Operation Rice Bowl: A Lenten Tradition
Week five — Cameroon
This week our pilgrimage takes us to Batouri, Cameroon, a country in central Africa. Here we meet Angeline, one of 510,000 people living with HIV in the country. For Angeline, a combination of anti-retroviral drugs and a supportive community have transformed a death sentence into a life lived positively.
In Cameroon, about half the population lives on less than $2 a day. Rigorous programs to combat HIV and AIDS have led to a decrease in the HIV and AIDS prevalence rate from 11.8 percent in 2001 to 5.4 percent in 2005, according to UN statistics.
Pray:
In Sunday’s gospel a family’s faith was shaken by the death of a beloved brother and their disappointment in the late arrival of their friend Jesus, the healer who failed to prevent the tragedy. In the raising of their brother Lazarus from the dead, Martha and Mary deepen in their understanding of the nature of the life that Jesus has brought into the world. It is a life that does not play favorites. It is a resurrection that has already begun.
To believe that Jesus is the resurrection is to celebrate the fact that eternal life is already in motion – even in the face of the sin, violence, disease and death that pervades our world. St. Catherine of Sienna is quoted as saying “All the way to heaven is heaven because Christ is the way.” This is the profound reality of Jesus’ resurrection: as Christians we already stand in the Reign of God. We tend its soil and care for the fruit-bearing shoots that spring from the Word planted there; we witness its expansion, its deepening, its in-breaking. Eternal life is now. But it is also not yet. The Christian life includes the spiritual practice of dying as well as living. If we can die well to the things that kill our souls -- greed, selfishness, fear, complacency, being judgmental, arrogance – we can honor the dignity that is our inheritance. So this week, ask God to show you the areas of your life that do not express your human dignity.
Fast
What threatens people’s ability to understand and uplift the human dignity that each one of us possesses as a child of God? One answer is the humiliating effects of poverty, and how the lack of access to basic resources is an affront to people’s sense of self worth. Working to address the root causes of poverty is also an effort to respect the dignity that is inherent to all people. But what of the non-poor? How do busyness, fear, complacency and alienation from God and community threaten dignity? This week, select an area of your life that numbs or limits the joy, peace and serenity that are the fruits of human dignity. Practice a happy death in these areas. Embrace the resurrection that follows.
Learn
After Angeline first tested positive for HIV, she spent more than a year in denial. She watched her husband sicken and die. Another HIV test again proved positive. Angeline had to do something to re-embrace life, so she joined a local community association for people with HIV, supported by CRS.
“The association brings people living with HIV together so that we can build positive and supportive relationships and form a strong social support system for each other,” she explains. “We also learn the importance of eating healthy meals and continuing our anti-retroviral treatment as a way to slow the progression of HIV, so we can live positively with the disease. The association also provides education and revenue-generating activities so we can continue to support our families even while living with HIV. Even though I have HIV, I now have friends facing the same challenges who help me every day with their support.”
Give
Loving, supportive community is the soil out of which respect for human dignity grows. Involvement in church communities, schools or civic organizations offers the means to fight alienation and isolation. For people in poverty, community and strong social networks are essential to forging new futures. What are the communities and organizations that nurture your life and give it meaning? Put a dollar in your Rice Bowl for each organization that you are involved with, and from which you benefit.
