My Semester at Casa de la Solidaridad in El Salvador

This semester I will be studying abroad in El Salvador and participating in a program called Casa de la Solidaridad. Casa is an intentional community of students from around the U.S. who live together based upon four pillars: Accompaniment, Academics, Community, and Spirituality. Hence, the name of this blog. Each one of these pillar serve as a foundation for our experience in El Salvador and are lived out in our daily experiences. On Mondays and Wednesday I will be at a praxi site focused on living in accompaniment with members of a local community. The classes I are focused upon the history, development, and current realities of El Salvador,and compliment the work I will be doing at my praxi site. In the community, we have community meals and spirituality nights.

Since I started attending college at Regis University, the people of El Salvador have continually been on my heart. The more I learned about what it means to attend a Jesuit university, the greater call I felt deepen my personal vocation to service and solidarity. Studying Philosophy and Peace & Justice with minors in Music and Sociology, I have had various classes that continued to challenge my understanding of justice, peace, and war. I have read books, attended lectures, watched various documentaries, and spent many nights at Regis University's Romero House learning about the people of El Salvador. Over the years I have had the privilege to attending the Ignatian Family Teach-in and the School of the Americas Protest and Demonstration. From the moment I first learned of the people of El Salvador a part of my heart rested with them in their suffering and joy.

I am so excited for this opportunity and cannot believe the time to embark on this adventure has arrived. My hope over the months while I am in El Salvador is to blog about every two weeks. I would love for you to accompany me in my journey!

I will leave with you with this prayer by Archbishop Oscar Romero:

No statement says all
that could be said.
No prayer fully expresses our faith.
No confession brings perfection.
No pastoral visit brings wholeness.
No program accomplishes the Church’s mission. No set of goals and objectives includes everything.
This is what we are about:
We plant seeds that one day will grow. We water seeds already planted, knowing that they hold future promise. We lay foundations
that will need further development. We provide yeast that produces effects beyond our capabilities.
We cannot do everything,
and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that. This enables us to do something,
and to do it very well.
It may be incomplete,
but it is a beginning,
a step along the way,
an opportunity for God’s grace to enter
and do the rest.
We may never see the end results,
but that is the difference
between the master builder and the worker. We are workers, not master builders, ministers, not messiahs.
We are prophets of a future not our own. Amen.