Shine All Over Parkal

On Christmas Eve Achen, Kochamma, Binu (their son), and the six YAVs arrived at the Warangal railway station; we had survived a twenty-four hour train journey (complete with singing pilgrims), and were now in the state of Andhra Pradesh, Kerala’s neighbor to the northeast. Anu, Achen’s sister (x2 – by blood and by faith) was waiting for us at the station; she has lived in Andhra Pradesh since beginning her ministry with the area’s Parkal Mission and now runs a boys’ orphanage called the Home of Love. From the station we still had two hours left in our journey, so we all piled into the bus to drive the remaining distance.

Andhra Pradesh is a completely different environment than Kerala. Driving along its rural roads, we passed palmetto trees scattered among fields of cotton, newly harvested red chilies drying in the sun, and farmers riding atop hay bales, their Brahma cows under yoke. This is the backdrop of India’s agricultural center. However, despite the richness of its resources, Andhra Pradesh suffers under an obstinate feudal system that keeps the people of its agricultural sector impoverished. By the end of December we had spent four months in India, and we had certainly encountered poverty more conspicuous than any I have witnessed in the United States. However, this journey was our first exposure to the harsh conditions under which many Indians live, and it offered new insight into the extreme and humbling realities of economic injustice. The Home of Love is located amidst the cotton fields, in the state’s poorest district. A junction lies near the orphanage that boasts the area’s few shops, the church the boys attend stands across the street, and a ten-minute walk down the highway will take you to the Mission’s medical clinic. The remaining space is sparsely populated, with huts made of sticks and plastic sheets lining the roads and only the fields beyond.

Upon our arrival Anu, the staff, and the twenty-five boys living at the Home of Love welcomed us openly; the atmosphere of warmth and joy they had created was immediately apparent, and we were excited to be a part of it for Christmas. During our four days in Andhra Pradesh, we spent our time playing with the boys, seeing a few of the nearby sites (two temples and a lake), and visiting the Home of Love’s sister orphanage about an hour away. Every night we gathered for evening prayer, a time when we exchanged songs and skits and watched the littlest boys nod off to sleep. These evenings together formed some of my favorite memories from our visit. A return to Vacation Bible School days, the six of us reached into the recesses of our brains to find every song learned in Sunday school, complete with actions (which we pulled off with quite a bit of flare, if I do say so myself). Standards such as ‘This Little Light of Mine,’ ‘Hallelujah/Praise Ye the Lord,’ and ‘Father Abraham’ were received with energy and eagerness, and the movements even deterred the five-year-olds from sleep.

When December 25th arrived, it did not feel much like Christmas morning; I was lacking the day’s usual signifiers of cold weather, the smell of coffee brewing, and my sister waking me up at an ungodly hour. But as the day progressed, I realized I had never before experienced a Christmas where Emmanuel’s coming was met with such evident joy. Here we were, sharing in the celebration with children who had lost their family and whose visit from Father Christmas was purely a product of one community member’s generosity. Many of the people who joined us for worship on Christmas morning started their day in huts that couldn’t keep out the evening chill or the snakes, but they sang and clapped to the music of Christmas carols with more enthusiasm than I’ve ever experienced back home.

After joining the boys for worship at the church across the street, we accompanied Anu to a second service in a village a half hour away. We arrived to find a one-room church, beautifully decorated with streamers and balloons of every color, and empty save for the altar and a couple chairs in a back corner. The floor was covered with mats for sitting, and there were already enough women gathered to fill the left side of the room (the men’s side was significantly emptier). Kochamma, Ariel, Becca, Lindsey and I filed in right against the back wall, and the service began. Before long enough women and children had poured through the door to fill the right side of the church as well, and then enough to fill the aisle, and then the comfort bubble between the last row of men and the first row of women. People sat in positions that allowed them to occupy as little space as possible, perching on laps and putting knees at odd angles; the church was packed to the brim. And when the service ended and we stood to exit, I realized that this was where the men were, standing outside the doors for the duration of the service.

I think, in many ways, we live in a world not unlike the one Jesus knew. It is not the Roman Empire, yet we experience a time of globalization that arguably supports Western imperialism. Though the religious institutions wear a different façade than the ones Jesus criticized, we have formed churches that too often reinforce the status quo. And that which is holy now gets lost among the department store racks, like the temple was lost to the market . . . Two thousand years ago God sought out a humble woman of great faith to bear the Christ child, and that child lived with, ministered to, and advocated for society’s marginalized. In this world I believe God might choose to dwell among the farm laborers of rural Andhra Pradesh, relying on an Indian woman who can barely support her family, but shows great faith in God’s promise. After this Christmas I am certain that she, like Mary two millennia ago, would rejoice the most fully in the arrival of a liberating God made human.

(P.S. – It was certainly difficult to spend my first Christmas away from home. However, the tinge of homesickness began to lift as I realized I was singing ‘Oh Come All Ye Faithful’ with a worshipping community in Andhra Pradesh just as my church family back home was gathering on Christmas Eve to do the same. We are always more connected than with think . . . I hope everyone on both sides of the globe had a joyous Christmas full of peace, love, and hope.)

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Swamiyee Sharanam Ayappan

For weeks shoeless men dressed in black dhotis have flooded Kerala’s railway stations. In addition to their attire, strands of marigolds tied to open train windows, chants echoing from neighboring compartments, and the sheer number of people makes them a conspicuous presence. These men are pilgrims, traveling to the Sri Ayappan forest temple at Sabarimala, around 50 kilometers east of Kottayam. According to my guidebook, this is the second largest pilgrimage in the world, one that culminates in mid-January during the festival of Makara Sankranti. However, for those who either cannot or choose not to participate (for instance, there is a centuries-old ban on women of menstrual age), there are alternative festivals to celebrate the deity Ayappan.

John, Lindsey, and I attended one such festival sponsored by the members of the Dalit Community where I tutor. Donning our traditional Kerala attire, the three of us joined my friends in a procession down the streets of Aluva, finishing at a shrine they had erected for the occasion. A group of men led the way with drums and dancing, the women followed carrying their decorative umbrellas and candles. John, Lindsey, and I (after losing our umbrella privileges . . . methinks due to inadequate handling) simply walked alongside, enjoying the energy of the evening.

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'Tis the Season

“Truly he taught us to love one another
His law is love and his gospel is peace
Chains shall he break for the slave is our brother
And in his name all oppression shall cease”
- ‘Oh Holy Night’

The other day Achen’s guide for independent Bible study steered me to Luke 3:1-17, a discussion of John the Baptist’s ministry as one who prepares the way. This proved a rather appropriate text to stumble upon during this season of Advent, and one that left me wondering how we prepare for Christmas two millennia after Jesus’ birth.

This year preparing for Christmas has meant letting go of certain loved traditions: the advent wreath, Christmas carols in four-part harmony, the smell of pine trees and fireplaces, and watching Miracle on 34th Street with my family. I’m adjusting to the idea of celebrating Jesus’ birth in the midst of palm trees, and am learning to recognize the season by the paper stars that grace churches and Christian households. Bust most of all, as I identify differences between Christmas in St. Louis and Christmas in Aluva, I am left pondering this question of preparedness.

Christmas is about welcoming the Messiah - a baby born to humble parents who lay him in a manger because there was no room for them in the inn. Despite reading the Christmas story every year, I think we often overlook the significant circumstances of Jesus’ birth . . . God did not look to the elite of society to parent the Christ child, but chose Mary and Joseph, individuals too poor to offer the recommended sacrifice at his circumcision (Luke 2:24). Mary delivered her baby in a stable - a fact so surprising it was met with wide eyes and dropped jaws when I explained it to my third graders during a lesson of ‘Away in a Manger.’ (‘No crib for his bed’ and ‘The cattle are lowing’ => Jesus was born in a ‘House for Animals’). But, in the face of rejection, there was no alternative for this couple; only the animals made them room. Finally, the angels shared the joyful news of Christ’s birth with the lowest of society – the shepherds watching o’er their flocks by night . . . God did not choose to dwell among the privileged, but among the marginalized.

However, in the materialism that surrounds Christmas in the western world, it seems we have lost sight of both Jesus’ humble beginnings and the essence of his ministry. As Mary suggests in her song (Luke 1:46-55), the coming of Emmanuel brings a promise of social and political change – “[God] has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly.” And, standing with and for the marginalized, Jesus acts in accordance with this promise of justice during his time on earth . . .

For the past few weeks, I have been reading Naomi Klein’s No Logo (©2000) – a book that explores the dangers of multinational corporations, globalization, and free-market capitalism. It was disturbing to read her report of the world’s 1,000+ Export Processing Zones, all of which specialize in sprouting sweatshops throughout developing countries. Klein reveals that factories in Sri Lanka, India’s neighbor to the south and a country I will visit at the end of February, are notorious for human rights violations. Another of India’s neighbors, Pakistan, sees 10,000 children (many of them sold as indentured slave laborers) contributing to the mass production of Nike soccer balls. And a factory manager in El Salvador (not-so-far from our fellow YAVs in Guatemala) is guilty of firing 150 workers, simply because they organized a union drive to ensure humane conditions as they labored over Gap t-shirts.

Upon reading this, I opened my green, metal wardrobe (standard Indian) to find clothes bearing the labels of both aforementioned companies; my Gap t-shirts and Nike running pants traveled with me to India – a country that has approved tax breaks for Export Processing Zones in an attempt to keep pace with an increasingly global (and unjust) economy. This find reminded me that, through my purchasing power, I have ultimately contributed to the exploitation of people throughout the majority world. These are people who lie forgotten, hidden behind a curtain that runs between the east and the west; it seems our society specializes in disconnectedness, both enabling us to forget those who labor in sweatshops producing our goods and fostering a deep sense of helplessness when we realize our role in this oppressive system. It is an issue that seems particularly pertinent during Advent, a season that has turned quite materialistic with our quests for the perfect gifts. As a people whose most obvious means of preparing for Christmas is by hitting the malls, we largely neglect those who suffer the bonds of injustice . . . those among whom I believe God would still choose to dwell.

I do not mean to reproach our Christmas gift ritual; of course, there is something beautiful in the act of giving. God gave the world Jesus that we might learn to truly love and serve one another. This is the very reason gifts became central to the celebration of Christmas, and for me this is an important part of my family’s holiday routine. I love gathering around the Christmas tree, sharing in the excitement of opening gifts that have been selected with care, and I do not believe there is anything selfish in such an exchange. Instead, it is a celebration of relationships. On my birthday, I received gifts from the children I tutor in the Dalit Community. These are children who live in two-room, concrete-block houses that typically contain little more than a few pictures of whichever God they worship, some wooden benches, one or two beds, and enough to prepare and eat food. Yet, despite their material poverty, my students gave in a way that reminds us that genuine giving is essentially an act of love.

My hope for the Christmas season is that we can all give generously and sincerely, in a way that celebrates our existence as relational beings. But, more importantly, I hope we can give to our entire family – the family that lives under the same roof as well as the family that lives under the roof of a dormitory in an Export Processing Zone. As Christians we are called to love one another as Jesus taught us, and with that love comes true and complete justice for all people. In order to prepare for Emmanuel’s presence in our lives, we must commit ourselves to working toward this justice.

“‘The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because [God] has appointed me to bring good news to the poor.
[God] has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
and recovery of sight to the blind,
to let the oppressed go free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.’” (Luke 4: 18-19)

My Aluva Family

One of my third standard students, Afrah, lives near U. C. College, and is the only other member of the Christava Mahilalayam community to share my bus stop. During my first week of teaching, Afrah invited me in for tea after school. I met her mother, father, and five-year-old brother, who welcomed me with smiles, delicious food, and the much needed feeling of family. Having both standard Malayalee hospitality and a knowledge of living abroad (Afrah’s father lived in England for six years), Sajitha and Sherif extended an open invitation to visit whenever I felt lonely, bored, or hungry. I have gratefully taken them up on their offer . . .

Continued at www.sudieniesen.com

A Westerner's Guide to Living in Kerala

Since my family arrives in less than one month (weeeee!), this seemed an appropriate time to publish those tidbits of information I wish I’d had before coming to India. Some of these points are irrelevant to those who will be in Kerala for a short time, but I hope they will be helpful to any future YAVs or long-term visitors . . .

Continued at www.sudieniesen.com