Christ comes in the Sacraments

Before I left to spend a month at home in Virginia, 22 of my students received sacraments. There were four baptisms and twenty two first communions! This was once of the best days I have had since coming to Banica because I was able to see my work bear fruit. These kids worked hard to learn their catechism and were faithful about coming to Mass, most without their parents' help. Here you see them listening and raising their hands during the homily and you can also see Aris' baptism, Pedro being confirmed and Juan Elias' first communion. I truly believe that in this one day the darkness of sin and ignorance often so present around us here in Banica was diminished by the light of Christ that began to take hold in their hearts. May the Lord guard their innocence and purity as they grow older and fill them with His Holy Spirit so that they can be little missionaries in their own families and communities.

Campamentos de Lectura

After observing that many of my catechism students struggled to read and write simple sentences and understand what they read, I had asked Father O'Hare if I could organize "campamentos" to work on literacy. My original idea was to have the camps run for a week in each community. We would read books to the kids, have them practice reading and writing on their own and try to make reading a fun and positive experience. We also sang, danced and played games.
Four Banica high schoolers who needed service hours for school asked Fr. OHare to help them out. So we put them to work helping with the 'prototype' literacy campamento. We held it in mid-May in El Palital and Los Yareyes. I provided materials and then general plan and the four young ladies lead everything. Here are a few pictures of the girls and their little students. The group picture shows the "big kids" group. We had a "little kid" group as well. The kids had a great time, and it was fun to see how much they enjoyed the stories and games, and how much effort they put forth to do a good job on all the activities the girls had for them.
One of the things I really liked about the campamento we did was that it was faithful to the principle of solidarity. As much as we can, we need to let Dominicans serve and be missionaries to Dominicans. We can facilitate, but should not try to do everything. If the goal is to eventually be "self-sufficient" the people themselves need to know that evangelizing isn't just for Americans and/or foreign missionary priests, nuns and volunteers. I think in many ways a Dominican educated in his faith and close to Christ could do so much more because he would not be an outsider.
From this experience I realized that our literacy efforts would probably be more effective if they tried to do more for fewer kids rather than a little for a lot of kids. Thus, instead of planning many week-long reading camps in many different communities, I have decided to hold a three-day-a-week class in Banica for the whole month of July. We invited kids from 5th and 6th grade in the parish school who need help with reading and writing. Many of these kids came from the public schools so they are behind.