Hello All!Thought you might be interested to see some pictures from my latest visit to a church out in the bush. I think I may have uploaded the images backwards, so please bear with me :) The order SHOULD have been such that you could see our course through the outskirts of the city and on out into the country side, ending at the church. It was about an hours drive and well worth every once of the gas. As you can see, the contrast between the city life and the rural life is quite significant. ( I think I would personally like to live in the bush, but that's no surprise to most of you! Its absolutely beautiful, not to mention incredibly peaceful. Its soil is very rich and vegetation lush, making it ideal for farming :) The church we visited there was called Good Shepard Christian Church and has a faithful following from the village its built in , as well as several other neighboring villages. In fact, people begin their 10-15 mile treks to church, on foot, by 6am in order to make it to church by 10am! Oh, and that includes mothers with multiple children in tow! If that isn't dedication, I don't know what is!
I should also mention that although most of these families have few resources, and often very few articles of clothing that even match, Sunday dress is always their very best. Many of the men and women are able to buy beautiful cloth made at the market and taylor themselves amazing dresses, only to be worn to church. I should also mention that the children you see in these photos were just the recipients of a clothing drive and were very proudly wearing their "new" threads!
The church suffered great loss during the war in both physical structure and member casualties. Now, I am excited to report that they are a very healthy community, thriving with MANY young, hopeful children as members! The church has been wise in recognizing that the children are not only the furture of the congregation, but also of Liberia. I had the pleasure of talking, at length, to several young pastors whose hearts overflow with love and dedication for these little ones. They hope to provide sound Christian teaching that will be the cornerstones of the lives they then build upon. One such pastor, Sero, said to me that if he could give these children even as little as five solid years of education, he believed they would be less likely to get involved in crime/drugs, and more able to contribute to the rebuilding of this nation.
The church consists of two separate buildings, one for the children's sunday school and one for the sanctuary. My favorite from the day was of the children being released from Sunday school and running up over the hill to all of us in the sanctuary. I tried to capture it, butin this instance, you just had to be there :)
As an added bonus, we squeezed a young mother and her newborn twins into our vehicle to give her a ride back to her village. She had already walked very far that morning with one slung on her back and the other on her chest. I got to hold one of these little munchkins, named Edwin, the entire ride back! :)
Well, that's all for now. I'll be in touch. Thanks for reading!!!
Love
Katie
