In Response to Anonymous

anonymous' comment to my caption to my pic of the church brought to mind an incident i had to endure during my time in honduras (where the pic happened to be taken). my overall goal while in country was to supervise the construction of a potable water system for 6 rural communities that were currently using water from an unclean river. one of the objectives in reaching that goal is to learn and adjust the attitude of the locals toward the commitments needed on their behalf to get the system up and running. a water system doesnt create itself afterall. there was one meeting i had early on with a village leader that was beyond eye opening. due to the religious turf battles that go on throughout all of central and most of south america between the catholic and protestant churches, friction, disrespect and animosity between neighboring communities has fostered an environment that makes such multi-communal endeavors quite complicated. much moreso than they ever should be. as i was speaking with the village leader he told me that his community was not interested in becoming a member of the the water system 'team'. keep in mind that all expenses were paid for by the honduran government, all supplies were provided. all the community had to do was supply the labor and meet certain relatively easy prerequisites. after it was built each household that had a spicket off the system would pay the equivalent of $1 a month to provide for upkeep and maintenance. i was baffled by why his community would choose to continue drinking out of fertilizer intoxicated river rather than contribute to this sweet deal. as it turns out all of the communities on this system had been catholic for many years. however, just as the catholic church had seen opportunity hundreds of years ago to expand its base by 'converting' other faiths, various other christian sects now realized that same opportunity. with the promise of salvation, mental and financial prosperity that catholics had also promised for decades yet upon which had failed to deliver, many communities were changing faiths. if this wasnt sad enough, a key technique that every church used in trying to expand its territory was to ridicule and put down the other communities and their faiths. such actions by strangers who make their way into a community and who are perceived as worldly and wise and spiritually 'with it' tend to have a lasting impression on the locals who usually have the equivalent of a 2nd grade education and have rarely traveled more than 50 miles in any direction. this one particular community (unlike the others on the system) a few years back had been managed to be converted to evangelical. a result of that conversion was a great divide in all aspects between the neighbors. hence, this particular community refused to be a part of a water system that would result in better health for all, simply because they no longer wanted to have anything to do with the unsaved souls of the other communities who did not convert. to drink from the same water line as them or to work beside them on its construction would be 'wrong' according to the local church leaders (who managed to come around for the collection plates about once a month and had quite little to do with actual community involvement). though it was quite a task i was eventually able to supersede their spiritual leader's advice by explaining that even if they didnt join they would still be drinking from the same water source as the other communities (the same river but tapped higher up the mountain). however, we did have to figure out work schedules so that the converted community did not have to work the same hours as the others. what is truly tragic about this is that each community is closely blood related to all the others. due to conversions and turf battles entire families do not talk to relatives who live less than a few miles away. so when i post a comment such as the one above, it is not disrespectful to the 'guy' it is aimed at those who pretend to speak on his behalf. and there ARE far too many mcdonalds in the world. note: to see anonymous' comment, click on the asteris under the Vaya Con Dios post above.