenged to ask a more liberating question: “Who can transform our pain and suffering into something good?” In the eternal and abundant answer, we need only to open our hearts and minds to see the true protagonist of our shared and fulfilled story. For it is in uniting our suffering with His, that His redemption brings us home.

From the start of my journey in a hope-filled, three-story building in Peru, this man was placed in my path. In our brief journey together, he showed me the direction in which we all are invited to travel and the final destination lying patiently on the horizon. His family’s friendship was also placed in my heart, tangibly communicated in their gifts of Pisco and wine. In our encounter, I am reminded that this man whose earthly life was taken by a cruel and careless cancer was never the loser in his worldly battle. Rather, through his steadfast faith, hope, and love in Christ and through his partaking in the perpetual gift of His sacrifice made tangible in bread and wine, he had already won. And with certainty and confidence, it is this man’s witness that “gives [my] life a new horizon and a decisive direction.”

***

Thank you for your continued thoughts, prayers, and support! You all continue to be in my thoughts and prayers, and I wish you all a blessed Easter season.

“We don’t grieve like those who have no hope; we grieve as those who know that death is not the end; 

that’s why death no longer has the sting that it used to have.” - Fr. Mike Schmitz 

Enjoying a toast at Easter lunch with our missionary team, Peruvian doctors, and visiting volunteers. 

Lunch included Spanish huevos rellenos, Peruvian lomo saltado and chicha morada, and a classic American chocolate cupcake with buttercream frosting.