"Food comes first, then morals."

-Bertolt Brecht

I have a conversation with (I will call him) Rodrigo. It was another conversation in a line of conversations I have had with him over the past year. He is clean today, hair washed, hands not blackened by the trash he sorts through on a regular basis. He is all smiles, hopeful. Of course, some of this is that he is coaxing a mango out of me from the corner store. They have them today, a rare treat! I agree to buy one. No one should be denied the plenitudes a ripe mango provides. Plus, now, with a mango in hand, hunger abated, we can talk more open about the nitty gritty. My basic question is, "Why?" Why are you in this situation, Rodrigo? Why are you digging through garbage for your needs? Why are you fighting haplessly over bricks you've collected from the rubble of torn down buildings? These questions would not make sense to many in this neighborhood. They are mental exercises of the lower classes (bear in mind, we are one rung down from them right now, meandering through the chaos of poverty: a class of people who do not think about the future in anyway at all because there is no promise of it, it's just one hour at a time; if you happen upon some money, it'd be better to spend it this hour!). But Rodrigo is different. once upon a time he was a teacher. Computer Science his trade. He is educated. He speaks three languages, English is one of them (convenient for my conversation with him at present). Once upon a time, Rodrigo, "went down." This I have heard many times from America's homeless. What happened to you?" And the response, "I don't know, man, I just went down."

Why Rodrigo, are you here?
I lost everything, my job, my girl, my family, everything.
How?
It's gone now. I am trying to get it back, but it's gone.
Yeah, but how did you lose it, and how are you gonna get it back?
It's gone.
The regret is a prison.

I want to talk about Jesus, but he's not torn into his mango yet, and I know he will not hear anything until he does. In the meantime, still with hunger in his stomach and heart, Rodrigo has a plan. Today, he is trying to get it all back, that's why he's clean, showered, why he's used his money on a piesa room instead of a biscuit of crack. Tomorrow, who knows? I am banking on dirty hands, runny eyes, and a return to begging. This judgment is a mentality I have obtained by living here. I am not proud of it, and I do not know what to do with it, so I introduce my confusion to compassion with the purchase of a mango. It's a good place to start. Yeah, maybe he's wasting his money on crack and his bones on fighting with the locals over meaningless possessions others have thrown out, but if I do not offer food first, I cannot get beyond it. Plus, God feeds me, I believe, and if I do believe it, why would I judge others for not feeding themselves before understanding why it is they do not?

I am still letting go. God be praised. I would not do so without the mangos He's buying me. 

Back at it...

Sara and I step into our barrio again after 3 weeks of being gone. The smell of exhaust and human excrement we have grown so accustomed to over the last year are somehow new. The sounds of people tinkering on the brink of laughter and misery, the not so quiet quietness of impoverished buildings that look abandoned but house hundreds of people inside, we take it all in. We walk the broken sidewalks uneven beneath our feet, lob ourselves over the potholes, to our house, Torre Fuerte, on the edge of it all, a place we have grown to love. We are back.

This Christmas season we were blessed to spend in Germany. Mike Turner very graciously sent us to Berlin to lead a seminar on Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Life Together. He is involved in a project there among his friends (and ours). Mike Edwards (yes, different Mike, but arguably equally as cool) is leading it up, overseeing four interns: Gracie Reynolds, Caroline Harlow, Luke Lanzoni and Kevin Underwood. The project is an internship with community on the brain, for young people to live in Berlin and be a presence of church among a culture that is post-church. "Brilliant," I think, in a world where church is so misunderstood, where the question, "Are you a Christian?" begs another, "What kind of Christian are you?" which brings up an endless debate on the merits of being Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican, Baptist, Southern Baptist, American Baptist, Primitive Baptist, First Pres, Second Pres, Pres USA, Pres of America, Methodist, Pentecostal, Church of God, Church of Christ, Church of the Good Samaritan, etc. etc. So yes, in a run-on-sentence kind of religious climate, it's kind of nice to have conversations that start at zero, like, "What do you think about Jesus?" and not so much, "What is your theological stance on women in the pulpit?"

There and back again, we gotta say Germany is a beautiful place. Berlin is fantastically clean (perhaps this is why we smelled the poop again so pointedly upon our return). The history is rich, full of vibrant upheaval and rebuilding. We are thankful for Mike Edwards who led us around town in the frigid temperatures and pointed out small details like the bricks in the middle of the street that signified where the Berlin wall used to be, and the apartment complex parking lot covering the bunker of Hitler's last stand with nothing to show but a very small sign at the edge of it, a telling reminder of what Germany wants to not remember. They have more than moved on from that. The art in the city, for one, is top notch, from the graffiti to the architecture. Berliners are known for their symbolism, such as, the site of the Nazi book burning is marked with a window in a path, and upon looking down into it you find a library with one bookshelf in it, always lit and always empty. And such as, on the parliament building, you find a glass dome with a circular staircase that ascends over the assembly, a symbol to the people that the decisions being made down below are from them. The list goes on.

For our fourth anniversary, Sara and I venture out into the German countryside. Here, we are reminded of how much we love the natural world in comparison to the man-made. Although we will always be suckers for the kind of culture and art one only finds in cities (e.g. we spent 3 hours, wide-eyed with Luke and Kevin in a modern art exhibit in Berlin, complete with Warhol pieces), the allure of the growing, natural creation creates a no-contest situation with what we recreate with it. Such as, when Sara and I visit a castle in the south on our anniversary, it began to snow, and within two hours the ground was covered with a listless white blanket. The mysterious allure is enough to whisk you away to all kinds of fairy tales and stories of past, present and future. Yes, what we make is incomparable to what God has made. The origin of art itself.  

All in all, Sara and I say thanks, Germany. Your land is rich and wonderful. Your people are frank, forthright and honest (an awesome quality, having grown up in the southeast). And your Schnitzel is good.

And thanks to Mike Turner for making it possible, to Mike Edwards, for the work you do, to Luke, for traveling with a pair of nervous, pre-birth newbie parents, and to Kevin, Gracie and Caroline, for being the best makeshift Christmas family one could ask for. Choos for now.

Christmas Eve in Berlin

Bells in the distance. Time approaching midnight. Sara and I are eating a German cake version of the illustrious American jelly doughnut. We are spending this Eve of Christmas with three Germans and four Americans. We just got done with the cheese fondue and Schnaaps shots for dropping our bread in the pot. Laughter has bridged our way to the couches, and we now sit and eat the jelly as we read our way through the Luke 2 story of Jesus, pausing to sing traditional German hymns, some of the tunes familiar, some of them not. When we finish, we layer our bodies and step into the cold night. Bells, again, in the distance, this time we focus on them. They are calling the surrounding houses, people form their couches, to come. We walk. It is dark. Our breath rises in the dim light from post lamp corners and living rooms spilling out. We walk in silence. The bells grow louder. We turn the corner into a large courtyard, and there she sits, the second largest Lutheran church in Germany. Her walls tower over the landscape, twin columns rising beyond the light. The bells inside swing and ring. They chime in powerful full and half tones. Inside, the people are gathered and quiet, still, waiting. Sara and I comment, in slight, in silence, What a wild and wonderful, yet familiar Christmas. Gathered halfway across the world, celebrating the coming of Christ with Germans and whoever else is presented tonight in this fancy dome with perfect acoustics, the use of which are tested in between Scripture and singing by a solo saxophone. He walks through the space carefully. He plays a responsive piece, a call and an echo. It seems to me in meditation that God is calling peace into the world, and the people offer back in thanksgiving. Single notes ring. Silence. Broken by a cacophony of short staccatos and again, silence. It is worshipful. How did we end up here?  This Christmas, so far from home, yet, in some way, home. The service ends, and we the people file out into the cold night again. A brass band is playing German tunes, and the people are dancing. The light is dimmer. The night is colder, and we walk into it.

Christ comes. He came. And is coming again, to collect his family. A reminder this season, to be ready. 

Merry Christmas.

Merry Christmas 

to all of you from the 

Torre Fuerte Family!

What to do When You're Throwing Up on a Bus in Bogota...

Bear in mind, this advice is reserved for those displaying a number of qualities:

1. You are susceptible to viruses

2. You still get on a bus when there's about a 50/50 chance of you (for sure) soiling it

3. You have bad aim while expectorating on bumpy back roads

4. You speak very little Spanish, and can't remember the word for "barf bag" when you need it most

Somehow, I received, downloaded (I don't know what you call it), contracted that little pest of all minor sicknesses...the 12 hour puke out, Chuck fest, Bile-be-Gone Throw Down. It just takes a spark to get a fire going. A spark landed on my kerosene infused logs around 3 o'clock. Prior to that hour, I was enjoying the small vista lake town of Guatavita, Colombia with Sara and some of our friends. Guatavita is a cool little village stuck in time. A dilapidated clock tower keeps the population ticking. Little artisan markets line the streets without being too cumbersome. The locals are content, nice, laid back, and boy can they cook! We had a wonderful HUGE lunch in an old outdoor pavilion, replete with brick ovens and short little ladies cooking in pots on hot stones. Had I foretold my doom at the time of lunch, I would not have eaten that whole fish (yes, head still on). I certainly would not have tried the eyeballs and sucked out all that wet forehead meat. Edwin, my Colombian friend was doing it. And when in Colombia...right? I was satisfied, though. Quite. 

My belly started it's S.O.S. message about two hours afterwards. "Why is this in here?!" it seemed to say. 

"Guys...uh..." I said.

This was the big announcement of my revelation. But you can relate to it, right? When you get this thing, you never really want to admit that you're getting it. And so, before you finish your prognostication, you just say...

"Nah, it'll be fine," and go on your merry way, just keeping back from the group a bit to quietly burp and sputtertoot.

An hour later (while I was keeping back from the group a bit to quietly burp and sputter toot), I began the sweating and the glancing. Looking for distractions. Clouds, sunset, little kids in the market place laughing, old lady crocheting another quilt, anything. This can't be happening to me. Not now.

Fifty-five minutes later, I was sitting on the bus, praying to God it wasn't. But it was. Edwin came with me. The others took the one car we had (without enough space for all of us) to ride back in. Sara offered to come with me for comfort, but she's pregnant, and this little bull of a sickness is something a pregnant woman should never get. It took about forty-five minutes for the first round to surface. Poor Edwin. I just looked at him with that sad, whimpering smirk that says, "Yeah, I'm about to..."

It was a lot--corn, rice, tomato water, fish head wet meat and eyes. I had one bag on me, and I promptly filled it. Some spilled on my jacket and hands, down on my leg. I got some looks and quintessential coughs that really are objecting sneezes. As quiet as I could, I opened the window and threw the bag into the road grass. Laid my head back. Good for now. All Quiet on the Southern Front. Feeling okay. But to my luck, the bus we were in was about 28 years old with wobbly axles. And to my more luck, the road got bumpier. And to my more luck's luck, a man got on the bus around minute 35 after explosion number one with a bag, a bag full of chorizo. Chorizo, or street sausage, is perhaps the lowest grade sausage produced on planet earth (I am sure there is some world out there of Pygmalion Cannibals that has it beat, but we haven't discovered it yet). The defining characteristic of chorizo is its undeniable smell, a smell which nose-rapes all olfactory systems within a block radius...OUTDOORS. I believe it is against the law to bring it into confined spaces without a professional license. I was flabbergasted to the point of humorizing at this point, but aghast beyond as Chorizo man chose the seat directly across the aisle from us. You gotta be kidding me. Edwin just started laughing. I watched in horror as the man reached into his oil translucent paper bag and pulled out a fleshy chunk of pig/rat/foot/hoove meat and shoved it into his mouth. I could hear it pop and squirt. It is at this point in the story where I pride myself by saying that I made it without puking again. And good thing, too, because I forgot (in that moment) the word for "barf bag," and I didn't (in that moment) remember the phrase, "Stop the bus, I'm gonna go!" I made it, barely. Not two steps off the bus at the drop point did I greet the sidewalk with a personal "Puke Happens" Marquis, but I made it.  

Sure I had to hold my head out of the window doing eighty on a bumpy back road. Sure it started to rain as I did so. Sure I looked like a wet-triever half breed in the back of a SilverDollar. But I didn't throw up on that bus again, I tell you. Yes, I will always look back on the event fondly as the night I bested the Chorizo.

Dark Streets

Our big iron door shuts loudly. I am on the streets now. Gotta watch over my shoulder. I take two blocks and turn into the construction, a ripped up one way. I walk through a curtained alley and duck down another street. Two homeless men are burning a fire to cook something. Many of the homeless here are different from the ones back home. They are stolen men. It seems they have been taken away and their skin filled with vacancy. On up the way, two more dig through spilled garbage. As I pass, they do not look up. They never look up. The sun is going down. The fire is flickering off the buildings. Soon, the streets will be full. This is a night town.

This particular night is Halloween. The kids are all dressed up, walking around with moms, aunts and uncles. There's SpiderMan. Batman. Little Bo Peep and Snow White. A rabbit and a frog. A Jedi and a pop star. A ninja turtle and a cowboy. The streets are choppy, chunks of them taken out by weather and time. The kids are laughing. I am surprised this night by the joy. They say it is supposed to be the darkest night of the year, but I am taken aback by the laughter. In a moment's glance, it seems so nice, like problems do not exist. I know my mind glance is a farce. Years ago, a study came out of abducted girls. After countless investigations of missing females, the data showed that the trail of their whereabouts, for most of them, ended in Santa Fe, the barrio I am now standing in. Girls' traces followed from one barrio to another, offering hope of recovery, but when led to Santa Fe, they just dropped off the face of the earth. There is a night club here that was caught years back sacrificing young kids in their basement ritualistically. The owner of the place was dragged out into the streets and shot Wild West style while the police looked the other way. There is no doubt this place is sexy dark. But I cannot see it tonight. I jut see children laughing in outfits asking for a bag full of candy. As I walk further, I get to the sex district, near that night club. Women are lined up, beckoning for the men walking by to abuse them and pay a little for it. To my astonishment, I find them smiling. Laughing. The children are there, in their outfits. Little Snow White holds her bag open. A topless woman with two inch eyelashes bends down and drops a candy bar treat in and kisses the little girl on the cheek. Ninja Turtle gets the same. I watch in wonder, it doesn't even bother me. I look down the row, children everywhere getting the best candy in the neighborhood from the whorehouses. The very best. It is a ruse. Behind the walls, little girls are being raped for the price of a Snickers.

I walk further on my way to the Jungle. We have assembled a team of people to beckon the kids to another alternative. We promise them candy and safety. Stretchy hammocks, slides, a ball pit, a hanging bridge, a fireman's pole, fusbol, putt putt and a puppet show. We want to get these kids off the streets, just for a bit, to see them smile and drop their guard. One of my little buddies, Boy S, comes every Jungle. His demeanor in and out of the building tells his story. When I pick him up at his family's place, he is guarded and careful, rigid and strict with his emotions. The moment he walks through the doors of the Jungle, he transforms. His arms flail. He runs and laughs. He crawls all over my back and wants to play chase and wrestle. He is brand new, for a time. Perhaps he is just able to be a kid. I love seeing him here. It gives my soul tears. When he walks back out, he sets his shoulders back into place, and he won't hold my hand.

Tonight's Jungle is filled. Packed with teddy bears and Princesses. Knights, dragons, karate experts and tigers. It's awesome. The Jungle is a jungle. We sing worship together. The kids are dancing, shouting praises to a God that knows them. Who cries for them. Who calls for the same in us.

"Do you love me?"
"Then feed my sheep..."



If you want to help us continue to build this place, visit Formando Vidas and donate.

There's a Baby in There...

It is surreal right now. We're not sure how to think of it, deal with it, not sure what to do with it. It's too big to do anything with. When people ask about it, they do not want to hear that we are freaking out. They want to hear that we are so excited. That this time is so special. They beckon us to tell stories about the loveliness of it all. But the reality of it hits Sara and I hard. Yes, I have to say, we are so excited, and the thought of it is quite lovely. Quite, quite lovely. But when it comes down to it, when I really think about it, I am left with so many questions. There is so much weirdness in my soul. I look at Sara's stomach, shudder, point and say, "There's a baby in there."

"I'm a dad."

"Sara is a mom."

Now, I gotta say, when Sara broke the news, my feet leaked rocket fuel. My voice turned nine, and my arms went mad like a kid in an acorn field. For days we were basking in the glory of the idea. But after some weeks had passed, we started to spout those little anxious kitsch phrases, like "Uh..." and, "O my..." and, "Whaaa..." The phrases Rearing a child and Raising a human are just a little too much to bear on the tongue. I mean, for us first timers, how is the migration from "childless" to "with child" going to be a smooth one? All I have to say is, "Thank you God, for the nine months to prepare." Of course, this begs the wrought iron gut wrenching agony of bearing it. The sickness. I look at my wife, who smiles weakly and says, after throwing up the fourth time today, "I guess I'm healthy." Is she allowed to say being pregnant sucks? Is she allowed to mention that the curse of the fall in this life-giving event reminds us all of a world made wrong by control? And while she suffers physically, my brain is in a vortex of turmoil. "A dad, a dad, I'm gonna be a dad!" It is being super-soaked with a thousand worries. What does it mean to be a dad? A father. How do I raise a daughter or son in this world of ghost men? It is a downright risky role in a classic tragedy. I feel my selfishness starting to kick in, to scream a little, not wanting to die. I want to follow after the examples around me, of men lost in the milieu of culture's conventional wisdom. To buckle down and start 401k's, save for the future. To worry a lot and take matters into my own hands, try to fix my wife and her sickness and diet. I try to figure it all out. To be a real man who's always ready to give an answer and act like he knows what he's talking about. But in reality, inside, I am the coward who sat by and watched his wife eat the fruit. I am the taste of control as I take it from her and bite into it. I am the blamer when God asks me why I am hiding in the bushes, "She made me do it." I walk in the shadow of empire. I take revelry in the Psalms which speak of God's silence and hidenness. Where are you God? Why have you forsaken me? My soul is thirsty, in a dry and weary land.

You might be reading this, saying, "Boy, he's not happy about this pregnancy, not one bit." And to this, I say not true. Not one bit. I am thrilled. I am ecstatic. I am still leaking rocket fuel. I look at kids around town, and I scrunch my shoulders, get completely cheesy within, and tear up about my own. I pray fervently for my child. I touch Sara's little tiny bump (barely noticeable) and speak to my son or daughter. Sara and I are writing down names and having those fun relationship freak out discussions about what kind of parents we're gonna be. My students at school are overjoyed, and it's so fun to go into class and say, "My son or daughter is the size of a plum right now." I love keeping the names we have thought of a secret as they try to wrench it out of me. But I am honest about the struggle here because I don't want to speak shadow dreams. At the end of the day, the thing I am learning as I mess up is that the worst thing I can do is control my child and family. To be the kind of father who speaks and does not listen. Who works and is wise without trust and proper fear. I have asked fathers around me for advice. Without fail, they have been unified in this, "Do not control your child or force them to be what you want them to be." They urge me to listen and take joy in their life and uniqueness. I see the struggle in their eyes and hear it in their voices. Regret hides in their words. As it will hide in mine someday. But I take joy in this. As the Psalmist writes, in a moment of great despair, "Yet my hope is in the Lord."

Praise be to God. He has given us a child!