Mission To AfricaBy Alice Matisz
Virgil Smith at work
Shirley Smith is in back, left side
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Many in our parish are sponsoring the less fortunate through Chalice, a Canadian Catholic sponsorship programme. The rewards are many, including much-anticipated letters and photographs from overseas. However for a lucky few, joining a Chalice Mission Trip can mean a chance to experience missionary work first hand. Shirley and Virgil Smith from St. Michael’s Parish in Calgary are two such sponsors.
I first met them when they kindly agreed to take small gifts to my sponsor children. This was a rare opportunity since the postal service can be unreliable in third-world countries. Shirley admitted cheerfully that their luggage was so full of gifts that their own clothes were being removed to meet weight restrictions. This was my first indication of how committed this couple is. They went on to describe three previous trips overseas and hopes to take as many more as their finances allow. Now that they are back from their three-week-trip in August 2013, I asked them how it went. Where did you go? We volunteered on a Chalice maternity/medical mission to Tanzania. Arriving in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania we drove to Morogoro to St. Vincent de Paul Seminary and completed 3 home visits for Chalice sponsored children. We continued on to Songea where we set up a medical clinic in the newly built maternity ward and completed 2 more visits for Chalice sponsored children. After 3 clinic days, we drove on to Mbangamao, an isolated village in southwestern Tanzania, near the Malawi border. We set up a clinic at the local dispensary. We also offered a mobile clinic that travelled to a different village each day. Between all of these locations, we visited 5 more Chalice sponsored children. Following the medical mission, the team travelled to Iringa for a 2 day safari, rest and recovery period before driving back to Dar es Salaam and flying back to Canada. What specific activities happened during the Chalice mission? We attended welcoming ceremonies everywhere we went; with prayer, song and dance. We offered basic medical services to everyone; specifically pre/post natal care, nursing assessments, lessons on nutrition, eye care, dental care and hand hygiene. We visited an orphanage at Neema and witnessed the ribbon cutting ceremony for a Chalice sponsored children’s nursery. We witnessed the official opening of a maternity ward in Songea, another Chalice sponsored project. We painted 4 cheery murals on the walls of the new maternity ward. We witnessed the local Bishop officiating the ribbon cutting for a new computer lab, science lab and library at St Vincent de Paul Secondary School in Mbangamao, yet another Chalice sponsored project. We also visited local markets, delivered gift packages to the homes of Chalice sponsored children, and shared a special breakfast with elders to listen to their stories. We served a hot lunch to hundreds of Chalice sponsored children at de Paul Primary School in Songea. We attended daily Mass with the Vincentian Fathers, the Sisters of the Visitation and the local people. And we challenged the students of de Paul Secondary School to a basketball game! What did you personally do during the Chalice mission? Virgil (a retired accountant) was assigned to the dental and eye care team. With 2 other Canadian volunteers and Tanzanian counterparts, he completed basic dental assessments and taught proper dental and eye care. Shirley (a registered social worker) completed social work assessments alongside local social workers to determine a child's eligibility for Chalice sponsorship. Shirley also provided 3 days of professional development for the local social workers. What did you get from this experience? It is not easy to say who receives more during a long hard day of work at the mission clinic. Who is comforting whom? Who is giving more joy? We have learned our relationships are very reciprocal. We may give our time, energy, money and talents, but what we receive in return is immeasurable. We saw and experienced things typical tourists do not have the chance to see and do. We received many expressions of gratitude; hugs, smiles, songs, dances and prayers. We felt extremely honoured to have visited the homes of many Chalice sponsored children. We have a greater sense of self awareness. We have deepened our faith. We learned these people have the basic ingredients of a happy fulfilling life. They have an inner peace and acceptance. Mother Teresa once said, “We call them poor, but they are rich in love.” How did you get started with these missionary trips, and why do you continue? Attending the 10 week Alpha Program in 2007 was a turning point for us. We learned we were contented, complacent Catholics. Alpha created in us a need to learn and experience more. A pilgrimage to the Holy Land in 2010 was also a life changing experience. While walking in the footsteps of Jesus, his teachings echoed everywhere. We knew we needed to reach out more to others in need; to follow the path /teachings of Jesus. And, although we have volunteered locally all our lives we had a strong need to expand our horizons. We had been sponsoring children in third world countries since 1999 through Chalice so while vacationing in Nova Scotia we spontaneously paid a visit to their head office. It was there we discovered partnerships and mission trips. We could have started smaller, closer to home, perhaps for 1 week in duration. But instead, we took a leap of faith, placed our trust in God and travelled half way around the world to serve the poorest of the poor for 3 weeks! It is fair to say, we have fallen in love with the people of East Africa. We never imagined just 5 short years ago, we would speak so freely about our knowledge and experiences with these beautiful people. Is this our calling? As John Ortberg, a pastor of a Presbyterian Church in California and author of If You Want to Walk on Water, You've Got to Get Out of the Boat once said, “A calling is something you discover, not something you choose.” We believe Chalice mission work is our calling! How can an interested supporter join a future trip? Check out the Chalice website www.chalice.ca. In 2014 there are trips planned to India, Ghana, Latin America and Tanzania. Contact Missions Coordinator Joanne Albrecht @ 1-800-776-6855 ext. 805 or @ joannealbrecht@chalice.ca. Ask lots of questions. Get all the info you need. Are there special skills required or desired? Each mission trip is specifically defined. Certainly if it is a medical mission, then specific professionals need to be recruited i.e. doctors and nurses. However, anyone can learn how to assist in many other areas i.e. completing nursing assessments, teaching proper hand hygiene, working a registration table, compiling statistics etc. Martin Luther King Jr. once said, “...anybody can serve ..... You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love.” -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Mission work is not for everyone. What Virgil and Shirley are doing might seem like an impossible dream to some. To others it might seem like a nightmare of anxiety and discomfort. However, we don’t have to leave home to do missionary work. God calls us to serve wherever we find ourselves. All we need is Gratitude and Faith. We need Gratitude to recognise that everything we have - our possessions, our abilities, our friends, everything, is a gift to us from God. Once we acknowledge our blessedness, we kindle a desire to pass some of those blessings to others. That is the simplest form of missionary work. And it can be incredibly impactful. A smile, a few dollars, a word of encouragement, a joyful attitude; the smallest acts of service can have profound effects when coupled with God’s grace. Therein lays the second part of mission work, Faith. Whatever we do, we trust that God directs our plans and actions. Our strength might fail or our actions go astray, but God’s strength and reach is unlimited. With God to guide and support us we can do mission work with far reaching consequences, even if it starts at our front door. |
Chalice Testimonial
By Lisa Noronha
“For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required…” (Luke 12:48)
This quotation from St. Luke’s gospel is one of the many things that motivated me initially to adopt a child from the Chalice organization. Plus the knowledge that Chalice has consistently scored the highest-rating in MoneySense Magazine’s charity listing under the International Aid and Development category.
I was born in Kenya, and even in my childhood there, I knew I was very blessed to be raised in a middle class family – unlike so many children I encountered on a daily basis. But it wasn’t until decades after immigrating to Canada, that I truly began to understand just how blessed I was. As an adult I began to read, see and hear more stories of the incredible challenges the people in third world countries face. As a result, I felt compelled to give back, not only to the country of my birth, but most particularly to women and children.
I heard about Chalice and “adopted” Viola. Soon I was delighted to receive letters from her that went into personal detail about her life in Kenya. I read about her best friend and the things they enjoyed doing together: what she liked and disliked about school: even about some of the seminars she had attended. Since then Viola and I have exchanged letters, photographs and a few small gifts which has helped each of us gain a better understanding of life in our respective countries.
For the little that I have done or given to Chalice and to Viola, I have gained so much more in return. While I initially saw adopting a Chalice child as my duty because of all the blessings I’d been given – I now know, rather than a duty, it is one more blessing.
This quotation from St. Luke’s gospel is one of the many things that motivated me initially to adopt a child from the Chalice organization. Plus the knowledge that Chalice has consistently scored the highest-rating in MoneySense Magazine’s charity listing under the International Aid and Development category.
I was born in Kenya, and even in my childhood there, I knew I was very blessed to be raised in a middle class family – unlike so many children I encountered on a daily basis. But it wasn’t until decades after immigrating to Canada, that I truly began to understand just how blessed I was. As an adult I began to read, see and hear more stories of the incredible challenges the people in third world countries face. As a result, I felt compelled to give back, not only to the country of my birth, but most particularly to women and children.
I heard about Chalice and “adopted” Viola. Soon I was delighted to receive letters from her that went into personal detail about her life in Kenya. I read about her best friend and the things they enjoyed doing together: what she liked and disliked about school: even about some of the seminars she had attended. Since then Viola and I have exchanged letters, photographs and a few small gifts which has helped each of us gain a better understanding of life in our respective countries.
For the little that I have done or given to Chalice and to Viola, I have gained so much more in return. While I initially saw adopting a Chalice child as my duty because of all the blessings I’d been given – I now know, rather than a duty, it is one more blessing.
Viola, and Viola's mother, opening a gift package that Lisa sent.