Dispatch from Marianhill: Friday, May 13

After a few days of enjoying the ambiance and beauty of the Mariannhill and the area, we wanted to dig deeper into the real soil of South African reality. Our first excursion came at the invitation of Elizabeth, an elegant and energetic German woman of indeterminate age (but not far from mine). She’s been coming to Mariannhill for 35 years, and about 5 years ago became a permanent resident of the Tre Fontaine Guest House (there are about a dozen). Elizabeth more or less runs the St.Vincent’s Children’s Home, one of the many ministries on this compound, and invited us to come for a tour. It’s housed in a far corner of the compound, a series of low roof veranda style buildings, among the oldest at Mariannhill. (The children’s home was one of Pfanner’s first outreach ministries.) It’s not an orphanage (though there are some orphans there) but a home for children 1-18 years remanded by the child services branch of the government (which pays about 75% of the real cost, the rest has to be raised). The kids are assigned there for such things as abuse, neglect, alcoholism, and of course AIDS which prevents a parent or parents from properly caring for them.
When we came all but the pre-schoolers were away at school. The kids live in “cottage groups” of 12 to 15 of all ages, so there can be more of a family feeling. The kids were so beautiful and wonderful, one of them doing cartwheels for us as we visited her play group. But others stayed away, withdrawn, unsmiling, undoubtedly still dazed by the traumas that brought them there, or just shy.
It’s a good, clean, warm and caring environment. Still it’s almost heartbreaking to see those beds all lined up, well-made, with some kind of stuffed toy in each pillow. They do great work with the kids, but as Elizabeth said, with tears in her eyes, no matter how much better off the kids may be emotionally and materially, it’s not “home.” Most would prefer the dirt floor hut and meager food of a real family than the relative good fortune of St. Vincents, and who wouldn’t.
It’s also sobering to reflect on the likely future of most of these kids. Elizabeth was still shaken as she told the story of a former resident, a bright girl selected to attend the girls boarding school (another Mariannhill venture), and star pupil of her class, who was buried a few weeks ago in the Mariannhill cemetery, a victim of AIDS. Here too there was razor wire and two dogs to protect the children from intruders. It is still a belief among many men with AIDS, that sex with a virgin will cure their disease.
Yesterday was an experience of the kind of stark contrasts which characterize South Africa. We had heard that Sister Agnes, an Austrian nun who reminds me of the Mother Superior in “The Sound of Music,” though somewhat more ample and formidable (more of her later), organizes deliveries of food to some of the poorer (but not the poorest!) “townships” in the area. We asked if we could join her, and she gladly agreed. After breakfast we joined a small group led by Sister Agnes including Franz, a Presbyterian elder from a nearby church, and Rita, a Swiss woman who comes here twice a year (she lived in South Africa 25 years ago). We loaded up Franz’s pickup with plastic bags of food, and then Jeanne, Rita, and I bounced along in the back while Franz drove and Sister Agnes shouted directions. As we moved into the endless hills farther out from Durban, we entered areas where few whites go, the poorest townships where people live in tiny crumbling cement block shacks, or huts made of scrap tin or wood. Most of these people have moved to the city from rural areas in search of jobs, but with little or no education or usable skills, are unemployed. There are not enough jobs, even in SA’s booming economy, and even if there were, these folks lack the basic education and skills needed for a decent job, as well as transportation to work, which is expensive and time-consuming.
We pulled up to a “town hall,” a rudimentary cement block building that serves as a kind of community center. A large group of people, mostly women and children, surrounded our truck. The chief of the village took charge quickly (the traditional tribal customs remain as the people move from the rural areas into the cities.) He looked very sad, and told Sister Agnes that his nephew, 22 years old, had taken ill, died and the funeral was later that day. We assumed it was AIDS in the case of such a young man. We unloaded the pick up and piled the bags on a table in front of the community hall while all the people sat in wood benches or stood about. We (Jeanne, Rita, and I) were escorted to plastic chairs in front facing the group, and were introduced like guests of honor ( though we had just come along for the ride after all), which made us feel very uncomfortable, but the chief and Sister Agnes insisted. Everyone clapped and we clapped back.
After our introduction a wrinkled old woman got up and began to sing a slow song, sounding more lament than welcome, while all the people soon joined swaying to the rhythm. After the song, she launched into a passionate prayer, and people joined in with a growing chorus of prayer, each praying their own prayers, with the old woman’s voice rising like a descant over the top.
Then Sister Agnes, this stout German nun in her starched gray habit, launched into a passionate and entirely biblical and evangelical sermon (translated into Zulu) on the meaning of Pentecost (next Sunday). She did point out that “our Mother” was also present among the disciples as they waited and prayed for the Holy Spirit, which is perfectly true. She moved to a climax by telling the people that the same Holy Spirit who came so long ago, still comes into our hearts today, bringing hope and reconciliation, forgiveness and joy. Everyone listened intently. Then she led the group in a song (which flopped) and prayer for the Holy Spirit to fill the hearts of those gathered that day.
The little children captivated us. They had no inhibitions, of course, and were delighted by the visit of strangers and the attention we gave. They smiled freely at us, and some came to us to shake hands, and then they would just stand there staring at us with a big smile on their faces. One little girl sat on my lap, another sidled up to Jeanne who scratched his back. When she moved, he moved with her, and just poked her leg for more back scratching. Some of the women wore designs of clay on their faces, sometimes in some sort of design. I don’t think it was a beauty cream, but must have some sort of tribal traditional meaning.
The food that was left in the truck, was not stolen or touched by anyone.
We ran out of food at that stop and had to return to Mariannhill to refill the pick up. Sister Agnes invited us to her office in the basement for tea and the obligatory bun with cold cuts, which is their morning snack. This wonderful woman of about 70 or 75 (though she jumped off the truck with the agility of a 40 year old), does this as a sideline. She explained that her main work is pastoral, some among the German community in Durban, and also ecumenically. She has training in psychology, and describes her work as listening. She rode with us in the back of the truck on our return, and as she talked we learned of her deep commitment to God, to the poor, to the unity of all Christians, and to her beloved South Africa.
Then it was back in the truck and off to another, even poorer township farther away. This place was even sadder, somehow, the look of despair or defeat clouding so many faces. A couple of drunk men hung around the edges of the crowd that gathered around the truck in the hot sun shouting words I couldn’t understand. The “chief” here was a formidable older woman, like the grandmother of the town. She read from a list of names, and no one was going to get a food package whose name was not on that list.
Rita, a hospice worker in Switzerland who comes here at least twice a year, was very knowledgeable about the economic and social problems of the people. On her visits she spends at least one week volunteering in a hospice for AIDS patients. She complained how the Government and especially the Minister of Health doesn’t really support the anti-retroviral drug program, but urges homegrown remedies from garlic to beetroot. Part of this is the residue of the twin calamities of colonial and apartheid, resulting in a distrust of anything the Europeans say is best. “Our own ways are better,” is the response. Rita also insisted that the rates of HIV infection are much higher than the government figures, up to 30% of the population, a truly frightening number that portends huge problems to this recovering nation and economy. And the biggest growth is among women and their babies (the government has done little to utilize the cheap and simple drug that prevents the spread of HIV to 80% of newborns). Also, rape is all too commonplace in this society, and women have little voice (the idea that sex with a virgin will cure AIDS still persists among some of the uneducated men).
Yet people are making it too. Just up the hill from this very poor town, we saw neat houses with cars in front, belonging to blacks who evidently had decent jobs and were climbing the social and economic ladder.
At the end of the morning we stopped briefly at a hospice run by the Sisters of Charity (the order founded by Mother Teresa) with their characteristic homespun blue-fringed habits. We dropped off some food but couldn’t take up the time of the one sister there caring for 50 or so dying people (the two other sisters were out in the towns that day). These sisters only take in people who have no one else to care for them, which means their families are either far away, or all dead. I was secretly thankful we didn’t go inside—I’m not sure I could take any more that morning.
The jarring contrast of the day came when we had to return to the huge, glitzy Pavilion Mall about 7 miles from here to do our blogging and emailing (it’s the closest place that will accept my USB memory stick), and for me to get a haircut (yes, I’m keeping the buzz). It was a shock to walk among the fountains and waterfalls, and see all the material stuff when we had just witnessed such poverty and despair. This massive demarcation of rich and poor, with a growing but struggling middle class, is the story here and all over Africa, Asia, and Latin America, where the same issues of colonial fallout, inept and corrupt government, AIDS, and lack of education create such inequities.
What we did yesterday seems like a drop in the ocean—a few bags of food in a vast township of destitution and need.
I continue to study Eugene Petersen’s enormously rich spiritual theology “Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places.” A couple of quotes come to mind as I reflect on these experiences.
History is lubricated with tears. Prayer, maybe most prayers (two thirds of the Psalms are laments), is accompanied by tears. All these tears are gathered up and absorbed in the tears of Jesus. (P. 138)
Then, reflecting on salvation in the context of Exodus, he describes how it comes at Israel’s darkest moment, as they faced slavery and genocide at the hands of the Pharaoh.
This is a significant discernment. It means that our classic story of salvation does not build on anything that we have done or can do either as individuals or societies. It is initiated in conditions of human impossibility, all odds stacked against it. We are blocked from going into a huddle and calculating our chances. At that historical dead end, our imaginations, unencumbered with social, political, and therapeutic strategies, are free to pay attention to God. (P. 149)