During the months of January and February, nine friars - formandi and formators - from the Province of St. Francis Solano, Argentina, spent some time with the Mundurukú people in the Brazilian Amazon, a people and territory where the Order is present as the custody of St. Benedict of the Amazon.
The following are some echoes taken from www.franciscanos.org.ar
It is very difficult to put into words what we have experienced, even more so when what we want to narrate and share is as unique as in this case. It is however worth trying, keeping in mind that, like God, the Amazon will always be more than what we have been able to capture, and much more than what we can say in these lines.
We are not writing to describe or report. This is not a chronicle. We write as an antidote against oblivion; we write to be able to return (symbolically and literally); we write to honour and so that, through the experience we were granted, others may awake to the desire to "go and see" the hidden treasure of the Mundurukânia, that is worthy of selling all our goods, as in the parable of the Kingdom.
The pedagogy of the territory forces us to enter it little by little. The verb "entering" could faithfully represent what we lived upon arriving. Because that is just it: you do not just arrive, you are getting there.
It took us two days of sailing to travel from the last town that can be reached by land to the village of Mission San Francisco, where the brothers live. Two days in the river and the jungle. A time spent in water, clean, calm, or choppy and inhabited, and lush vegetation, abundant, imposing, lively and generous. This endless landscape gradually revealed villages in its midst. On the shores of the river there were houses, a chapel, boys and girls playing, women doing the wash or men returning from fishing. What would soon become our daily routine appeared before our eyes as a picture we saw from our boat.
This pace, these postcards, this time made us feel gratitude, surprise, and respect. After months of picturing it in our minds, we became aware of where and among whom we were. Our desire and state of mind was one of removing our sandals since we were stepping on sacred ground.
Our everyday life focused on simplicity and alternation. These were weeks of intense and joyful fraternal sharing. At the Mission, we usually had Eucharist and housework in the mornings; in the afternoons we played soccer with the young people and visited homes. We tried to participate to the life of the brothers and the community while experiencing the reality. We cut grass, cooked, made repairs to the house, went fishing, learned crafts and the language, sang, played with the children, visited the sick and families and tasted new foods. Every 5 or 6 days, we went out in small fraternities of 2 or 3 to visit other small and remote villages.
It was striking to hear the story of the encounter between the Mundurukú people and the first friars who arrived years ago. The natives of that land associate the flute to their divinity. The first friars did not know it, but in fact played the flute. Thus, the natives gradually accepted them. Under different circumstances, these bold brothers could have died shortly after disembarking, following a six-month journey, and more than a century later we would have never told this story.
After this first encounter, the bond between the Mundurukú and the "pain" (as they call us) became an alliance. They still do not welcome the "white people", but they have embraced us as their own. Yes, they reject anyone who is not Mundurukú, but made us part of their people, of their culture, their hierarchy and history. And that is how they made us feel, from day one until the last. They welcomed us thanks to the presence of others throughout their history; they welcomed us because we were friars; they welcomed us without knowing us, because they trust us, and because of the significance that our presence had and has for them. They embrace us like this. And we, as an Order... How do we embrace vocationally and charismatically that an Indigenous and Amazonian people, with all they represent, make us part of their identity? We believe that our presence there was, is and must continue being a treasure to care and protect; a treasure worthy of selling comfort, security, structures, and calculations.
Brothers of the Province of St. Francis Solano
