On Wednesday, February 27th, the Lococo family, along with Mike Duffy, began a journey to our Sister Parish of Santa Maria in Nebaj, Guatemala. It had been just over four years since our first visit to Guatemala. Our trip would help us to understand how things have changed, meet the new Pastor, and learn how we could work more closely in the future.
Over the past four years, the St. Pius parishioners have been generous in their support of our Sister Parish. The Parish Center, which had been a burned out shell when we last saw it, has been fully restored. Funds from our last Mission Sunday collection helped retire the debt on the center’s kitchen. The Santa Maria Parish is made up of the main church and 92 small villages. The primary means of communicating with these areas is by radio. The parish radio station broadcasts spiritual, educational, and general information from the Parish Center. The station uses software purchased by St. Pius. Additionally, the Bibles donated by St. Pius parishioners have been distributed as part of Catechist training. Your name may be in one of the bibles in the Guatemalan Highlands.
When we reached Nebaj we were welcomed by Fr. Diego Agapito Santiago, the new Pastor of Santa Maria parish. We found Padre Diego a very intense and down-to-Earth person. He had only been at the parish for a few weeks but was quite engaged in parish life. Padre Diego was raised in Nebaj and speaks Ixil, the indigenous language of our Sister Parish. If you think what it would be like if Fr. Bob didn’t speak English, you can imagine how good it would be to find the new Pastor speaks your language.
We had a chance to sit down with Padre Diego and representatives of Santa Maria’s Parish council to discuss how we could work together in the future. Some of the things we identified were: collaborating on parishioner Formation, helping to put books in the new library building, supporting a program to distribute medical supplies to families in need, and renovation of the parish’s old convent to be used as a hotel.
We met with Catholic Relief Services after leaving Nebaj. We were very pleased to learn CRS had worked with Padre Diego in the past and would be happy to do so again. This is important because CRS is experienced with working as an agent in sister parish situations.
We also had a chance to spend time with Padre Rigo, Santa Maria’s former Pastor. We visited Padre Rigo’s new parish and saw the radio station he manages in Quiche.
We returned to Milwaukee on Thursday, March 6th. We accomplished our goals for the trip. We found the support St. Pius parishioners have provided has been used wisely. Padre Diego is someone we can look forward to working with. As we look to the future we have a wide range of opportunities to collaborate.
We plan to return to our Sister parish in July, 2009. We would like this trip to be a “Family Outreach” project to work on Santa Maria’s old convent. We hope to build our Sister Parish relationship through face-to-face contact and hands-on experience.
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