We feed, rehabilitate and love Argentina's forgotten

Moladh go deo le Dia!

Praised be Jesús Christ

Dear readers,

Tempus fugit quam celerime. Time flies and I find it difficult to believe that I am now writing another Christmas letter.

It has been an eventful year;  we’ve had times of pain and great sorrow, but also much joy and gladness. Life is a series of deaths and resurrections, but we know for certain that in some mysterious way pain and suffering will finally be overcome. The story of Christmas reassures us of that.

This year four of our residents died- Julio Mario, Jorge, Marcelo and Anna.  All of them had suffered a lot and we know they are now in a much better place, but it is always hard to lose the people you love.

Julio’s  Story

Let me tell you about Julio Mario because his story illustrates the sadness and the joy of journeying with our residents. Julio came from a large and very poor family. We found him in the local hospital back in November 2000 after he had suffered a serious diving accident. He had misjudged the depth of the water in a river where he was diving and his head struck a rock. His swimming companions thought he was playing a joke and threw themselves on top of him. As a result, he was left quadriplegic at the age of 20.

Julio was brought to a state-run hospital in Posadas, the capital of Misiones province and about 100 kilometers from Oberá where we work. He was neglected in hospital, as can happen so often in State-run hospitals in Argentina. (It is a common sight to see seriously ill and dying people abandoned and left to fend for themselves as best they can. These places are a far cry from Irish hospitals where standards of cleanliness and care continue to be high, despite the problems with the Irish health service.)

Julio spent two years in this hospital where his health went from bad to worse. His parents begged us to help them so we brought him to Hogar Santa Teresita (St Teresa’s Home).

I remember his first evening with us. His body was covered with sores, some of which were ulcerous. We had to position him  in a special way so that he could rest, and he had to lie facing the floor for many months. But our assistants put cushions on the floor in order to face him while chatting to him. That loving gesture was typical, and still is, of their great love, compassion and hard work for our residents.

Julio improved by leaps and bounds. He underwent two more operations in order to transfer skin tissue from one part of his body to another. The sores healed and closed during his 3 years with us.

Thanks to a generous donor he enjoyed using an automatic wheelchair. He got a diploma as an amateur radio operator.  He became well-known and popular and a most loved person in the city of Oberá. He attended the telephones and received people visiting Hogar Santa Teresita. He was overjoyed with the news that the President of Ireland, Mrs. Mary McAleese, was to visit our homes on 20^th March last. He had even begun visiting and inviting our neighbors to come and meet her.

Sadly, Julio never got to meet the President. He died suddenly on 11 February, six weeks before she was due to arrive.

We were numb with the shock. All our residents and assistants cried profusely and we experienced sensations of void and emptiness; everything seemed changed. We found it very difficult to continue. For me personally it was a terrible blow. Each year before I left to fund-raise in Ireland and in the UK, Julio Mario would see me off at Posadas airport, shedding many tears and reminding me not to stay away too long.

In the days that followed Julio Mario’s burial we reflected upon and evaluated his short life. He loved the Home of St. Teresa. He lived for it. He was most happy when we rescued some poor abandoned and disabled person who was brought to live in the home.  When we were approached to help ten-year old Eliseo, Julio did not rest day or night until the child arrived safely . (You will recall Mario Eliseo from previous letters. He continues to improve, thank God and is now much more sturdy than when he first arrived.)

Julio’s death brought the words of poet Mark Van Doren, about the sudden death of Fr. Thomas Merton to my mind:

“The best bottle of the best wine

tipped over all at once and spilled,

catch it, save it but nobody could,

nothing left but the fragrance…”

Despite our sadness we knew that the best way to honour Julio’s memory would be to continue our mission and reach out and help as many people as possible. Indeed, soon after his death, Julio seemed to send us his successor.

Marcelo’s  Story

We met 27 year-old Marcelo, undernourished, dehydrated and dying in subhuman conditions. Like Julio, his body was riddled with deep ulcerated bedsores and again he had to lie facing the floor, and we arranged a special position for him. But Marcelo came to us too late. Although we managed to ease his suffering somewhat during his short time with us, he was called to a better world within 9 weeks. He had the consolation, however, of a visit from his mother for the first time in about 15 years. Such a long separation was due to the fact that his parents had separated and Marcelo had stayed with his father. Now, in the last week of his life, his mother was visiting a relative living locally and thank God both were moved to come and see Marcelo.

Jorge and Anna’s Story

Our other two residents who died this year were Jorge and Anna. Jorge came from a very tough family background and was severely disabled from birth. He became ill suddenly in late July, as did Miguel, another of our residents about whom I have written to you before. While Miguel recovered and is now doing quite well, Jorge died after a day or so in hospital.

Anna was an elderly lady who had been abandoned by her family. Even in her last hours, they were reluctant to come and see her. But our assistant Fernando accompanied her with love and prayers as she prepared for the next world.

President  McAleese

I hope you will forgive me for talking so much about the sadness we felt this year. But thank God we had reason to celebrate too. On Saturday 20^th March –six weeks after Julio left us- President Mary McAleese visited our homes, accompanied by her husband Martin and a entourage of 30 people.

The weather had been rainy and stormy just a few days before the President arrived. But everything changed in time for the President’s visit   She arrived on a magnificent sunny day with clear blue skies. We felt that Julio, the man who had looked forward so much to her visit, had sent us a farewell gift.

President McAleese is a great communicator and engaged wonderfully with the staff and residents of our homes. She paid warm tributes to our staff, saying it was very apparent to her that the residents of our Homes in Oberá and Guaraní “have found a place of happiness, where they are loved and where they feel valued as human beings, regaining their human dignity”.

The President’s visit led to some much needed publicity in Ireland for the work of the homes and it was a welcome acknowledgement of the help given to us by countless Irish people over the years.

Ariel’s Story

Her visit was a life-changing event for one child in particular.  Recently we had got to know Ariel Marquez (10), who lives near us and whose family is extremely poor. Not long ago, Ariel lost an eye as a result of a neglected infection. But thanks to the goodwill generated by the President’s visit, we were able to “buttonhole” the local authorities on his behalf.  Ariel got proper medical treatment and now has an orthopedic eye which has given him a new lease of life. Not only that, but our Homes, at the request of our Irish and UK volunteers, have “adopted” in a certain sense Ariel, his parents and five brothers and sisters. We are helping them acquire a house and teaching them how to prepare a garden. Ariel’s father was, up to now, a wandering labourer-  one of the most exploited and abused classes of people in South America. These men work long unsocial hours far away many times from their families, for barely subsistence wages and are prone to terrible accidents without any insurance or other help. Helping this family regain their dignity is a new challenge for us.

2004 Volunteers

I should perhaps mention to those of you getting a Christmas letter for the first time this year that our two homes, St. Teresita’s in Oberá and Our Lady of Lujan in nearby Guaraní, are centres of care and centres of prayer. They are a refuge for abandoned people with learning and physical difficulties and abandoned senior citizens primarily. They act as half-way houses for people who have no other place to recuperate from illness. They are a hospice where some people spend their last days in an environment of care and comfort.  For some abandoned children, they are a temporary Home until we can organize suitable adoptive parents.

These homes are formally linked with the Cheshire International Organization which has been a great support over the years. Financially, however, we are almost completely dependant on donations from Ireland and Britain.

This year we had nine volunteers (Irish and English) who came to help us at various stages during the year. Please join with me in thanking God for Niamh, Triona, Edmund, Aileen, Denis, Rónán, Ciara, Páraic, John, the two Toms, Breege and Josephine. They lightened the burden of life during a very difficult year. I think it is a particular characteristic of Irish and UK volunteers that they don’t confine themselves to working in their own countries but reach out to the ends of the earth. This is now more important than ever because of the terrible economic and social divide between the first world and the extremely underdeveloped countries.  We are a global human family and most of that family is living in great pools of poverty and hopelessness.

The volunteers who joined us this year gave generously of their time, their talents and their energies, not for any profit but out of love for God and respect for some of the world’s most forgotten people. Voluntary work here is not easy on account of the language, the mud roads and the sheer inhuman poverty. But we were very fortunate that our visitors had the strengths and qualities needed to adapt.

They helped in various ways- feeding, teaching, playing, talking, laughing, comforting, nursing, providing professional therapeutic care etc, according to their skills. They taught English, Music and Art to some of our young people in transition in a most enjoyable and disciplined manner.

New Website

Thank to one of our volunteers, Denis Murphy, Hogar Santa Teresa and Hogar Virgen de Lujan had an informal web presence. If you connect to the new website you can find information about the homes,  read about the residents and find out about the various ways you can help our efforts.    Many thanks to Denis for his great assistance in operating the previous informal website.  Today, thanks to James Kennedy and Patricia Groves, both volunteers,  we now have our very own independent website www.rescueargentina.com  which came into being October, 2009

Please join with me in thanking God  that three of my brothers, Divine Word Missionaries from Poland, celebrated  fifty years of religious life in our Congregation. Fathers Jorge, Eugenio and Branislao entered our Congregation when Poland was suffering the terrible consequences of been crucified between two thieves. The Nazi terror subsided only to make way for the Communist persecution. My brothers experienced different kinds of harassment in their formation making it most difficult for them to continue. But thank God they persevered.

It’s time to close now. Once again, I want to thank you for helping us. Please be assured that you are remembered in our daily prayer.

As the magi came bearing gifts,

may we, this Christmas, gift one another

with the gold of charity,

the myrrh of kindness

and the incense of prayer.

Guím beannachtaí na Nollag agus na Nollag agus Áthbhliain faoi mhaise ort agus ar do mhuintir.

Le míle buíochas arís,

Padre Liam Hayes, S.V.D.