Day 2: Mindful of Martyrs

Although we were told what we were going to be doing today, we were not sure quite what to expect. We soon discovered what the day had in store for us, both physically and mentally.

The day started out with a short prayer outside the chapel. This was solely to help us get in the mindset of reflection and awareness for the day. We were then supplied with a delicious breakfast from the retreat house. After our bodies were fueled for the long day ahead, we ventured out to our first stop: The Universidad de El Salvador. Here, we first walked through the building in which six Jesuit priests were murdered during the Civil War in El Salvador. First, we looked at the accesories, pictures, and clothes of the priests who were murdered. This was very moving in that it helped us to realize that this situation was real, and that this was not something that happened a long time ago. We then walked past the "Garden of Roses," where a beautiful garden was planted in memory of the slaughtered priests, and two innocent women in the building whose lives were also taken at that time. Initially there were six red roses that represented the priests, and two yellow roses that represented the women. Then we were presented with a few photo albums. These albums each contained something different, but the most moving one was the album filled with pictures of the dead priests. The pictures in the albums were very graphic, and very disturbing to look at. It was at this point that our team started to realize how little respect the Salvadorians were shown at the time of the Civil War.

The next stop was the house of Bishop Romero. At this location, our guide, Andres, explained the life of Romero, and expanded upon his significance during his time. We learned about how he had formed a solid relationship with the Pope, how he had not been afraid to stand with his people in public, and how he was seen as a great leader within the Church. At his house we saw his personal car, walked through his living room and bedroom. These rooms displayed many pictures of him, displayed his collection of books (his own homilys included), and the clothes that he was wearing when he was assassinated. Just before we left his house, an audio recording was played for us to listen to. This recording contained Monseñor Romero´s final Homily and the gunshot that killed him directly after his finishing of it. This recording filled all of us with awe, for his Homily discussed how he knew he was going to die, and that he would fully forgive the person who would kill him. As discussed by the group later in the day, we determined that Monseñior Romero had achieved a point in his life where he had fully given up his ego for the betterment of the Salvadorian people. After visiting his house, we walked directly to the Church in which he was killed. Here, we sat in the pews for a few minutes to pray and reflect upon the events that had taken place in the Church nearly 25 years ago.

With the events of the morning still in our minds, we returned to the retreat house for lunch. Again, we were supplied with food muy bueno, and were given about a two and a half total block of time to spend doing whatever our hearts desired. Some of us played cards, some read, some slept, some kicked around a hackey-sack, and some even played with their new slingshots (Sohum). This was a great time to help relieve us of the weighty things placed in our minds in the morning, but also to help them settle in with time.

After our "free time,"  we went to the memorial wall in San Salvador. This wall contained the names of 30,000 who were involved with homicide during the Civil War. This wall extended farther than one could imagine, and reached into our hearts deeper than one would have thought. Knowing that not only these names on the wall suffered, but all of their families as well as those who cared for these people suffered too. This event was the last moving event of the day until the nightly reflection, but we will get to that later.

Next we stopped in to the mall for some time to shop, eat, or just hang out and grow closer as a team. Most of us made a beeline to the ice cream shop. The ice cream was very tasty, but we really did just enjoy being in each others´ company and spending time with one another. We only hung around the mall for about an hour. It seemed quite Americanized, so nobody was really too inclined to stay very long. We are all in the mindset of wanting to experience new and exciting things in this foreign country, and would rather spend our time doing that than being somewhere relatively familiar.

When we arrived back to the retreat house, we soon decided that fried chiken sounded good for dinner. So the team loaded back up into the bus and made way for Pollo Campero. This restaraunt is basically a Spanish KFC. Here, we spent time together not only eating chicken, but improving our Español speaking skills. We took turns ordering our food in Spanish, then after our waiter had left to input the orders, took turns asking Andres different questions in Spanish. The questions ranged from, "Cual es el animal mas grande in El Salvador," translating to "What is the biggest animal in El Salvador," to "Cual es tu color favorito," translating to "What is your favorite color?" This was a lot of fun. We are definitely starting to all grow closer together, and are starting to become more comfortable in this unknown territory.

Shortly after our arrival back to the retreat house, we headed to the chapel for our prayer and reflection time. There is not much we are able to discuss with you about our conversations, for they are supposed to be confidential, and not discussed outside of our group. What we can say though is that we are really taking a lot out of this trip already, and that we realize that we have hardly scraped the suface of our emotions to come while on this trip. It is easy to be open with such a great group of guys (and Mrs. Cabrera), and we could not have asked for a better team for this mission trip.

Signed,
Jessi Guerra and James Miller