The Jesus Prayer

I've been doing a lot of hiking lately and clearing trails of blowdowns as I go. Small to medium-sized tree? Move it with your burly arms or axe the dickens out of it. Massive tree? Get out the chainsaw. Yeah, the one you've been carrying on your back (along with everything else) for the last 10 miles. Yesterday we were on a trail flooded in knee deep water for 5 hours, clearing blowdown after blowdown, and noting jobs too big for our three person crew. It was exhausting and so deeply gratifying and fun.

It feels inexpressably good to be on the trail in a beautiful place, doing the outward work of restoration even as it occurs inside. Sometimes my head gets filled up with anger, sadness, bitterness, or confusion about the more difficult events of the past 8 months of my life. I've been trying to recast those things in a more redemptive light as I ponder them, but the hurt is often too big for me to handle alone - so I've turned to Jesus in the form of an old, old prayer that people have been saying for centuries, beginning with the Desert Fathers of the fifth century.

My variation goes simply: "Lord Jesus Christ, having mercy on me." That's it. Over and over. And that kind of says it all. Jesus is Lord and the Christ. I need his mercy not only to heal my sin, but also to bring out the best in me. This goes along well with another prayer I've been saying most mornings: "Lord, help me remember the grace that you have given to me so that I can give it to others."

I feel the peace and purpose of God, and it is finally, increasingly well with my soul.

Prayerful Planting

My job this week, along with the rest of the conservation staff, has been to plant trees in burn areas from the big Ponil Complex Fire of 2002. Restoration and regeneration. Perfect!

I've thought about how St. Francis used to preach to the birds, and have so felt inspired to pray for each little tree (we're planting 5,000 - each with an unfortunately low chance of survival) to make it through the dry months and hold on for rain. I'm so blessed to have the chance to so intimately involve my body and soul in the physical regeneration of the land - an absurdly beautiful and direct metaphor for the work that God is doing in me right now. Hallelujah.

Arrived

Hey all. I have made it to Philmont. On the way I stayed with a friend in Fort Collins, CO and played an open mic, had dinner and good times with other friends in Denver, pushed on through the night to arrive here early this morning. Planted trees in a burn zone this morning, relaxed this afternoon.

The sky is big, the mountains are inviting, the air is fresh, the sage is fragrant. This feels a lot like home, but I know it now as preparation for a return to my truest home on Earth, Kansas City. Looking forward to quieted time in the wilderness, more celebration, and heart/spirit restoration. Love you each and all.

Address

Hey there. So for the next month, I'l be receiving letters at:

David Burchfield
Philmont Scout Ranch
Staff: Conservation
47 Caballo Rd.
Cimarron, NM 87714

email and phone are still in the game, but not all the time. hooray!

Ready, set...

Today I feel the thrill of expectation mostly buried underneath the mundanity of this windowless office day. Still, it bears noting that tomorrow is my last day at the office of IJM Guatemala, or IJM in general, for that matter. In a few short days I´ll be on the road West to Philmont, CO Springs, Denver, Telluride, then back East to Nashville, Smokies, Conway, Osceola, then back home to KC by July 4th. It´s going to be an exciting two or so months followed by the great journey of refinding a home in KC. I know these next steps in my life´s journey are at least as important as the last, and I´m ready for whatever challenges, triumphs, griefs, and joys may be coming my way.

Meanwhile I feel like I´m out of pictures, witty quips, and condensed stories or bits of wisdom. I´m sure I´ll be back on here to keep you all updated on where I am, who I´m rubbin shoulders with, and what foot-stompin tunes I'm playing. For now, though, I need to focus on packing, then unpacking, then repacking, then driving, then unpacking, etc....... You get the idea.

Further support for a life as a barely solvent (or not at all), nomadic musician

"I know nothing that is greater than the Appassionata [by Beethoven]; I'd like to listen to it every day. It is marvelous superhuman music. I always think with pride—perhaps it is naive of me—what marvelous things human beings can do!

But I can’t listen to music too often. It affects your nerves, makes you want to say stupid nice things, and stroke the heads of people who could create such beauty while living in this vile hell. And now you must not stroke anyone's head: you might get your hand bitten off. You have to strike them on the head, without any mercy, although our ideal is not to use force against anyone.

Hm, hm, our duty is infernally hard."

-Lenin

And that is why we should play music, make beauty, and do some things that make no sense economically or politically, but because they make sense to the soul.

I like mate

This is not posed.

Despedidas Pt. 1

Despedidas means something like "farewells" but we also use it to describe the going away parties and get togethers that occur in the last weeks and days of someone´s (mine) days in town. That´s right. I´m heading home soon. Here´s the beginnings of my despedidas:

Last Friday we three interns looked pretty funny next to each other, so we took this picture. Kim we labeled as chic New Yorker (surprise!), Kelly labeled me as straight out of "Dr. Quinn Medecine Woman" (which I took as a compliment of course), and Kelly is wearing a traditional Q´eqchi´ traje.
There was a mariachi band at Tacontento, one of my favorite restaurants. I pretty much want to be these guys.

A lake named Calderas below the summit of Pacaya. Volcan Pacaya is sort of a tourism must-do here in Guate, and I hadn´t yet done it. We finally got er´done on Saturday.

Walking up towards the lava through the descending fog.

We brought up that stick to roast marshmallows over the lava.

We thought it looked like "Lost" on Pacaya. This picture barely captures that. Also, Kim is a balla.

We´re risky.

Somedays there´s a river of lava on the mountain. Somedays there´s none. This particular day, there was a couple pockets. It was much more impressive than you may think.

This is pretty much how it looked when we were walking down the mountain. There´s two Brits in this picture. See em´?

Every Sunday after morning church I go to lunch with these ladies. I call it my "Over 50 Club." It´s a long story as to how I got included, but it´s been one of the best, most surprising friend groups I´ve ever had.

A bit of wisdom

Here´s this poem by Rilke that´s been up at my desk since January. Don´t know if I´ve posted it already, but it´s worth a repost de todas maneras.

I am, you anxious one.

Don´t you sense me, ready to break
into being at your touch?
My murmurings surround you like shadowy wings.
Can´t you see me standing before you
Cloaked in stillness?
Hasn´t my longing ripened in you from the beginning
as fruit ripens on a branch?

I am the dream you are dreaming
When you want to awaken, I am that wanting:
I grow strong in the beauty you behold.
And with the silence of stars I enfold
your cities made by time.

---
Also, I´ve had this verse (my favorite) up:

"Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus." Philippians 3:12-14
---
Finally, while in Antigua this past Saturday, Kim and I ate at La Fonda de la Calle Real. They´ve got great Guatemalan food and dichos, or sayings, painted all over the place. This one must have been put up for me at just the right moment. Definitely a lesson learned over the last several months:

A Good Sunday

So yesterday I went climbing with a friend from the climbing gym and a bunch of his friends (now also mine). We went to Lago Amatitlan, about 20 minutes from the city, and had a great time. The rock was beautiful, the view was big, the sun was very hot.

After climbing, we headed back to the city by way of a gas station for some celebratory beers, where we were accosted by a stereotypical drunk Latin American man who thought it´d be a great idea if we all shared a second round, and would be cool if we bought? We turned him down and headed back to the city, where I hit church just on time for the very end! I would´ve liked to make it for the whole thing, but at least I got to hang out with some of the crew (see below) for dinner. I´m feeling the end coming quickly and want to make the most of things while I can.


The view.
Julio, Leoni, and Garilla hiding in the shade. German and Luna in the foreground.

On Corrosión, 5.10d. Gorgeous rock. Hoping to go back and send it clean soon.

See? Gorgeous.

Leoni.

Making hardcore faces to accompany bold moves.

We got right up under the airtram lines. People kept shouting "Escaladores! Buena suerte!" I waved at them from the top of a 60 foot rapel. It was funny to me that people would pay to be transported by box to the same height and view I had reached by hiking and climbing for free. What a deal!

Julio and Johnny, at least I think that´s his name. He kept telling me to call him "La Gorda," which is the feminine version of "fatty." Wha?

Johnny on a 5.11c of unknown name.

The afterchurch party. Lucia, Ana Lu, Anaco, Jillian, and some obnoxious guy.

My buddy Rodrigo.

Semana Santa

So I´ve been known to leave my camera at home on more than one occasion. When it comes down to being there, and proving that I was physically present, I tend to prefer the former. Forgetfulness, really, though, is the reason that I don´t have any pictures of my time up north in Coban visiting the caves of San Marcos, Semuc Champey, Lanquin Cave, or the sweet people from Wyoming I got to hang out with. But really, it was a good time. I went up there with some friends from church, and we took it really easy. A lot of napping that first day, which fit in well with my sick-recovery plan (still workin on beating this bronchitis). The next day we checked out San Marcos, then the next I went to Semuc by myself. I ended up befriending a girl from the Czech Republic who promised to email me photos from Semuc, which I´ll post here if she ever does.

On the evening bus back from Semuc and Lanquin Cave, I ended up really hitting it off with a couple girls who had met at the University of Wyoming. I ended up getting off the bus with them and having dinner with them and their friends. It´s hard to explain, but I sort of felt like we were all immediately old friends, and that was a great feeling. The next day I bussed back by myself to the city and a few hours later headed to my host family´s pineapple farm. It was hot, rustic, and beautiful. It all ended me up back in Guate for a few days alone, which I mostly spent recording demos, reading, and watching movies. Here´s some pictures and a video.


The chicken coops behind, the chickens (and roosters), hanging out on a rail ahead. Why do people keep roosters over the longterm? I´m serious. All they're good for is crowing all night, fertilizing eggs, and eating.

A few of the folks from next door who watch the house for Victor Sr. and Candy, and then Jo and Victor.

They grow pineapple. We didn´t eat any of it on this particular day though.

Victor Sr., Joanna, Victor. None of their hats fit my big American head.

Amor means love.

Better Than Expected Friday

With a quite varied and exciting Holy Week coming to a skidding crawl due to bronchitis and skin rash, I'm holed up here back home in Boca del Monte for the rest of the week off. Sort of a bummer, but a good opportunity to get a lot of demos recorded/movies watched/books read/friends called.

Today I was recording until about five, then decided I oughta head out to the pharmacy for some meds and to the corner store for a pirated DVD. When I rounded the corner out of my dead-end street, I came upon a giant alfombra, which is basically a huge pattern of flowers, vegetables, and colored sawdust to depict bible scenes or religious iconography. They work on these things all day long, right up until the procession passes by carrying incredibly heavy and ornate floats depicting scenes from the passion, and then the alfombras all destroyed in an instant. The temporaryness of all of our works.

There were people gathered in mobs to see the procession go by. Incense was burning. Vendors were selling street food. The brass band was playing dirges. People were dressed in robes, etc. Smells, sights, sounds, even motion. Most people walked right along with the procession, making the whole ritual a bodily, as well as spiritual, experience. I was blessed to experience such a holistic replaying of the drama of the cross on this Good Friday. I was anticipating a quiet night and another conspicuously unLenten-feeling Lenten night. Admittedly, this Lent doesn't seem to have the communal feeling or focused discipline of Lents past, but it will no doubt be a memorable one.

Travels with Mom and Dad

That´s right. My mom and dad came down to Guatemala last week and we had ourselves an adventure. We headed straight to Antigua when they arrived and spent a few days there enjoying the colonial city in all its goodness: Good food, ruins, a few museums, ziplining over a coffee plantation, Lenten festivities. From there we headed to Santiago on Lake Atitlan (called "the most beautiful lake in the world" by Aldous Huxley and a whole lot of other people) for a few days. We enjoyed the weather, played cards, rode horses up to a ridge and overlooked the whole lake, my dad and I sunk a kayak in the middle of the lake and got rescued (not that we weren´t gonna make it safe to land on our own, but it would have taken a long time) by some local fishermen in their clapboard boats. Adventuresome, simple, good, luxurious. We spent our last night in the capital at dinner with my host family. Both moms cried about the awesomeness of the other. It was a good time. Very nice to have some time off and see parts I hadn´t been to before. Here are the pictures from my camera. My dad will send some more soon.

Lent is a big deal in Latin America. Here is a vegetable design on the floor of the main cathedral in Antigua. They do stuff like this the whole 40 days.

All vegetable.

They carry these massive floats all through town. They´re so heavy that they have to trade carriers every block. They sway back and forth and side to side when stand in one place because it´s too darn heavy to stand still with it. See video below.

The guard.

The biggest float. I think I counted something like over 60 carriers.

My dear friends Dave and Jessi Lueck happened to be in the country as leaders on a youth group missions trip the same week! We met up on their last day in Antigua for lunch. It was inexpressably relieving to see these people.


That was last week. This week I´m working, and then next week... more vacation! Yep, pretty much the whole continent will be on vacation next week for Holy Week. I plan to go visit some caves/waterfalls with some friends from Church, go to my host family´s pineapple farm for a couple days, then go to the beach for a couple days with some other friends. THEN... the home stretch. But let´s not start counting just yet. More photos and updates to come soon.

An update and the latest thoughts on lawyering, etc.

Lots going on lately. The pace here is picking up in life-giving ways. A climbing gym finally opened a week ago. It´s right on the way home and has given me back one of my favorite activities. Hanging out with people from church more, and finding more to do in the evenings in general. I’ve recently gotten into Lost, and am eating any negative words I might’ve said about it before. Season 1 is just full of genius. Maybe I’ll get frustrated later on, but for now it’s a great escape when I need one.


Pretty much every day I sit at my desk and am overcome by the feeling that I really ought to be playing music somewhere. Hopefully I can make this a reality sometime down the road. Big recent contributors to this feeling include: Chris Thile/Punch Brothers, Yonder Mountain String Band, Ray Lamontagne, Crooked Still, Justin Townes Earle, The Hot Club of Cowtown, Old Crow Medicine Show, and Son Volt – all pulsing through my earbuds. For now I’m going it alone and working on music as much as possible with my ample (though lately shrinking, thanks to the mentioned above) free time. I’m working through some flatpicking DVD’s by Steve Kaufman, two (or three?) time National Flatpicking Contest winner at Winfield (i.e. heaven on Earth, more specifically, in Kansas (where else would you look?)). I’ve been writing as much as I can, and am now working on charts for that fantasy band that I’ll surely form soon after returning to the states. I expect to make some demos in the next month too. Maybe I’ll put something up here for you all when they’re done.


I’ve been struggling with work lately. As in any internship, it has taken a long time to find my niche and figure out how I can contribute here. As I’ve finally found it (and indeed I have, I’m busily contributing in real ways these days), I’ve also determined that as much as I believe in the ends of this work, the means are mostly frustrating/boring/unchallenging/uncreative to me. It’s good to learn more about what I do and don’t like to do. And I guess that’s sort of part of the intern’s lot: do the tedious stuff that needs to get done but that no one wants/has the time to do. I’m okay with that for now, but looking forward to moving on to greener pastures. I now know how important it is to me that I work in smaller organizations that allow me to fill a more dynamic, creative, interactive role. Getting outside would be pretty great too. This is all good revelation. A big reason for coming here was to figure out if I wanted to be a lawyer, and now I know. If anything, this has been confirmed for me by some recent reading and interesting insights in Luke.

The National Revised Standard Version has Luke 11:46-52 like this (underlines added):


“46And he said, ‘Woe also to you lawyers! For you load people with burdens hard to bear, and you yourselves do not lift a finger to ease them. 47Woe to you! For you build the tombs of the prophets whom your ancestors killed. 48So you are witnesses and approve of the deeds of your ancestors; for they killed them, and you build their tombs. 49Therefore also the Wisdom of God said, “I will send them prophets and apostles, some of whom they will kill and persecute”, 50so that this generation may be charged with the blood of all the prophets shed since the foundation of the world, 51from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who perished between the altar and the sanctuary. Yes, I tell you, it will be charged against this generation. 52Woe to you lawyers! For you have taken away the key of knowledge; you did not enter yourselves, and you hindered those who were entering.’”


Now, I don’t by any means intend to indict all lawyers, but Jesus is being pretty direct here, especially in that last verse. “Taken away the key of knowledge”? That sort of characterizes the legal system, doesn’t it? We have lawyers because the system is so complicated, senseless, and unnavigable without them. This often works to the disadvantage of the poor, who rarely have the means to challenge this system in a dignified, successful way. This is also why it’s important that organizations like IJM exist. We have lawyers committed to working against the tilt of this system to seek justice for the poor. They work within the system to overthrow its evil (wording too strong for you? go back to Luke) disposition.


I understand the necessity of organizations like IJM, but at least for me, in the ways that this and the following verses have spoken to me, I think Jesus is calling me to live according to another way of life – to see the Kingdom come and not engage with corrupt systems. Here’s Luke 12:11-12 and 57-59 (underlines added).


11When they bring you before the synagogues, the rulers, and the authorities, do not worry about how* you are to defend yourselves or what you are to say; 12for the Holy Spirit will teach you at that very hour what you ought to say.’


57 ‘And why do you not judge for yourselves what is right? 58Thus, when you go with your accuser before a magistrate, on the way make an effort to settle the case,* or you may be dragged before the judge, and the judge hand you over to the officer, and the officer throw you in prison. 59I tell you, you will never get out until you have paid the very last penny.’


In 11-12, Jesus tells us to hold to God´s justice, and in 58, he tells us to avoid litigation.
Granted, of course, all of these verse could be applied to the support of IJM’s work, and I don’t mean to take that away. I have, however, felt a personal call to read these verses as I’ve stated. It’s hard to explain, but I’ve even felt this here at the mission. As I see the organizational inefficiencies and the usual bureaucracy that are bound to occur in any giant corporation or organization, I’ve felt a lot of resistance to simply towing the line.

I guess I’ve always been pretty independent. In some ways, that can be a bad thing – like if it were to keep me from being effective here at the mission, or in school, or in the church community, or whatever. I’m aware of the necessity of curbing the independent spirit for the sake of community. But in other ways, I’m seeing how this is a good characteristic that God has put in me for a reason. I need to listen to that tug toward independence, and make myself as free as possible from participating in corrupt systems. For a long time I thought that maybe I could be that advocate to stand in the gap and navigate the corruption and senselessness of the legal system for the typically underrepresented. As much as I believe that that should be done, I’m now learning that instead of playing by the system's rules for the sake of the Gospel, I personally am called to, as much as possible, live by a new system according to the Gospel for the sake of the system. Similar ends, but very different means - a path, I think, that fits me much better.

Not that I’ll never work for another organization, or fight corruption directly, or live in community, etc. But rather, I want to form community, work with organizations, and live a life that models the Gospel’s alternative reality and avoids as much as possible engaging in the world’s broken systems. There are signs that this is possible, though my own version is yet mostly unformed. Here are some clues and outlines: Catholic Worker houses, Jacob’s Well, local food and goods, home gardens, veggie oil engine conversion, solar power, clandestine urban chickens and bees, forming relationships across socio-economic divides, front porch folk music. I’m just reaching for little pieces of this alternative vision. I know that´s vague, but I have a feeling many of you get what I´m saying. I look forward to working for this kind of life with all of you.

El Salvador

Hey folks. We´ve begun the crazy month of travel that my March promises to be. It all started off in February, actually. I left Guatemala on the 26th and took a four hour bus ride to San Salvador, El Salvador where my dear old friend Jennifer picked me up. Jennifer and another friend, Sally, have been living and working in El Papaturro and Suchitoto, El Salvador since October. They flew through Guatemala and I got to see them at the beginning of their time in Latin America. They are finishing up their time, and I wanted to see what they´d been up to living up there in the campo (countryside).

It turns out they´ve been having a really richly meaningful and growing time, and I got to experience a bit of that over the best five days I´ve had down thisaway. Jennifer and Sally work for a U.S.-based organization named Sister Cities in conjunction with a Salvadoran organization named CRIPDES. Both organizations were formed as a response to the Civil War fought between 1980 and 1992.

The war was basically waged by the urban-based elite and wealthy against the leftist ideas (and guerilla army) taking root among campesinos (country people, almost exclusively wretchedly poor) as communism took hold in Cuba. Of course, the campesinos had a reason to latch onto leftist ideas. My first night in the country I sat with an older man named Don Pablo who had lived through the whole war. He said that before the war, campesinos lived in tiny pueblos (villages) without water, electricity, or schools. They worked on plantations owned by the wealthy, paid just enough to survive and given rancid food and water during their short lunch breaks in the middle of 12-16 hour workdays.

Don Pablo said that as word of communism spread, they asked the soldiers who had begun coming to the communities what it was. It was, of course, characterized as an evil system that would really serve no one´s interests. Fidel Castro was described to them (literally, like not as a joke) as a devil with horns and a tail who ate children. After a while, one of the villagers talked to someone from the budding leftist party and learned the truth. That the party would be concerned with redistribution of wealth and just wages and conditions for the poor won this particular villager over. Don Pablo recounted how horribly mutilated this man´s body was found after voting for the leftist candidate in a regional election. This signaled the downward slide into gross human rights abuses (rape, mutilation, property destruction, mass murder, etc.) by the government and military, much of which, by the way, was financed by our very own U.S. government. We were so afraid of the spread of communism that we financed (i.e. $1 million a day) the terrorization and slaughter of peasants young and old (over 70,000 dead in El Salvador. About 200,000 dead in Guatemala in a similar situation).

Many of the campesinos fled to Honduras as refugees while the guerrilla army fought it out with government forces. When the war finally ended and the revolutionary army was recognized as a legitimate party, the refugees came back to their villages and reorganized them in just ways according to a land redistribution set up by the new government. The day we visited Don Pablo in Cinquera, El Salvador was that community’s Repopulation Day, and they were celebrating with joy and remembering what happened lest it happen again.

And it very well could. The day I was in Cinquera, the mayor´s record was being examined per charges (proved that evening) that he had stolen $30,000 from the community’s treasury. This particular mayor was from the right-wing Arena party, elected in the leftist stronghold of Cinquera through some devilish maneuvering similar to gerrymandering. What if he had gotten away with it? Further oppression of the poor. Obviously, the struggle is far from over, which is why it´s so important that organizations like CRIPDES and Sister Cities remain funded and active. It is equally important that we pay attention to the role that our own government is playing throughout the world. I didn´t know this story until I walked into it. What else don´t I know about the past? Or the present? I was so blessed to learn this story directly from Don Pablo and many others who lived it. Here are some pictures from my visit.


Martyrs from the Civil War.
"I don´t believe in Arena." I saw this sticker in more than a few places.

Names of victims from Cinquera.

LtoR: Jennifer, Sara (staff from Sister Cities), Sally, sitting at Don Pablo´s house. It´s filled with revolution posters and artifacts from the war.

People dancing like they mean it at the repopulation party.

Jennifer on a Suchitoto morning.

"Communities in Resistance against Neoliberal Politics"

One day we hiked up to this farm to meet one of Jennifer and Sally´s friend´s boyfriend. He was super nice and the view rocked way more than this picture.

The town of La Bermuda also had their repopulation party while I was there. To celebrate, they had a big horse race/competition. See the video below.

After the horse race, we went to this woman´s house for lunch. She works for CRIPDES and served as a nurse for the guerrilla army during the war. She told us her whole story.

We also celebrated Angelita´s (left) birthday by making empanadas over her woodburning girl in her backyard. They were soooooo delicious.

Jennifer frying.

Angelita´s backyard.

I tried to get involved, but I´m a boy, which means they mostly wouldn´t let me. Angelita´s daughter "helping" me fry.

Folding them up.