Tag Archives: St. Camillus Center

Concert at the Convent

The concert at the convent has definitely been my favorite concert of them all. It was inside, it was a small group, and Will did not need to strain to be heard.

The sisters loved it. Many of them got up, stuck their backsides out and danced. Even those in wheelchairs clapped and swayed from their seats. It was so much fun.

Again, we experienced Besotho hospitality, with delicious bread, fruit, coffee and tea. In gratitude, the sisters presented Sam and Will with small traditional painted Besotho hats. And then one of the sisters ran back to her room and came back with a Traditional full size Besotho hat for me. We left with our hearts and spirits filled with joy. What an afternoon!

Walk to Rethabile’s Family Home

Today, Rethabile took us on a walk to her village. I love walking and interacting with the people we meet. Most of the time we are in the van, whizzing by and getting only glimpses of life in Mohales Hoek. But today, we walked. We passed a beautiful rondeval and the owner let us go inside. Rondavels are the traditional round Besotho homes with thatch roofs. They absorb heat in the winter and stay cool in the summer. They are much more energy efficient then the more modern cinder block homes. I find their earthiness and simplicity to be unbelievably beautiful.

Color Crayons and Paper

After our walk to town we returned to the center. All the children were back from school and for a short time we just checked each other out, not quite sure how to interact. Then I went to the car and brought out paper and crayons and a few markers for the older children. Suddenly, the energy shifted. Benches were moved to serve as tables, I gave out paper and crayons and every single child began to color. As they finished their masterpiece each child came to me and put it in my hands. I had not asked them to turn them into me, this is something they just did. As they handed me their pictures I oohed and awed and commented on the beauty of their artwork . At the end of our art time, every single crayon and marker was accounted for with very few broken pieced. I found that amazing: 20 children, 15 of whom are under age 6 and all the pieces were returned.

As I reviewed their drawings, I was moved by the messages I found written on their artwork. Slindle wrote: “Thank you for being part of my life.” I felt like these messages were their whisperings to us, the words they wanted to say but were too shy. These drawings became a bridge between us, allowing us to connect our hearts in a gentle way.

A Walk to Town

After the concert at the elementary school, we returned to the St. Camillus Center. The 4 older students took us on an excursion in to town. On our mile walk, we saw a funeral procession, and got a great sense of our surroundings. Kids in their school uniforms waved as we went by. Everyone we passed looked at us. It was obvious that we were a novelty. Very few white people live in or visit Lesotho. In fact, white people are not allowed to own any land in this country. So far the only other white person we have seen is Stephanie, the Peace Corp volunteer.

In town, we stopped at the grocery store. Will, in his generosity bought each of the children a soda. Then we went to the Viacom shop to try to get Niko and Sam set up with Sim Cards.

While we waited for them, I looked at Besotho blankets. This is the souvenir that we each want to purchase to take home as a reminder of our time in Lesotho. The blankets are THE traditional item of the Besotho People. They are made of wool and they have beautiful designs and colors that represent the various regions of Lesotho. It is very common to see the Besotho wearing their blankets, especially the shepherds.

After NIko and Sam were finished we went to a small restaurant for lunch. The building was made out of tin and had about 4 tables and a dirt floor. We had a delicious meal of papa, which is made of corn meal and is the staple food of Lesotho, chicken which was cooked outside on the barbecue and morejo , which are greens. The portions were so large. I could not finish mine. Sam seemed to inhale his and he cannot wait to go back to go back for more.

Concert at the Elementary School

Our first full day in Mohales Hoek started with Will and Sam giving a concert to over 450 elementary students. This was a huge act of courage for these two young men. Sam and Will have been in a rock band for the last 2 years and have performed quite a bit with the band. Before leaving for Lesotho, the 2 of them had only performed alone 2 times. Once before they were in the band, they performed 2 songs at an open mike at our local frozen yogurt shop to a handful of people. Two weeks before we left for Lesotho they performed at a fundraiser we organized to raise money for the St. Camillus Center. They learned from that performance that it is much more difficult and vulnerable to perform as a duo then it is to perform with the band. Now today they stood on a stage in front of all these beautiful Basotho children and performed without any back up or any kind of sound system.

Of course the children and faculty responded to them with kindness and jumped into the novelty of the moment. It isn’t often that they have 2 white boys from the United States show up to do a concert for them. Just the fact that together Sam and Will had access to and played not only a drum, but a guitar and a ukulele was a novelty in a culture where even the most basic school supplies are not accessible.

The St. Camillus Center

This afternoon we arrived at the St. Camillus Center. The center was just completed and the children moved in last December. The building and property are beautiful. There is much more land then I expected. Besides the building that is home to 20 children, there is also a structure that can hold 200 chickens and a large portion of land that is being prepared to grow vegetables that will not only feed the children, but also provide income for the center.

The building of the Center was funded by the Lesotho Connection (TLC). TLC was started in Tacoma, WA about 7 years ago when Theresa Power-Druitus was working on her doctorate in Lesotho, Theresa had heard about the work of Sister Julianna and she set out to meet her. As she shared her experiences with her husband, Joe, back in Tacoma and their dear friend Fr. Bill Bischel, SJ (better known as Bix), Joe and Bix set out to establish The Lesotho Connection to support the work of Sr. Julianna.

I was on the original board of TLC for 3 years. The building project seemed like such a huge undertaking. In those early years, the progress towards the building seemed so slow. Now I see that there was a foundation being built. As the board has changed and grown it has drawn to it many people who have a lived experience of Lesotho and their passion for this place has fueled its growth. I am moved to see this dream fulfilled and I feel a spark of passion for this place being fanned within me.

Gifts Multiplied

In the months leading up to our trip, I found myself purging our house of things we did not need. If it was in very good shape, and I believed it could be useful in Lesotho, it went into our Lesotho pile. If not, it was given to St. Vincent De Paul.

I spent one afternoon purging, pens, pencils and markers. How did we ever accumulate so many? I swear they must multiply like rabbits when we are not looking! I filled 2 – 1 gallon size zip lock bags with our excess, and put them in our Lesotho pile. I told my friend Eileen about this and her eyes lit up. She works in the school system and has a closet of school supplies she has accumulated from every good sale she has ever come across. She promised to go through her closet and bring me some things. She brought me over 4 grocery size bags filled to the top with school supplies.

When I wrote to Stephanie, the Peace Corp volunteer at the St. Camillus Center and told her we had school supplies to bring, she responded, “The children will be so excited. These items are not available in Lesotho, and if even if they were, most Besotho children would not be able to afford them.” Not even available? Pencils, pens, glue, lined paper are not even available?!!!

I separated the supplies into 2 piles, one for the St. Camillus Center and one for Mary’s school. When we arrived at Mary’s home and were preparing for our visit to her school, I took out the supplies we had to share. Mary quickly made 4 piles: a pile for her school, one for Sammy”s preschool, one for her Church and one for another school. She wanted to be sure that as many children and teachers benefited from this gift as possible. When I brought out our gifts for the St. Camillus Center, the same thing happened. Rathabile created 3 piles: one for the Center, one for the preschool and one for the elementary school.

I was amazed. Instead of hoarding these supplies that were so hard to come by in their country, they each wanted to share them so that many children would benefit. I stood in awe, humbled by their generosity.

Sr. Julianna

Sr. Julianna is the soul of the St. Camillus Center. For many years, she has been the person that the community turns to, to care for children who have nobody else. Regularly, the police show up at her doorstep with a child in their hands asking her to take them in. Before this new center opened, Sr. Julianna had a much smaller building where all 20 children slept on the floor of one small room. And still she said yes and welcomed each child.

Sister Julianna not only cares for these children, but many others in the community whose parent’s have died or whose parent’s are sick or do not have work and therefore they do not have money for their children’s school fees or food. Stephanie, the Peace Corp volunteer exclaimed, “Every time I think I have a handle on all the different things Sr. Julianna does, I learn of something else that I had no idea that she was doing.

Sr. Julianna lives by faith. She believes that God will provide and she is consistently proven right. When no one else has any idea where the money or resources will come from, Sr. Julianna is grounded in trust and somehow the all that they need arrives. As we work with her, I am moved by Sr. Julianna’s gentle way. I watch as she gets out of her truck at the center and see the children run to her, to be held, to be patted, to be loved. Niko, got it right when he said, “She is a saint. You know that feeling you get when you are in the presence of the Holy? That is the feeling I get around her.”

A Message from St. Camillus

Last Sunday, I woke up early motivated to get my self packed for our trip. I gently woke up Niko and said, “Let’s get up and get packed before we go to Church.” As we worked on our personal packing, I was overwhelmed with the amount of donations we still had yet to pack. I would not know how much space we would have available for these donations until we each had our personal items packed. Anxiety began to fill me as I looked at the great feat ahead of me.
As we headed off to Church, Niko was almost all packed and I was well on my way, but the stress of all those donations, still loomed large in my consciousness.
It was Fr. Jim’s last Mass at St. Leo’s. He had been assigned to a new parish. I was grateful to be there to send him off and to infuse myself with the energy of this community as we prepared for our journey to southern Africa in just 6 more days.
To my surprise and delight Fr. Jim’s sermon was about St. Camillus. I have been a Catholic for over 55 years and never before have a heard a talk, a sermon or a story about St. Camillus. I knew nothing about him. And it is the name of the orphanage that we are going to in Lesotho. Coincidence? I think not.
St. Camillus is the patron saint of the sick and of those who care for the sick. He was a friend of St. Ignatius. Fr. Jim shared the story of St. Camillus being overwhelmed by his calling to create an order of religious dedicated for caring for the sick. There was so much that needed to be done. He had no idea how he could possibly do it. In the midst of his overwhelm, he heard the voice of God say, “Why do you worry, don’t you know that this is my plan.”
As Fr. Jim repeated God’s words. “Why do you worry, don’t you know that this is my plan?” I heard God speaking to me. I felt my breath deepen and my shoulders relax. I have known from the beginning that this trip was a calling from God. I knew it was God’s plan, God’s trip, directed by Spirit. My job was to say, “Yes.”, listen to the voice of my spirit, respond to it’s urging and all would be well. All of those donations would get to Lesotho. All I needed to do was trust.

The Seed of a Dream is Planted

Thula Thula Game Reserve, South Africa

Kim, Mary, Sam and Niko 2010

St. Julianna, Founder of the St. Camillus Center

In 2004, I went to South Africa to study the AIDs pandemic with a delegation of 16 women from the United States. We spent 2 of our 16 days in South Africa on a game reserve. Upon returning my then 6 year old, Sam, who is an animal enthusiast, made me promise that I would not go back to Africa without him. I made that promise and set my intention to go back to South Africa with Sam and Niko one day and to spend time on at a game reserve.

In 2009, a young woman, Mary, came to Tacoma from Lesotho Africa to work in L’Arche for a year. We were her host family. Mary walked into our home and took up permanent residence in our hearts. She returned to Lesotho in the summer of 2010. By the summer of 2011, Mary had married her longtime boyfriend, Paul and she had given birth to their son. They named their son after her brother… Sammy. Our family’s dream to visit her and to meet Paul and our grandson, Sammy became more than a dream. It became a clear intention.

I served on the board of The Lesotho Connection for 3 years from 2006-2009. Lesotho is a small mountainous country surrounded by South Africa. One out of four children, in Lesotho, is orphaned by AIDs. A Holy Names, Besotho, nun named Sr. Julianna has devoted her life to caring for the orphaned children in Mohales Hoek, Lesotho. One of the goals of the Lesotho Connection has been to raise the funds needed to build a home for the orphaned and vulnerable children in Sr. Julianna’s Care. This dream was fulfilled and the children moved into their new home, the St. Camillus Center, in December of 2014. I wanted to see this center, which had been just a seedling of a dream when I was on the board and I wanted to spend time with Sr. Julianna and these beautiful children.

This dream of returning to Southern Africa, which started in 2004, continued to grow in me as our love for Mary developed, the St. Camillus Center was built and Sam grew into a young man. The dream expanded to include Sam’s best friend, Will, in this adventure. Sam and Will have been friends since birth. Their friendship has been nurtured by their deep loves of animals, music and community.

In the autumn of 2014, I felt a voice inside me say “The time is now! You must begin to prepare and plan to go to Southern Africa this upcoming summer.” It would be the summer before Sam’s junior year of high school and Will’s senior year. If we waited any longer, the opportunity for all of us to go together could be lost. And so we began to plan.

Body Sacred

Celebrating the Sacred In Ourselves, In Our Relationships and In Our World.