Mawazo Juu ya Jumapili ya Matawi – Thoughts on Palm Sunday

Today I celebrated Palm Sunday with about 1500 people at Kanisa Katoliki la Mt Maria Kwa Njenga – St Mary's Catholic Church in the slum called Kwa Njenga, literally Njenga's Place.
This week is the holiest of weeks for Christians remembering events of 2000 years ago that draw us closer to God and to believing that love is stronger than all else.

There were many memorable moments but to share a few:

• Seeing why Fr John called us last week to get our shoe sizes – in case we needed gum boots to reach the church.
• Bumping along the narrow pathway with people making way for Fr John's truck which reminded him why he always walks to the church. With the visitors today, he forgot.
• The faces of so many - both interested and disinterested in the visitors, the shy and bold greetings of little ones.
• Brushing ants off a little child who had leaned against a tree they inhabited.
• Victor, a 4^th grader, offering me the cross he had woven out of palm branches.
• Watching Cindy & John interact with the children, knowing they will soon be using their gifts with young people as teachers.
• Amassing with the others to begin the procession.
• Straining to hear the reader outside over the neighboring church.
• Processing slowly, trying to make out the words being sung.
• Seeing a 4-year old walking with us, holding her palm high above her head but hidden within the adults around her.
• Hymns and incense filling the air.
• Catching enough Swahili to know where the story was of Christ's conviction and death.
• Singing the one word I knew – pokea – receive. We offer our lives, our hope, our prayers and ask God to receive. Christ offering us peace and us singing that we receive it as well.
• Making all those people laugh with a few words of Swahili and wishing I could give them more than a smile and a blessing.
• Talking with parishioners afterward with the words I could find.
• The children. Adorable, mischievous, timid, smiling, crying, watching, listening for the mzungu to speak their language. All of them.
• Chicken and cilantro as only I had thought Minh, a co-missioner I trained with in New York, could make.
• The cook at the parish apologizing for what, I don't know (I'm starting to speak Kenyan English), but with “Hakuna stima, hakuna maji.” – There is no electricity, there is no water.
• Father John praying for those who inspire us by their perseverance.

The blessing of the palms before the procession.

The cross leading the procession ... about to begin.

Processing to the church

The choir in the center in purple robes led the singing.

Some of the children. Victor, the one who made the cross I carried, is on the left waving.
The girl with the red sleeve & her sister on her back sat next to Cindy & me in Mass.
The church is the metal building behind us.

There's a bit of time in the midst of prayer in another language, whether it is sung or read, to try to fill in the blanks, the unintelligible or the unknown words. Today I was reflecting on one word I heard many, many times: pokea – receive. So much of what I have experienced here is about receiving. Being received as a visitor, a foreigner, a student, and one who wants to be with people to learn from them. Receiving a new kind of education – language, culture, different ways of being and communicating. Knowing I have so much more to learn, but also being grateful for what I've received.

Wish you all a very holy week!