To Touch the Congo Sky

Today's blog is a poem (perhaps someday to be a song?) written by Rev. Vernon J. Stover, who was a pilgrim on the journey to Mbandaka, Congo.  He speaks with a beautiful voice about how deeply we all were touched by our pilgrimage.

TO TOUCH THE CONGO SKY

To touch the Congo sky,
To breathe its reddened past,

    

To see what it will be 

        In ev'ry child I've passed,

To hear its odes to joy

  Phrased by the river's word, 

    






To savor fruit and fish

        As presence of our Lord
Does make my heart brim full

With cane juice dripping sweet,

Does make my soul sing out

In song of pulsing beat,

Does make my mind unwrap

The gift of dancing friends,
Does make my arms embrace

The changeless God-filled winds.

Your will, O LORD, calls forth
All those who will but try
To fill the world with love
Or touch the Congo sky. 

THANKS, VJ!  AND THANKS, GREAT PILGRIMS!

"The Things We Didn't Know"

Notes from May 28

One of our goals for the journey was to learn what it means to "walk in another's shoes", and to share what it means to walk in our shoes.  This Saturday was certainly a wonderful opportunity to accomplish that task.  Scott Seay, a professor of Global Christianity at Christian Theological Seminary, had the opportunity to visit the faculty and students of the theological faculty at the Protestant University of Equateur (Equateur is the province in which Mbandaka is located).  Bob Shaw went along as interpreter and, as chair of the Congo Task Force, interested party.  According to all reports, they had an exciting morning sharing information about theological education in both countries.  Scott reported that although their library was, of necessity, small, its contents were very impressive.  The depth of the curriculum was likewise very impressive.  Knowing that there will be few opportunities to share much of the material in the churches the students will serve, it is nevertheless considered important that the pastors' own faith be grounded in a deep understanding of the Bible and Christianity's greatest thinkers.



The rest of the pilgrims spent the morning with Disciples women and female pastors.  The study was led by our own Rev. Toni Colbert, who spoke deeply and movingly of the meaning of a Bible passage for all Christian women.  She was presented with a gift of cloth that is worn by many Christian women in Congo.  Both Congolese and US women shared stories of their vision for their role as women in the church.  The whole group broke out into spontaneous song and dance, accompanied by enthusiastic women drummers.  Surely a morning to remember.

During the afternoon, most of the group journeyed down the Congo River by pirogue to Ikengo Farm, a model agricultural project that is sponsored by the Disciples of Christ.  This project (Centre Agro-Pastorale) is both teaching the Congolese how to improve their own agriculture and providing a much-needed source of income for Disciples in Congo.



Vernon Stover spent the afternoon working with the choral directors of the Mbandaka parishes, sharing western four-part harmony versions of hymns that are traditional both in Africa and the USA.  I was privileged to help with translation (and when necessary, demonstrations of directing techniques, but certainly not with the singing).  It was amazing to hear how quickly tunes could be learned by a people where music is simply a fundamental part of their being.

Saturday ended with some very welcome rest, after four very intense and exhausting days.  Besides, all of the pastors needed time to prepare for their sermons, to be given at five very diverse parishes, the next day.

Patience

Notes from May 24

Well, we are all disappointed. We were delayed by a mechanical failure in New York and missed the daily flight from Brussels to Kinshasa. This did provide me with the chance to share a bit of Brussels, which I consider a second home, with the pilgrims, and the history of DR Congo is closely intertwined with Belgium. We are also better rested by breaking the journey with a good night's rest.

While visiting the cathedral St. Michel in Brussels, we were saddened to learn by text on the death of Naomi, the daughter of our good friend Rev. Maman Nzeba, head of the Department of Women and Families of the Church of Christ in Congo. We offered prayers for her family in their time of loss. We were to have met with her today.

We are currently somewhere over northern Africa, bound for Youande (Cameroon), then on to Kinshasa tonight. We are very anxious to meet with our sisters and brothers there. We may not have much time, though, because our flight to Mbandaka is scheduled for 8am tomorrow. Have no idea if I will be able to make this post before then!

We are blessed to have people in the Division of Overseas Ministry of the Disciples of Christ working with our partners in Kinshasa and Mbandaka to let them know of our delay. This will make extra work for them, for which we are very sorry. But as we are reminded again and again (even by the pilot of the airplane with mechanical problems), this is an "event-based" trip and not a "schedule-based" trip. In some ways, this is one of the hardest lesson for us. What happens will occur in God's time and way - and we are practicing patience and trying very hard to stay in the moment. I hope we are good students.

Two brief side notes: While I am practicing patience, I am reading "Half the Sky", a very compelling book about women's issues in emerging countries - highly recommended and good preparation for our experience. Second, the woman across the aisle from me is from Paoli, IN, on her way to Kinshasa to continue the process of adopting two Congolese children. The world really is quite small.

Please pray for our Congolese partners as they have the inconvenience of dealing with our delay. Peace to all who read this.

Susan McNeely
Sent from my iPod

On Time After 24 Hours

May 26, beginning in Mampoko

After spending all day and part of the night on the river yesterday, and dancing till midnight, we still woke up a little before 5 am in the guest house.  Church was announced for 5 am, but we doubted this would happen, until the big lokole (talking drum) started thrumming exactly at 5.  We were called to worship!  Sleepily the whole village gathered, including choirs from other parishes that had come the day before to welcome us, and had stayed over to be certain to have a chance to sing for us.

After a very moving worship, where Bob share the importance of partnership for the Indiana Disciples as well as the Congolese Disciples, we walked to the primary and secondary schools.  Only one year ago, rebels had come through Mampoko on their way to Mbandaka.  The people fled into the forest, and the rebels burned many things in the village, including many of the school desks. Children in some classes now had to sit on the floor, because there is no easy way to cut down the giant trees and plane them into planks.
After breakfast, it was time to prepare to leave our new friends, which was hard.  We were given gifts - fruit, three chickens, a duck, three goats, and a crocodile (yes, crocodile - lunch the following day!).  All had to be loaded onto our already heavily-laden boat.  At 9 am, we set off.

We headed down river to Lolonga, and arrived after a few hours, only 24 hours later than planned.  As before, a great welcome awaited us.
We descended from the boat through arches and walked on cloths along a file of dancing people for several hundred yards to the half-completed church.  They had raised enough money for bricks to build half of the walls, but construction was on hold.  Our offering should help to move them along.


By the time we left Lolonga, we were short on water, so we were careful to share what little we had.  Bread, fresh fruit, and avocados tasted great for lunch.  The pineapple and oranges helped slake our thirst.
Although the day was very hot, travel was cooler than the day before because the captain had thoughtfully removed one of the forward windows in the small cabin, and a breeze filtered through past the goats when the boat was moving.  The most amazing thing was that in spite of all the difficulty along the way, everyone, pilgrims and Congolese alike, continued to joke, sing, and happily share stories throughout the whole return trip.

Late in the afternoon, storms gathered on the horizon, but we arrived at the guest house just at nightfall, with only a few drops of rain before we left the boat.  Tired and thirsty, we remained joyful and amazed at our good fortune to have a wonderful chance to experience the daily lives of our partners - to truly walk (and ride) beside them for a while.

There is a River

May 26, 2011

How to describe the trip to Mampoko without sounding like the “African Queen”? Not easy, that’s for sure. Very early in the morning descended from the guest house to the Congo River and loaded 14 people into a 8 meter (24 ft) runabout for the trip upriver. Six crammed into the small cabin and 8 were in the cockpit. 

Soon after we set off, the motor started to sputter. We pulled to shore, worked on it, and finally went back across the river to Mbandaka, where we all disembarked and ate the picnic breakfast. Water in the gas, maybe? The boat took off to get more gas while we ate. Finally, at 9 am, we set off again. The engine was only firing on two of four cylinders, but that was all we were going to have today. 

We cruised for hours upriver, marveling at the small villages along the river. It got hot; then it got hotter, especially in the small cabin with a metal roof. We rotated positions often so everyone had a chance to cool down a bit. We ate lunch in the boat, and made a short stop midafternoon. 

The sun sank down, and we finally reached Lolonga, where we were supposed to stop on the return trip. Surely Mampoko was not far. Darkness fell, and we could no longer see the sand bars to avoid them, so we stopped frequently. Two hours passed, and nervousness turned to fear. We must certainly turn back now! 

As the stars became brighter and brighter (there is no way to tell you how incredibly bright they were), it became clear that we were where God intended us to be that day, and we would just have to be patient. Each light from fishermen along the river raised hope that we were nearing the village; another hour passed. Finally, about 9 pm, we began to hear singing, and we pulled to shore. In the darkness, hands reached out and pulled us up the steep hill and guided us toward a compound where dinner, dancing, and rest awaited us. We had arrived, 10 hours late, and yet the whole village turned out to meet us! We enjoyed a late supper before the festivities began. 

As we settled in to watch the dancing, we had a great surprise when we were allowed to hold young Henoch, the baby whose dedication was pictured in the video from the 2008 trip (see the link on this blog site).  He is now a strong 3-year-old, and his father has moved from Nsele to Mampoko to serve as pastor. 

The dancing and drumming continued for a while after we finally collapsed about midnight, being the first visitors to the brand new guest house in this village.  We realized that we were granted a rare opportunity to truly enter into the daily life of the Disciples who live along the great river.  Unplanned, unsettling, we were on our way to accomplishing one of the goals we had set for our journey - to encounter our brothers and sisters where they live, and to walk beside them for a while.

Playing Catch Up - Arrival in Mbandaka

I was unable to connect to the internet while we were in Congo, but there is much to tell about the experience.  Join me in re-living the journey as we experienced it, starting with our arrival in Mbandaka on May 25.  (Due to a mechanical problem in New York, we arrived in Brussels too late to catch the daily flight for Kinshasa.  This did give Bob and me a chance to share the delights of our old home town with the pilgrims.  While in St. Michel's Cathedral, we learned of the death of the daughter of Maman Nzeba, a good friend who stayed with us last summer during her Indiana visit.  I lit a candle and offered prayers for this family in a time of deep sorrow.  This was a reminder of how connected we have all become through the Partnership, and how deeply the sorrow of one can be felt by us all.)

Arrival in Mbandaka May 25, 2011

We’ve finally arrived in Mbandaka.   We arrived at the ECC hotel in Kinshasa fairly late at night, and rose at 5:45 a.m to go to the airport at 6:30 to be weighed in for an 8 am departure.  Unfortunately, we had the wrong figure for the allowed weight, and we had almost 100 kg too much.  They kindly removed two of the seats, and we pared everything down, but only by leaving personal items and all of our gifts except the banners behind.  MAF will bring them up when they fetch us for the return flight, so we can still get them to our partners.

The flight  up was beautiful and very calm.  When we arrived at the Mbandaka airport, there was a large contingent of soldiers and a military band on the runway.  The plane from the local airline Hera Bora had just arrived, and there were some important ministers or a general aboard, hence the welcome.  We waited until they left, but several of our partners came out to the plane to greet us while we waited.  How good to see Papa Bonanga (head of the Disciples of Christ in Congo), his wife Anna (who will be our hostess for meals), Principal Supervising Pastor Ilumbe (Mbandaka District, similar to regional minister), his wife Maman Rosette (chair of the partnership committee in Mbandaka), and our diligent protocol officer, Jean Robert.  In many ways, it feels like coming home again.  As soon as we exited the airport property, a huge crowd welcomed us with songs, dancing, and drums.

Off to the city center, accompanied by the greeters.  We descended from the cars about 5 blocks from Mbandaka III church.  The street was lined the entire distance with school children and adults, singing again to greet us.  There is always a strong Palm Sunday feel about these welcomes.  We participated in a great welcome service and presented the large partnership banner that is the gift from Indiana to the Mbandaka district.  There are small banners with the logo for all of the district churches, which will be presented as we visit them.  Lunch, rest, discussion of itinerary, and dinner, then early to bed.  We are scheduled to depart at 5 a.m. tomorrow.