Caught Between Two Fires - Workshops on The Bible and Gender

Over the past month I have done four workshops with the congregation (men, women, and youth) at la Iglesia Presbiteriana Emanuel. It is not the end, but only the begining of my work and their`s. At the request of the pastor and moderator of the Ayacucho Presbytery, Rev. Juan Quispe Flores, they were all on domestic violence and what the bible does or does not say. I knew I couldn`t cover everything so I tried to be direct and to the point. Let us not dance around anything. That is the exact opposite of Latino culture, communication, and frankly homeletical method, which is more like a cyclone that finally comes to and makes a point after mucho Blah, Blah, Blah. Pastor Juan and I talked and reflected a lot about domestic violence and scripture before doing the workshops. He said ¨One of the women in my congregation asked me why was the bible machista?¨ He told me he had trouble responding, and couldn`t help but chuckle at this women`s direct approach and line of questioning. I said ¨I love her already, who is it?¨ He wanted to begin equipping his congregants to combat domestic violence and abuse first in their own homes and church and then move out into the wider community, reaching out to their neighbors and saying ¨This isn´t right, and the church will no longer be silent on this issue. Women AND Men are children of God, made in God`s image.¨ He, and I wanted them to be aware that domestic violence is not just physical or ¨hitting¨someone. It is any combination of physical, emotional, sexual, and economic related (think money) threats of using or actions used to control, intimidate, or coerce another person with whom you have a relationship with.
One of the things that we (really I so far in my department of 1.5 people) are doing with churches through Paz y Esperanza is trying to encourage ALL people to take a look at and maybe try reading the sacred texts that we all know, those we DO NOT know, and maybe the scriptures we THINK we know, but to read them through the eyes of gender. See Irene Foulkes article, Rereading the Scriptures through the Eyes of Gender. For instance try reading Psalm 55:12-14 through the eyes of a victim of domestic violence and abuse:

12 It is not enemies who taunt me— I could bear that; it is not adversaries who deal insolently with me— I could hide from them. 13 But it is you, my equal, my companion, my familiar friend, 14 with whom I kept pleasant company; we walked in the house of God with the throng.

or maybe try reading Ephesians 5:22-23through the eyes of a woman in a male dominated household or machista society:

22 Wives, be subject to your husbands as you are to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife just as Christ is the head of the church, the body of which Christ is the Savior.

...and then read it again, but read the WHOLE of the text, Ephesians 5:21-33 and see if there is not a difference:

21 Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ. 22 Wives, be subject to your husbands as you are to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife just as Christ is the head of the church, the body of which he is the Savior. 24 Just as the church is subject to Christ, so also wives ought to be, in everything, to their husbands. 25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26 in order to make her holy by cleansing her with the washing of water by the word, 27 so as to present the church to himself in splendor, without a spot or wrinkle or anything of the kind—yes, so that she may be holy and without blemish. 28 In the same way, husbands should love their wives as they do their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 For no one ever hates his own body, but he nourishes and tenderly cares for it, just as Christ does for the church, 30 because we are members of his body. 31 "For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh." 32 This is a great mystery, and I am applying it to Christ and the church. 33 Each of you, however, should love his wife as himself, and a wife should respect her husband.

Do your eyes seem new? Oh my goodness I never looked at it that way before, you say! Is there anything coming to you like maybe mutuality instead of submission, like it does to me? I have found this to be one of the most dangerous, often misused, and chopped up texts in the bible. The church through the years has used(misused) it as a weapon and an edict to restore dangerous, controlling relationships that are manifestations of fear, power, and control, rather than mutuality, respect, tenderness, and love. Mutual duties are named. The relation of the wife to the husband (or two people) is like that of the church in Christ, a close, tender relation, in which there is no bondage, but freedom, because the service is that of the heart. (Two people)Husbands, love your wives. We have here not only the duty, but the measure of the duty. As Christ loved the church. Loved so well as to be willing to give all things, even life, for her welfare. The union of (two people)husband and wife were here described is ideally perfect. The tenderest love on one side, and loving obedience on the other.(1)

Clergy and lay people sent and are still sending women back to submissive and abusive relationships, instead of listening and supporting victims, helping them to reclaim their voice in a safe place. Forgiveness and reconciliation doesn`t mean sutpidity. It requires time apart, and honest change on the part of the aggressor. It means the victim not forgiving someone until they are sure that it will not put them back in the same unhealthy and dangerous situation. The church is not a courthouse of judgement, but a sanctuary. Try telling that to an ingrained machista and majority conservative society...that is what it is like to stand between two fires....the gospel of Jesus Christ on one side and a raging, testosterone filled, room of armchair theologians on the other.....biblical hermaneutic of suspicion and interpretation and machista...DISCUSS!! (Think SNL ¨Discuss¨ Lady here).

Standing between two fires, that must be what it is like to be or have been a victim of domestic violence, turn to clergy or the church and have the thing you trusted most in the world, scripture, used as a weapon against you or to support the abusive nature of your relationship or marriage.
It is certainly what it feels like to stand infront of men and women who`s culture says or tells them: Men are the head of the house, the kings of the castle...that means they are in charge and that women will and must do whatever they say (and that is not mutual). That is the danger and risk of proof texting or taking little slivers or single lines of texts from the bible instead of more complete stories or passages.

Resource (1) The People`s New Testament

Looking for the Trigo de Mi Pan

Yesterday was Valentine´s Day in the United States and I am sure that FTD, Brachman-Whitman candies, and Hallmark were rolling in the profits. Here in Peru it was also Valentine´s Day, but they call it Dia de Amor y Amistad (they mention it is honor of San Valentìn) so it is more than just love for that special someone you are enamored with, it is also for friendship, so many groups of friends gathered together to celebrate. Of course there were a couple of tiendas with over size bears that say ¨Te Amo and Yo Quiero¨, but in Ayacucho, Peru (in the Andes Mountains) atleast it was sort of low key on the pounder bags of red and white M&M´s and the life size Hershey´s Kisses. Oh! You can buy a dozen roses here in the market everyday (very inexpensively), not just February 14th.
At Paz Y Esperanza we began Monday´s as always, with our devotional and singing. We seemed to sing all of the Amor y Amistad songs from our chorario or hymnbook. Even a rousing version of Eres Tù. For those of you who have seen the movie Tommy Boy...when David Spade and Chris Farley are driving in the delapitated convertible, singing every song that comes on the radio to celebrate selling the brakepads...you know what I am talking about:

Eres Tù

Como una promesa eres tù, eres tù, eres tù, como una mañana de verano;

como una sonrisa eres tù, eres tù asì, asì, eres tù.

Todo mi esperanza eres tù, eres tù, como lluvia fresca en mis manos; como fuerte brisa, eres tù, eres tù asì, asì, eres tù.

Eres tù, como el agua de mi fuente; eres tù, el fuego de mi hogar, eres tù, como el fuego de mi hoguera eres tù, el trigo de mi pan.

Todo mi poema eres tù, eres tù, como una guitarra en la noche; todo mi horizante eres tù, eres tù, asì, asì, eres tù.

So at Paz Y Esperanza we started Monday in our usual way and then had cake and chips in honor of the birthdays of our compañeros and amigos, Raùl and Honorato. Later, yesterday at the Sulca-Tucno House, Rosa had invited some of Sheridad`s friends over for the evening to play dinamicas and eat sopa de gallina and masamora. It was sort of fun. I learned some new dinamicas to play and also stumped them with the human knot, as it takes patience to figure out. It was a fun night though, because the lights went out and we played games for a little while in the dark. We also instituted the ¨Su silla se Quema¨ rule. If someone says that then everyone in the room must jump up and change places. AHHH!! Good times.

So I hope that you all went out and found or spent time with the ¨Trigo de su Pan¨ The Wheat of your Bread) or the one(s) that you love.

To Love Something you have to Know it First

I recently finished reading Tracy Kidder´s book of a few years ago called ¨Mountains Beyond Mountains.¨ Kidder follows the work of Dr. Paul Farmer. Farmer is a world renowned Infectious Diseases expert and medical anthropologist, especially in preventing and treating TB, malaria, and HIV/AIDS, and is the founder of PIH or Partners in Health. Kidder´s book, is the story of Farmer and his sometimes unconventional journey and work in the impoverished central plateau of Haiti (Cange) in addition to the world health system as he similtaneously, and I believe unintentionally ¨Changed the discourse about what is possible¨in medicine. Dr. Farmer is unconventional because he treats the whole person and their situation in hopes of preventing the enfermity from reoccuring. It is a combination of medicine, sociology, and social outreach. Farmer, in addition to medical school and residency, claims to have done an internship in house building and a practicum in ¨blah, blah, blah,¨(I think I might have done the same practicum!) along with countless hours of inflicting his hortitorture and reeducation of blan or non-Haitians (mainly white people) on what the real situation is. I have been thinking about some of the things that both Kidder, and Farmer via Kidder said in the book. Farmer makes no bones about it...there is an inherent link between poverty and the contraction and spread of illness and disease like TB and HIV/AIDS. He refers not just to circumstances in Haiti, but Farmer´s work also takes him to the northern slums of Lima, Peru (Carabayllo) and Tomsk, Russia and the Russian national prision system, rought with TB and multi-drug resistent TB.

So what sticks out for me is something that Dr. Farmer said to Kidder on one of their many ¨hikes¨in Haiti. He said (I think referring to his work and style of doing it) ¨In order to love something, you have to know it first.¨ In addition to his countless credentials and certifications, Farmer can add accompaniament and partnership to his resume. He may never get a plaque for the wall, but the patients he touches physically and emotionally just by taking the time to sit, sometimes in conditions that most people wouldn´t touch with a ten foot pole, and listen to the stories, hopes, and dreams often unrealized of those who seek medical treatment.
Farmer loves his work, and his work is anthropology, education, medicine, but most of all it is people. I think Farmer loves his work because he takes the time to get to know it...the it is the people...the patient that lays in the bed, the patient that sits in a hut on mat, and the patient who is brought by ¨donkey ambulance¨to his clinic in Cange clinging to life. Farmer takes the time to know their illnesses in order to treat them, but that is surface details. In treating the whole individual Farmer gets curious. He asks the questions that get to heart of the individual and communal causes of illness and injury.

In reflecting, I of course have to ask myself how or what does the work and vision of Dr. Paul Farmer have to do with me, my calling, and ministry. Farmer says ¨In order to love something you have to know it.¨ While I am nowhere near an expert in my field and passions like Dr. Farmer, I can say that I love and am more passionate about 3 things (among others) in ministry, mainly because of my experiences that have allowed me to get to know them. Those three things are mission, worship, and pastoral care. The beauty, atleast I think, is that even with all that I know and my experience in these areas there is always more to learn and to experience so that I can love them (mission, pastoral care, and worship) even more.

While sitting in here in Peru, I reflect on my current work with Paz Y Esperanza, and it leads me to also think about having lived and walked alongside campesinoes in Guatemala, as well as the men who came to lunch at the Wayside Christian Mission. Then there was serving as a chaplain in trauma centers in Louisville, KY and Winston-Salem, NC where I sat with individuals and families in the silence of death, and then there is working alongside of the neighbors of the church I interned at in Kentucky after the week long blackout of ´08. In most of these situations I have not been required to DO anything except BE there, and for some of the people that I accompanied that was all they needed.
I am reminded of how critical it is to sometimes carefully swim upstream like Dr. Farmer as situations require you took adapt norms to location and population. He did not ignore precedence and procedure he put it to the test in a variety of situations, and sometimes created his own, that others soon followed. Dr. Farmer took the time and extra minutes to better serve his patients, by ¨Being¨ with them inorder to determine what they really wanted and needed, before he tried to ¨DO¨anything for them. He did this in the technogically advanced Brigham Hospital in Boston, MA and in the Central Plain of Haiti, as well as the slums of Lima, Peru. The unconventional part was that when Farmer´s patient´s life was on the line he learned that he might have to ¨DO¨ something first and then he would go out into the far reaches of the Central Plain (on foot) to ¨BE¨with them and ¨KNOW¨their situation, becasue he loved his work and what he did. I look forward to the years ahead, God willing as they say here in Peru and in Guatemala, to drawing connections and building bridges between congragations and their ministries to my experiences in mission, work as a chaplain, and student minister in KY. I look forward to building on what I already know, love, and am passionate about; by getting curious, engaging in study, having new experiences, and being present.

That´s more Peruvian than Potato!

Potatoes have eyes you know...those little sprouts that grow out or those divits that make peeling them fun?!! If the eyes are windows to the soul, then perhaps potatoes and their eyes are windows to the souls and hearts of the Andean Mountains and her inhabitants.

For 8,000 years these little (and in some cases big) morsels have been delivering power packed nutrition to the people of the Andes Mountains, and to the rest of the world for 4 centuries, after the era of Spanish exploration. Potatoes are the world´s 4th largest food source behind rice, wheat, and corn. They are starchy and tuberous, but loaded with iron. This is especially useful in remote areas of the Andes Mountains and other higher elevations that lack access to other basic food stuffs. It is good for me because I dwell in a Peruvian household that is vegetarian, but eats meat, and vegetables are scarce. It is not a plate in Peru unless there is some form of potato on it. A snack I often enocunter is small red or blue/purple potatoes that have been boiled and Andean cheese which is sort of dense white and rubbery, with a tinge of saltiness. You take a potato in one hand peeling (one handed) with fingers and a chunk of cheese in the other and go after it, bite for bite.

So why potatoes in Peru and the rest of the world?

Well, following the Spanish conquest of the Inca Empire (which potatoes help build and fortify), the Spanish introduced the potato to Europe in the second half of the 16th century. The staple was subsequently conveyed by European mariners to territories and ports throughout the world.(1) Was this one of the first examples of free trade? The potato was slow to be adopted by distrustful European farmers, but soon enough it became an important food staple and field crop that played a major role in the European 19th century population boom. However because of the lack of genetic varieties introduced to the world outside of South America, the crop was left succeptible to disease, like the 1845 late-blight, which lead to the destruction of Ireland´s potato crop, and eventually the Great Irish Famine (for you history buffs).

But back to Peru, and the Andes Mountains...

According to ancient legend, when the mythical founders of the Inca empire, Manco Capac and Mama Ocllo, emerged from the waters of Lake Titicaca, the first thing the god Wiracocha taught them was how to sow potatoes.(2)

Today, scientists have identified more than 4,000 potato varieties, many of which such as the yellow potato (papa amarilla or papa huayro) are only founded in Peru. In fact, Peruvian potatoes are held to be matchless in flavor and texture: their noble yet delicate shapes fit perfectly into the cultural background this tuber enjoys in Peru: the all-powerful Quechua culture revered the potato not just as a crucial foodstuff, but as an icon.

There is even a popular saying: "That's more Peruvian than potato"(2), a reference to the unmistakable stamp of Peruvian origin on the tuber. It is a compliment that does justice to this age-old fruit of the Andes.

Age-old fruit of the Andes, huh? Yes that is right. Six years ago I was sitting at a computer in south western Guatemala writing to you about the presence and importance of corn and ajon ajoli (sesame seed) to the diet and economy of the tiny finca, called Santa Fe, in which I lived and worked. Now it is potatoes, and the often remote rural Quechua communities nestled in both the hills and valleys of the Southern Andes Mountains that I visit with the interdisciplinary Paz y Esperanza Team. They are Putis, Putacca, Callquì, Huamanquiquia, Chuschi, Incaraquay, and many others. When we go to visit and/or lead a workshop or session designed to continue to help the indigenous people find ways to greive, and find hope and healing in the midst of slow justice for the years of political violence perpetrated by the Shinging Path (maoist, geurillas) and the military, we typically bring some sort of food item with us. That might be trout, chicken or vegetables to consume or it might also be seeds of nutrient rich plants like broccoli, spinach, beets, and carrots for the women to cultivate. In some cases like Incaraquay and Callquì we also took young live chickens and cuy or guinea pigs for them to raise, and breed.

Our workshops and visits usually involve a communal meal that the women prepare over log (or linea) fires in huge pots that you could swim in. As each member of the ¨community¨arrives they take off their hand woven manta or brightly colored cloth that is strapped to their back. For women with young babies or toddlers this is how they transport them, strapped to their back like an on going piggy back ride. The women who do not have children or their´s are grown often use their manta like a knapsack or purse. In it they have a little stash of Soles (Peruvian coins) their DNI or ID card, a paper or two, someitmes a Bible if they own one, and from my experience potatoes. These potatoes are added to the communal table to be consumed by the crowd or integrated into the meal. It is what they have to offer. The potatoes are their life blood, and have been for thousands of years. High in the hills they till the land and cultivate the crops, guarding and processing seed for the next year´s planting to ensure that the species they grow will continue in purity, developing ways of irrigating crops where their is no potable water, and practicing crop rotation to preserve the land or mother earth that has been gifted to them.

So when one of these fascinating women opens up their manta it is like they are opening up their lives for me to see...just like in our groups, as time goes along, and trust is earned, I gain a deeper glimpse into the pain and victimization of political violence, the uncertainty of being caught between two forces (the Shining Path insurgency and the military counter-insurgency) meanwhile suffering from an oppressive poverty. I catch, only a glimpse, of what it is really like to run for the hills with only the clothes on your back and a child under each arm to escape the invading revolutionaries or the ¨black heads¨ as they called the ski masked government soldiers. Higher and higher into the hills they would climb, silencing the cries of children by covering them up at risk of suffocation, and surviving on uncooked beans and yes potatoes which were both portable and grew everywhere (both cultivated and wild) in the region of Ayacucho.

Potatoes are what the people of the Quechua communities we (Paz y Esperanza) go to visit and accompany, do. Potatoes are as much a part of who they are, as they are what they do. For some 8,000 years these people have cultivated a multitude of potatoes for their own use, as well as for trade or sale. Trading and selling is how they get the things like wheat, barley, and meat that they do not have. Just like the Quechua people and their colorful culture, so are the potatoes that they cultivate. From large and small to purple, red, and yellow with pink spots to lumpy, spiralled, and striped Peruvian variety potatoes come in all shapes and sizes. Sometimes traveling in the Andes Mountains you can find more than 100 varieties of potatoes growing in a single valley. The varieties have unique names like ¨The miracle¨ and ¨the red shadow¨ and ¨like a deer´s white tongue¨ among others.

For 8,000 years potatoes have helped the Quechua and their predecesor Inca people survive drought and famine, war, disease, and invading forces. Packed with iron, they continue to fortify the mountain economies of the Andes, but the mantas have opened and given the rest of the world the gift of potatoes and a colorful culture that is meant to be enjoyed, not exploited or changed becasue someone else can do it better or faster.
A potato is a complex carborhydrate in the world of nutrition. The best of which for us is the sweet potato or camote as it is called here in Peru. Complex, that is a good word to describe Peruvian history and cutlure, the Quechua people and their ways of being, and most definitely potatoes, which are inextricably linked to Peru and her people. It is a complexity that is yes, more Peruvian than potato.

(1) Information gathered from wikipedia, potato

(2) Travel article - Peruvian Potato - Peru Food and Gastronomy