Incarnation is Identification

I recently spoke with a man who had been a missionary in Brazil. While he was there he made a great effort to learn Portuguese well, taking as his models the Brazilian Portuguese speakers around him. His goal was to sound just like them them--or as much like them as possible--when he spoke.

To this day, twenty years after leaving Brazil, he speaks excellent, idiomatic Brazilian Portuguese. The hard work that he did many years ago continues to yield dividends in the way he speaks the language.

He told me about a time he traveled with a fellow missionary in Brazil. After an interaction with a Brazilian man, his colleague turned to him and asked in an annoyed way, "Why do you do that?"

"Do what?" my friend replied.

"Why do you try talk like the Brazilians, instead of like an American?"

"Because they talk right, and I want to talk right."

"Well," his friend concluded, "don't do it around me."

I thought about that story again a couple of weeks ago when I was listening to a radio program about language learning. The man being interviewed said something to the effect that the greatest compliment you can pay a language learner is to mistake him/her for a native speaker.

I realized that this was exactly what my friend's colleague had wanted to avoid. There was something in his self-identity that resisted identifying with Brazilians and he didn't want to risk ever being taken for anything but an American.

Now I realize that for most of us it is very unlikely that we would ever learn a language so well as an adult that we would be taken for a native speaker. But putting that aside for the moment, one of the reasons that my language students tend to be the most motivated language learners in the world is that they don't only want to communicate information with Paraguayans; they want to identify with them in the language that defines them as Paraguayans--Guarani. By learning Guarani, we affirm, value, and make part of us something that most Paraguayans hold in very high esteem--the language that is uniquely theirs.

Dr. Gailyn Van Rheenen, in his book Missions: Biblical Foundations and Contemporary Strategies, talks about this identification: "Such identification is not an external façade designed to create some kind of artificial congeniality; it is the heart of God incarnate in the missionary." (p. 66) The heart of God was demonstrated in Jesus, the Word who took on human form and had to learn words--human language--as a baby. His identification with us, his creation, sets the pattern for missionary identification.

That's why language learning for missionaries is not an onerous task to be endured so that the real missions work can begin. It is an indispensable step in the process of incarnation that every missionary must engage in completely in order to be effective ministers in the context they've been called to. For this reason, people who go to minister in contexts where they "don't need to learn the language" find themselves at a distinct disadvantage, because they lack one of the most fundamental tools of identification.

My Irish Forebears

Of all my ancestors whose details I've uncovered over the years in censuses, wills, tax lists, city directories, Civil War pension files, and other documents, by far the most mysterious is a man named Edward Harding Ryan.

Edward was born in Ireland in 1826 and immigrated in 1873, arriving in Philadelphia. He was apparently a Protestant so I'm guessing he may have been from the North, but I have yet to find any more concrete information on his origins.

He was naturalized on August 31, 1880, but strangely I can't seem to find him in the 1880 census. I don't know what his wife's name was and I don't know his profession.

He had at least two children, one of whom was my great great grandmother, Isabella Esther Ryan, born in 1859 in Ireland. She married Andrew Lucas Chamberlain and died when my great grandmother, Laura, was only five.

Edward's other daughter that I know of, Catherine S. Ryan, was born in 1857, also in Ireland, and married Douglass Bellerjeau, a Philadelphia native.

The most informative source on my great great great grandfather is his death certificate, dated January 1886. He was only sixty. He died of pneumonia and was buried in the Greenwood Knights of Pythias Cemetery. His address was listed as 1477 Cook St., and he was a widower.

I'm fascinated by the mysteries of my past. These people are part of who I am, and it's amazing to think that this almost anonymous Irish immigrant was one of the people without whom I would not exist. Some day I'll find out more about him but until then it's good to know on St. Patrick's day (though surely Edward would not have acknowledged St Patrick!) that I'm at least that little part Irish.

Quisqueya Relief

Check out this new blog about the Quisqueya Crisis Relief Center in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Don't miss the opportunity to donate.

Paraguayan guitarist Agustín Barrios Mangoré is one of the greatest musicians of all time.

That's what world famous Australian guitarist John Williams says about this Paraguayan icon of the first half of the 20th century. Paraguayan guitarist Berta Rojas and Williams talk about this remarkable composer and guitarist that so beautifully represented the musical heart of Paraguay in this BBC interview.

Still Thinking About Haiti

My posts about Haiti have slowed down considerably since last week. On Friday we left home (our temporary home in Kentucky) for a one-month road trip. This is the first extended time I've had internet access since then.

I haven't forgotten about Haiti. It's been on my mind constantly and I've particularly been praying for Steve Hersey and the team at Quisqueya Christian Academy and all the folks that continue to work for the restoration of Haiti. For the last few days they've been updating their website and tell of the excellent work they're doing to coordinate medical teams and help patients find the right location for the help they need.(To contribute to the ongoing aid and recovery work based at QCS, go to their website and scroll down to the PayPal "Donate" button.)

It does seem that the news media are forgetting, as they are bound to do as our own attention span wanes and our eyes look elsewhere for news-entertainment. Troy Livesay tweets that the media row, so much in evidence for the first week and a half at Toussaint Louverture Airport, has now disappeared. The aid effort, of course, has not disappeared and in some ways is only now beginning.

I've followed my sister Ruth's blog for a long time. She's been mysterious about where exactly she was located, preferring to refer to her adopted country as Tecwil. But after the quake she outed herself as a resident of Haiti, where she has in fact lived and worked since 1993. Check out her blog for beautiful writing in general and specifically these days for her own reflections on the earthquake, being a mom in a crisis, and being evacuated.

Some Links

We're on the road for a few weeks and I'm not able to write a full post but I'd like to refer you again to the following excellent blogs:

Ben and Katie in Haiti, an excellent update on the goings-on at Quisqueya Christian School.

The Livesay [Haiti] Weblog, following the very hands-on relief work of missionaries Troy and Tara Livesay.

And the following interesting links: 

Satellite image of the location of the QCS campus. If you zoom out you'll find the nearby Montana Hotel and Caribbean Market.

Article about a lady who will be sending aid for the work at QCS.

Interesting news today from QCS director Steve Hersey: they are going to reopen the school for the few students who are still in the country. They'll resume classes in a very scaled-down way on January 27th.

QCS Earthquake Command Center

"Our campus has been preserved for a purpose." That was the realization that Quisqueya Christian School's Plant Operator Ted Steinhauer came to just hours after the earthquake hit Port-au-Prince and the surrounding area on January 12th. Although there was great destruction around the school, the QCS buildings had not sustained damage.

Almost immediately the QCS campus began to become a center for relief efforts. Its most obvious resource was its physical plant--undamaged buildings and courtyards as well as fields and open areas. Director Stephen Hersey comments on Facebook about the structural soundness of QCS buildings:

It is amazing. Many people are using the word 'miracle.' Walls collapsed right across the street, and the house directly across from the High School building suffered huge damage, big pieces falling off. I really have no explanation.

But it also had a dedicated, compassionate team of administrators, faculty and staff who love the people of Haiti and feel a call to serve them. Many of them were already involved in ministry in orphanages and Haitian schools. An additional resource was the community of parents and alumni, both Haitian and expats, that QCS is connected to.

Many of these people responded to the call for help and have teamed together under the leadership of people like Steinhauer and Hersey, sometimes using their training and experience in administration, organization, technology, and medicine; sometimes reaching out to their connections within Haiti and beyond; sometimes simply doing the grunt work that needed to be done to make the relief effort work.

An example of the last category is Ben Kilpatrick, a North American teacher who had barely worked in Haiti for two weeks when the earthquake hit. Yesterday he volunteered to accompany a trip up the mountain to the Dominican Republic to search for a truck carrying relief supplies that had broken down. Reports say that Ben and others like him have been available to do whatever was asked of him, joyfully serving others and helping to ease pain.

Part of the extended QCS community are Troy and Tara Livesay who work with Heartline Ministries and World Wide Village. They have been working with missionaries John and Beth McHoul, John and Jodie Ackerman, and others to treat those injured in the quake. Using very basic equipment and supplies, they have sutured wounds, set seriously broken bones, and otherwise helped to relieve suffering. They've had to get creative, like using sterile gloves to provide drainage for wounds. The Livesays' blog tells an amazing story of how they found help for some of their most serious patients on the U.S. Navy hospital ship USNS Comfort.

The Livesays report that the larger Non-Government Organizations, better-supplied with water, food, fuel, and medicine, have not been heeding the call of smaller NGOs for help. The smaller organizations, many of which have invested in Haiti for years, are trying to band together to provide the support they are not finding in the large groups.

It's not clear whether the humedica team from Germany continues to lodge on the QCS campus now that they are no longer working in nearby Hôpital Espoir, but Els Vervloet reports that a Korean team will now be moving onto the grounds.

With access to communications equipment, motorcycles, trucks, interpreters, and runners, the QCS Earthquake Command Center has become a vital nexus in the ongoing relief and recovery efforts in Port-au-Prince.