By Brian Hotaling
Honduras remains in poor condition, but those we visit continue to show unusual resilience. Of major concern at this time is the education system. The Honduran government is pushing to privatize education, claiming that it can no longer support the education of children over the age of 15. Though the government claims scholarships will be available, it is likely that these would be distributed according to political loyalties. In protest against this curtailment of public education and where principals allow it, the public school teachers have been on strike. As a result, students attend classes only one or two days a week, if at all. While we were in the country, teachers and their supporters blocked highways and held rallies in the major cities. Crowds were dispersed with tear gas and water cannons. In one city, a panic ensued; one teacher fell and was crushed to death by the tank carrying the water cannons.
Increased drug trafficking and violence plague the country and have spiked after the 2009 coup. The murder rate in Honduras is now over 9 times the rate here in New York City. Rather than hunting down drug traffickers, the government has diverted the police, focusing their attention on repressing political opposition. Events such as the mysterious disappearance of a captured plane filled with drugs lead many to believe that the police and armed forces are complicit in the drug business.
Our group consisted of four people (Monica Maher, Mary Phelan, Catherine Rode and myself). We enjoyed good visits with the four groups which we (and Xavier parishioners) are assisting. We met with the ten secondary school students we are helping with partial scholarships (about $26/month) at the Hacienda in a former banana plantation area. The students talked about their hopes and dreams for their futures. They have various goals – teacher, computer engineer, health care, travel business – but their financial situations are dire. They remarked, for example, that the cost of notebooks has increased 50% in the last two years and requested that we increase our funding, even a little. We will see what we can do.
We stayed overnight in the village of Guacamaya visiting the women whose children also benefit from our support. Three of the women have lost sons to violence in the last three months. Though the mothers are grieving, they have an inner strength and faith which allow them to persevere in their efforts to support each other and continue working to improve conditions in their community. We visited the family of a young man who died in a sugarcane-crushing machine in January. Another mother, whose 15-year-old son was shot in a drugrelated killing, moved away from the village because a second son got involved with drugs. She feared he would be killed too. She returned to Guacamaya during our visit. Everyone was naturally very happy to see her. The women tell us our visits always raise their morale.
We also visited the Garifuna community of Triunfo de la Cruz on the Honduran coast. The elementary school, which has benefited from our support, was eerily silent because of the strike. The group there now has plans to use our money to install new fans in the classrooms and to replace the wire security screens with plastic which is more resistant to the salt spray of the nearby sea.
Finally, we visited Casa Corazon. We treated the children to our traditional pizza lunch. In the 12 years we have been visiting the Casa, we have watched the first children we met grow into adolescence. A number of the young women have now celebrated their “quinceañeras,” an important celebration of their 15th birthdays (similar to a “Sweet Sixteen” in the U.S.). The Casa added a new library with many donated books and also an adjoining meeting and study room with computer. The older children are allowed a few minutes each day on the computer for social networking.
As always, the groups are appreciative of the support of the Xavier parishioners. Your support through donations and from our annual Christmas Card sale has enabled a number of students to graduate from secondary school who otherwise could not have done so. Given the broken condition of the country, education is not a guarantee of a good job. Yet, without a diploma, a good job is virtually impossible. One can well understand why so many Hondurans risk everything to try to reach the U.S.A. We are always impressed, however, with the level of commitment and hope the people have for their own country, always trying to seek creative solutions to entrenched problems which (to our eyes) only get worse. Their strength is amazing. Our visits inspire us to continue our efforts to support these local initiatives morally and financially so that the next generation of Hondurans find a way to stay in the country that they love and continue the work of their parents to make it a better place. In a world of such violence, ours is a people-to-people diplomacy based on deep friendship and faith developed over many years. We are inspired by the generosity of the Xavier community and by the dedication of the Honduran community in this spiritual journey of accompaniment, to which our faith continually calls us.
