A lesson in partnership

When ELCA staff and donors arrived in Colombia last October, they were ready to learn. This made the group stand out for one of their guides, Kaitlynne Larson, an ELCA missionary serving in this South American country. The visitors, she said, had a “sense of, ‘we just want to accompany and learn and see how we can be church better.’”

During the visit, members of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Colombia (IELCO in Spanish), the group’s host, discussed the challenges of trying to create a culture of peace amid ongoing conflict. Over 20 armed groups are active in Colombia, with a history rooted in land access disputes, poverty and illegal drug trade.

IELCO members also spoke with their visitors about the new ways they are following God’s call to “welcome the stranger.” Within the past decade, Colombia has become a place people immigrate to, not emigrate from. An estimated 7.7 million people have left neighboring Venezuela. Of those, about 3 million have stayed in Colombia while most of the others have traveled through the country on their way to other places.

This sudden influx of migrants and refugees has caused an increase in the fear and hatred of foreigners.

The IELCO is a relatively small denomination. Still, the Lutheran church is making an impact across the country—creating peace, welcoming new neighbors and strengthening community. The ELCA group saw and experienced this as they visited a few of the church’s ministries.

A place for shelter

The IELCO is made up of a few congregations that support smaller mission communities and “preaching points” across the country. Some ELCA members visited a mission community near Bucaramanga called Christo Rey. There, they met María Carmen Rodríguez, who gave them a vivid example of a life transformed by the power of God’s grace.

Rodríguez once lived with her family in a small, nearby ranching community. One afternoon in 2000, an avalanche destroyed her home as well as those of 42 other families. “We felt a big bang,” she said. “The river [overflowed] on the bridge and swept away all our ranches.”

Rodríguez said everyone—including 40 children—managed to get out unharmed, “thanks to God Almighty.” They arrived—all wet with mud caked up to their knees—at the mission church with nothing but the clothes they were wearing.

Although the government promised aid, it “says one thing now and tomorrow they’ll say something else,” she said.

Colombian Lutherans—with support from Lutheran Disaster Response—were the first to provide the families with shelter and welcome. All 43 families stayed at the church for three months, eating meals from a “community pot.” Rodríguez compared it to the miracle of the loaves and fishes. “The more we took out of the pot, the more it [filled up],” she said.

Rodríguez is 83 now and is starting a house church across the river from the site the ELCA group visited. About 20 people meet in her 6-foot-square space for worship. It’s her joy, she said, to keep sharing her testimony and passion for the Lutheran church.

A place to learn

Schools were some of the first ministries the Lutheran church built when it was established in Colombia. Those who began converting to Lutheranism were ostracized from the largely Catholic society and barred from other educational spaces. Since then, the value of education has remained at the core of IELCO’s mission.

IELCO also provides scholarships for higher education as well as school supplies and uniforms for kids who need them. Some of this is made possible through its partnership with the ELCA.

The IELCO’s guests visited the Lutheran School in Paz de Ariporo. Located in the Colombian plains, the school is surrounded by family farms and ranches. Quality education can be difficult to access in rural areas, and the school gives kids a place to learn and grow in faith.

ELCA members attended an assembly where the students presented a few songs and dances. The visitors then presented some students with Christian education awards and, in return, the kids pinned Christian badges on the shirts of their guests.

Larson said one moment from the visit is burned in her brain. When she went to lead an ELCA guest to the next activity, she found him sitting in a chair and covered in rocks, flowers, pencils and other little gifts the kids had brought him during their recess. “It was like [the students] had new grandparents there with them,” she said. “It was so beautiful.”

A place for all

The group also visited La Vid Verdadera in urban Bogota, where Larson works part of the week. There she told them that nothing in Colombia is ever truly broken—it just needs to be reused.

In one sense, this applies to the things made from recycled materials at La Vid Verdadera. Program participants learn to weave purses out of plastic bags, sew torn shirts back together, turn busted umbrellas into raincoats and more.

In another sense, Larsen’s belief that “nothing is truly broken” applies to the program participants themselves. La Vid Verdadera serves differently abled people, especially from the deaf community. In the past these populations have been judged as “broken” and excluded from society.

But these people can be part of the community and part of the church, said IELCO Bishop Atahualpa Hernández Miranda. “They are teachers for us,” she told the visitors. “They give us very valuable lessons with who they are, as well as how God has formed them.”

In addition to teaching skills that can increase income, the center provides wraparound support such as money management and human rights training. All these programs are supported by ELCA World Hunger.

Recently the program started serving migrants as well. Larson said she was nervous to invite migrants into the community because she has witnessed so much prejudice against them in Colombia. But everybody at La Vid Verdadera “feels the same thing in different ways,” she said. “So it’s been really beautiful to watch that integration.”

The community was thrilled to welcome the ELCA visitors too. Their time together ended with a dance party.

A place for partnership

As the ELCA visitors were welcomed into homes, churches and ministries in Colombia, they continually received the wisdom of their hosts. This mutual openness carried the participants through the short trip, and it will carry the relationship between the ELCA and the IELCO forward as the churches continue to work together.

John Eggen, trip leader and ELCA development director, said he was struck during the visit with a sense of partnership. IELCO members couldn’t do what they do without global partners, including the ELCA. And the ELCA couldn’t serve its neighbors in Colombia effectively without the relationship with the IELCO.

“This is an incredibly efficient way to do it,” Eggen said, stressing how this meaningful and caring partnership helps strengthen the church as a whole.

 

To help support the ministries of the ELCA, give online at elca.org/give.

 

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