Letter 6

Dear Family and Friends,

I hope this letter finds you all well in 2012. As I told you at the end of my last letter, a lot has gone down in the past two months…I’ll try and give you some highlights.

20 Años Puntos Corazón Perú

For those of you who don’t know, the first Heart’s Home opened in Argentina 21 years ago and one year later arrived in Peru. The house was founded in the outskirts of Northern Lima in a neighborhood known as “La Ensenada”, a neighborhood founded by people who moved to Lima from the mountains. Lima is full of neighborhoods as such that are referred to as invasions; about 40 years ago there was a massive movement of traditional mountain people to Lima, founding there homes in unoccupied territory but without passing through the normal legal process. Therefore, Lima is full of micro-cities that for many years left millions of people living outside of the rights afforded to other “Limeños” such as running water, electricity, education, etc. Now the majority of these “pueblos jovenes” have been incorporated as official parts of the city, but you can only imagine the chaos of a city that developed for 2 decades without recognizing the presence of 3 million peopl e. While there are now two Heart’s Homes in Lima (my house in central Lima was founded 3 years later), the two neighborhoods are two distinct realities; Barrios Altos is loud and urban while La Ensenada maintains a more tranquil and simple ambiance. A few years after the foundation of the Heart’s Home in Barrios Altos, the Heart’s Home sisters arrived and now live right outside of the city. Throughout the years the Peruvian Heart’s Home family has multiplied with Peruvians who have gone on mission to other countries and more than 100 missionaries who have passed through the Heart’s Homes here in Lima. The gift of such a large and strong Heart’s Home community along with a new chapel constructed on the sister’s property gave us all reason to celebrate the 20^th anniversary. All things considered, our founder Father Thierry de Roucy came to share in all the festivities. When the Heart’s Home community in Ecuador caught wind a fe w months beforehand, they made plans to come to Peru. Many long hours, days, and months were invested to plan an awesome 3 day weekend which included a conference given by Father Thierry entitled “The Beauty of the Humble People”, an afternoon of events in La Ensenada, and finally an afternoon at the sister’s house complete with an inauguration mass of the new chapel, a “Pachamanca” (a traditional Peruvian cookout of sorts), and hundreds of friends.

In the midst of all the craziness, what I will always remember and treasure the most is the people surrounding me during it all. Let me take one step back to explain another factor in this story. All of our communities were in time of transition of new people arriving and old one returning to their respective countries making each community a litter large than usual. Honestly, normally having 11 people in our house for 5 days would have driven me out of my mind, but having the community from Ecuador in our house was truly a blessing. While we all come from various countries, it is amazing to see how the charism of Heart’s Home truly connects us all… how we are all living something extraordinary that is often times hard to express with words. Being in the presence of 21 people who are experiencing the same thing as myself was a gift beyond words.

Another interesting tidbit about this Heart’s Home mega mix is that it included 4 Americans (Katie and Lenore on mission in Ecuador, Kari in La Ensenada, and myself) plus Father Thierry whom is French but lives in New York. Many people are under the impression that in whatever part of the world, you are surely to encounter fellow Americans and fluent English speakers at every turn of the corner… this has not been my case. Outside of the visit from my mom and brother, I can think of two brief American/English speaking encounters since I’ve been here so when I found myself in a room with 3 other American girls my age, it was total culture shock! My most profound “whoa, I have really lived in Peru for over a year” moment was during a mass celebrated by Father Thierry; he offered me the Holy Eucharist as the “Body of Christ” in place of “El cuerpo de Cristo” to which I have grown accustomed. As melodramatic as it sounds, I immediately burst into tears. I real ized that over the past year I have subconsciously disconnected from back home, but in that moment everyone and everything I hold dear and precious came flooding into my heart. The Body of Christ is not contained here in Lima or even with Heart’s Home. It is in Rome, New Orleans and New York. It is in Argentina, Chile, and El Salvador. It is in Montgomery, Alabama. It is universal. In that moment I remembered Holy Spirit parish and St. Francis in Tuscaloosa; I remembered every member of my family and all of my friends who have been by my side up until this moment. It was a moment of profound gratitude that the Body of Christ has been present in my life, is present in my life, and will be present in my life when I leave Peru. St. Paul’s words to the Philippians ring true for my affection for each of you.

“I give thanks to my God at every remembrance of you, praying always with joy in my every prayer for all of you, because of your partnership for the gospel from the first day until now. I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work in you will continue to complete it until the day of Christ Jesus. It is right that I should think this way about all of you, because I hold you in my heart, you who are all partners with me in grace, both in my imprisonment and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel. For God is my witness, how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus. And this is my prayer: that your love may increase ever more and more in knowledge and every kind of perception, to discern what is of value, so that you may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ for the glory and praise of God.” (Philippians 1: 3-1)

Fiestas 2011-12

By the time Christmas showed up, I found myself in a totally new community from the year before. Ceci and Benja returned home at the end of November, leaving myself with Nathan, Mathilde, Agata (Agathe), and Benito (Benoit), all from France. Padre Lorenzo/ Father Lawrence, whom is responsible for my community, came to visit us as well as the whole Heart’s Home community in Peru for the month of December. His official role is to check in on the well being of each one of us, our community as a whole, and guide us in our mission here in Barrios Altos. What always amazes me the most about Padre Lorenzo is his fidelity to his vocation to Heart’s Home…while all of us come and go every year or two, he remains, and receives every person he comes into contact with as if he was his best friend… this is clearly evident as all of our neighbors anxiously await him in the street every time he comes!

A few days before Christmas, Padre went to the sister’s house to celebrate Christmas and Nathan’s parents, Elizabeth and Oliver, arrived to celebrate Christmas with us December 24. Christmas eve, we went to ‘’Midnight Mass’’ at 9 pm and then returned to our house to eat the dinner that Agata and I had prepared and exchange gifts with our Secret Santa. At midnight, as goes the tradition here, everyone opens their doors to greet each other, shoot off a few fireworks, and of course show off their new clothes. Christmas Day I went with Agata and Elizabeth to greet a few families while Mathilde and Nathan were cooking, and then we came home to share lunch and pass the afternoon on our patio with a few friends including Berta, Claudia, and Jose Antonio. If you remember from my last letter, Berta and Claudia suffer from a household of hatred and as a result are convinced that no one could possible want to spend more than ten minutes with them. At least five times, they tried to make lame excuses to why they had to return back to their house but we managed to make them stay for the whole afternoon. The greatest gift of the day was to finally see them singing, laughing, and hugging each one of us.

The next few days were filled with visiting our friends to wish them a Merry Christmas and drinking liters upon liters of Inca Kola (most popular Peruvian soda…it’s yellow and taste like bubblegum). For New Years, Nathan’s parents left and Padre Lorenzo returned to join in the party in Barrios Altos. A tradition in Peru is to construct a life size doll of old clothes from the previous year and to set it ablaze at midnight, a symbolic burning of all of the bad things from the previous year in order to enter the New Year with a fresh start. As soon as Nathan heard about this tradition, he put himself in charge of constructing the doll with the kids on our street…it was a success!

The next day, Padre Lorenzo went back to Chile and here we are in 2012, truckin’ along. Sometimes it seems crazy that I have now been here for 16 months and struggle to speak English (sorry if it shows in thisletter), however I am happier than ever and learning more and more everyday to embrace everyday and all of its surprises as it comes.

I will be home before soon… the beginning of April! Please continue to pray for me, for my community, and for Barrios Altos. I will do the same.

Con todo mi amor,
Charlotte