Mayan Partners has been involved in lots of activity this
year in Panyebar, and while there were challenges to overcome early in the
year, we are ending on an upbeat note and the future is hopeful.
Highlights of the year included two visits from teams from
the United States.
Additionally, Mayan Partners worked with the team at the
school (Colegio Bethel) to sponsor a vacation bible study for children in both
Panyebar as well as the neighboring village of Pasaquim, with the goal to
expose the kids to the gospel, and also encourage kids to begin attending
Colegio Bethel. The week of vacation bible school ended with over 30 kids
accepting the Lord. While we won’t know the school enrollment numbers until
early next year, the school administrator (Max) is encouraged and believes the
enrollment will grow over last year’s turmoil-induced decline.
Mayan Partners Trip (June 6- 13)
From left to right: Sam and Jim Porter, Kaelin France,
Lauren Thompson, Fryda Gonzalez, Chris Patay, Laurel Giles, Ron Giles, Emily
White, Elaine Giles, Kristen France, Steve and Peter Brown, Luke Patay, Preston
Brown
On June 6th a group of supporters and interested
partners of the school flew out of LA to Guatemala, traveling across Lake
Atitlan to stay in the town of San Pedro. Each day, the group of 17 would
travel up and down the mountain roads to visit and serve in the small town of
Panyebar.
Our activities included:
● Working
with the teachers to help with both the English and Technology (computer)
classes
● Helping
and visiting with the teachers running the Pre-school (which has over 40
students in two classrooms).
● Visiting
the library that is supported by Mayan Partners, and helping run craft activities
there.
● Doing
house visits to meet with local families. During the house visits, health care
packets were handed out, and the teams made sure to pray for the families
living there.
● Visiting homes that had installed fuel
-efficient stoves during previous team trips, to assess their efficacy or, if
discontinued, the reasons for using different stoves.
Given the turmoil at the school, and impact to the village
overall, that accompanied last year’s threats against some of the teachers, one
of our goals was to try to bring healing and mend relationships, as well as
evaluate potential changes to the operations of the school that might help
improve the quality.
Several meetings were held with leaders in the village and
community, including:
● The
Comite’ – a group of elected parents from the school community who help to
oversee the school’s functions (much like PTA).
● The
head of the school (Max)
● A
Pastor of the village (Juan)
● Pastor Emilio, who owns the building that the
school is housed in, and who supervises over 100 churches in the Lake Atitlan
area.
These meetings were invaluable in helping understanding the
complex dynamics of our partners in Panyebar, and also help to reinforce the
relationships that Mayan Partners has with the community during the eleven year
partnership.
The team enjoying a meal with the Comite’ and other local
leaders.
InterVarsity Pilgrimage (July 13-26)
The InterVarsity team visited Guatemala in July, and chose
to call their trip a pilgrimage instead of a traditional mission trip, as the
team resonated with the following quote:
"Pilgrimage is about re-connection with each other, with
our ancestors, with mystery and the depth of life. It is not an escape like
tourism but a returning to the center of pivotal events that marked us,
embedded in the land itself. The postcolonial pilgrim’s journey seeks
restoration towards a regained wholeness by a re-centering, re-entering and
recovery of history; it is a rediscovery that we are part of a living and vital
collective memory. We remember in order to heal, to recover memory, to
decolonize ourselves, to restore our deeper souls. Pilgrimage is a collective
experience. We journey together, experiencing together more than we could
alone." --Joanne Doi M.M.
Unlike other trips, this group stayed in Santa Clara, a town
much closer to the village of Panyebar. The June team had endorsed this
decision to try staying in Santa Clara, as the road from San Pedro up to
Panyebar had deteriorated such that it became very time consuming (and tiring!)
to travel it twice a day.
This group was comprised of members of Church without Walls
in Berkeley, CA., and InterVarsity students. The InterVarsity team had 11
people: 2 InterVarsity staff, and 9 students, with the students coming from
University of San Francisco, SF State, Santa Rosa Junior College, UC Davis, and
Sonoma State.
The pilgrimage focused on seeing global migration through the lens
of faith.
The team’s activities during their stay included:
● Building
relationships and working alongside teachers at the Panyebar pre-school and
Colegio Bethel middle school.
● Meeting
with families separated due to migration, and hearing their stories.
● Praying,
and receiving prayer, in family homes
●
Scripture study in Exodus, seeing parallels in
experiences of Israelites and today’s migrant communities
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