Dolores Copan

Hello family and friends!
Jarrett here- I'm really excited to fly home tomorrow, but I'm also going to miss a lot of people here. Just wanted to post an update on my time in Dolores Copan the last two weeks before I leave.
Dolores is quite a bit bigger than Plan Grande, however it's still quite small. I'd say it's about the size of Rockwell City. It's definitely more of a city. It was also quite a bit different of an experience for me. When I got there I hit the ground running. The first night I had a special meeting with the church council to plan out my time there, and also my spanish was much better than in Plan Grande. For some reason though they got the impression I was a missionary... so throughout my time there they kept calling me out and expecting me to do missionary/priestly things. The next day I visited sick people around town. Think it's hard to find the right words to say when you're visiting the sick in America? Try it in Spanish! It was humbling, but I think the important thing was that I was there with them. I also visited base communities (kind of like family bible study groups) in Dolores, but I was asked more and more to contribute or to give my take on the readings. It was definitely humbling, but also empowering. That week they also asked me to help with their liturgy of the Word on Thursday night. I agreed to read the Gospel, but then 5 minutes before they asked if I would give the reflection (homily). I declined, but when I returned the next week I was determined to do so. I spent the better part of a day writing it out, and was able to give it that Thursday night. They must have liked it because they asked afterwards if I would give the reflection for the youth group that Saturday! I went ahead and did that as well, but it was a little more difficult because it was interactive and so I couldn't just write it out. It went well though and we had a lot of fun.
The majority of my time however in Dolores was just spent with different families. I got to know/spend time with five different families and it was just great to share with them.
I had several encounters with fundamentalist/evangelical protestants in Dolores(they preach on the buses down here). By the way, sorry if there are any fundamentalist protestants reading this, but I found myself quite angry with the protestant churches down here. In short, they are spreading a gospel much shallower and narrower than what the people get from the Catholic church - for example, while the Catholic church is strengthening and encouraging the people to live their poverty in faith and to grow in charity, the fundamentalists here are preaching the "confess with your lips that Jesus Christ is your personal lord and savior and you will be saved" doctrine. Nevermind that we already do that every time we celebrate liturgy together, it's not a bad thing to do, but it's an inch deep and it's entirely individualistic. The part that really gets me though is that people join because the fundamentalists convince them that Catholics are going to hell because they "worship" statues. It's tough because a lot of the people here are simple enough to really be unsettled by such arguments. Being an almost totally Catholic area, the proselytizing here is just sowing dissension among people that need to being standing together in their poverty. I really wish I could convey the beauty of the Catholic church communities here too, who are really united and working together to build up their communities across the board, not just spiritually. Again, sorry to any protestants reading this - I do have a lot more respect for protestants in America, but here I really get upset. Just had to get that off my chest.
One last thing, visiting the sick was powerful. Two of the people I visited several times, and got the chance to see one of them recover - a 20 yr old girl who was bedridden and had one eye patched the first time I visited. The other was a 10 yr old boy who's legs aren't working for some reason. He has to have a cast on his whole lower body until september and can't get out of bed. He also experiences excruciating pain in his toes on occasion. As I was with him I was really powerless to do anything about his pain, but it just made his day when I visited.
Well, have to go, sorry for the rushed post. See you all in a couple days!

Jarrett