Give us Lord our daily bread
Fr. Donelan and CBC missionaries working on the grounds of the Mother of Mercy Girls' School.
A few days after I arrived back from Kenya a friend wanted to review a talk he was going to on one line from the Our Father prayer, “Give us this day our daily bread.” As he reviewed his talking points with me and different stories and examples he wished to use, I could only recall small memories, vignettes if you will, of my time in Kenya. The familiar words, “Give us this day our daily bread” summarized so well many things that I had seen and experienced in Kenya those eight days at Mother of Mercy School. I imagined that many people in Kenya must be uttering these very words, (Give us this dayour daily bread), in regards to their physical sustenance, their hopes, their dreams and their search for a better life.
I remember well driving down impoverished roads in the countryside near Lare and moving so slow at times that people who were walking could keep pace with us. This unfortunate circumstance on these dirt roads gave us a window of opportunity to take in the reality that so many poor Kenyans were living in. I was particularly struck by the number of houses made of wood posts and some sort of primitive clay or mud composite that seem to show little resiliency. I could only imagine the poor protection these houses could provide against the heavy rains and the cool damp mornings that we experienced while in Kenya. On these same roads there were plenty of children running down the street, still gleefully ignorant of life’s challenges, while their parents walked along a bit more somber perhaps worrying about mundane tasks, family problems, and providing the daily bread.One man in particular that we encountered on these trips stood out in my mind for he was laying on the side of the road one evening on our way back from town. This middle aged man was curled in a ball and a few people in our group asked if shouldn’t stop and help him? Our driver assured us he would be ok, he was probably just drunk! It appeared he was right. This drunken man however stuck in my mind for he too was poor and hungry, but hungry not just for bread but something more it seemed, something deeper. He and so many like him seemed to be hungering for love, for deeper meaning in their life, an easier way of life, or perhaps just to be noticed. This man hungered for many things it seems, and while he was searching in the wrong places, he too seemed to be seeking his daily bread.
Then there is the fond memory of friendly child voices constantly greeting us with, “Hello…. bubble gum?” as we would trek back after working to the guest house where we were staying. These children were neighbors to the school and well aware that we were not Kenyans. They were also aware that we were quite generous with candies and other goodies that we had brought, in fact they were aware to a fault. Soon this routine would grow old, we got tired of being bubble gum dispensers and we also ran out of candy to give away. While the request grew old I could not fault these kids as I reflected that a small lollipop or a piece of gum was a small delight in their simple mundane lives and they too were only seeking their daily bread.
For us too, the missionaries from America, there was some soul searching to be done during this trip. We all had arrived in Kenya with fanciful illusions in our mind of how things would be and adventures we would have. However, our dreams of adventure did not include things like days without running water or hot showers, or the boredom and monotony that come from doing manual labor and simple tasks like painting and digging trenches. Somehow the romantic ideas that we had about serving the poor were now not quite so idealistic and we were somewhat shocked that ordinary everyday life can be so… shall we say, ordinary. Encountering the reality of life without the luxuries and comforts we enjoy in U. S. can be sobering and even bitter at times. The soul can become disillusioned and lukewarm and if one is not careful you can easily lose your missionary spirit. One evening around the middle of the trip I tried to address this difficulty in our evening mass. During the homily I spoke about how life can be very plain and ordinary and even in very ordinary circumstances we should try to find Jesus. I think that night when we received communion many of us discovered a certain peace about our mission trip. It can be a tough lesson sometimes to see how little control we have of things and how much better life is when we let Jesus have control and sustain us with his daily bread.
by Fr. Donelan, CBC Missionary to Kenya, July 2018