Sister Evelyne's letter after her visit to
Haiti (15/02/2010)
Dear
Sisters,
After the brief visit that Sister Iliana and I made recently to
Santo Domingo and Haiti,
I would like to thank you first of all for your prayers and union of
heart with our Sisters in the
Province
of Haiti. You
cannot imagine how much your witness of solidarity touched them, and
also how much they need our prayers.
It is difficult
to recount all that we experienced during this week that passed too
quickly, but I will try to give you some ideas about it.
As I stated in a previous letter, the Provincial House was
destroyed. A company from
Santo Domingo
is in the process of removing the rubble, after which they will
tackle the sections of the school that must be demolished due to
severe cracks in the building. The new house in Periere is
uninhabitable because the surrounding ground has sunken
considerably. Specialized technicians have studied the structure of
the two other houses near
Port-au-Prince, Cite-Soleil and
Marie-Madeleine, and have confirmed that they have withstood damage.
Some of the adjacent buildings, however, will have to be demolished.
Our Sisters are living like refugees. Certainly, we will attempt to
acquire some of the prefabricated housing in preparation for the
rainy season, but inevitably they will continue to live for many
months under provisional conditions. I was in admiration of their
positive outlook on this deprivation that has been imposed on them.
The Sisters volunteering from North America, the Caribbean, South
America and Europe joyfully set to work, despite the frustrations
inherent in this situation. In reality, it is difficult to
participate in the NGO teams or to attempt distribution efforts that
risk turning into riots. Nevertheless, these Sisters are helping
those in the Province, on the one hand, to resume the usual services
such as consultation and care of malnourished children, day care
centers and primary schools, and on the other hand, to seek out
persons in great distress and discretely visit their homes as a way
of bringing them medical supplies and needed food.
The Sisters of the Province are collaborating, of course, with the
Vincentian Family and sharing the donations they receive with poor
persons and with other local congregations in a spirit of profound
communion.
It was very
moving to hear what the Sisters lived through on January 12. With
great simplicity, they described their fright, their instinctive
faith responses in the total chaos of the initial moments, then
their utter disbelief at the extent of the disaster, the unending
arrival of wounded persons, the spontaneity of their makeshift
relief efforts, and the hours spent cleaning and suturing wounds.
Everyone emphasized the atmosphere of prayer and solidarity during
that first night. They then described their anguished search for
Sister Brigitte in the days that followed and the emotion of her
burial in the garden of the Provincial House.
In the days immediately following the earthquake, some of the
Sisters had the opportunity to serve at the
Hospital
of Peace and to
give witness to the tender love of God to patients with severe
physical wounds, as well as to their families and the local or
foreign health care personnel. All the Sisters expressed to me that
the fact of having escaped death that night left them with a sense
of having had an experience of God, of having received a mission, a
call to put out into the deep…
I would like to conclude this brief message by thanking Sister Maria
Teresa Tapia and the Sisters of the
Province
of Haiti who
received us with such kindness, and who shared with us their passion
for those living in poverty in this beautiful country so terribly
devastated. In the prayer that brought us together each morning, we
offered the Haitian people to the Lord of Charity and to the Blessed
Virgin. I also express my gratitude to Sister Servia Tulia Garcia
and the Sisters of the Province
of Santo Domingo for
welcoming us at the beginning and end of our visit and for their
tremendous generosity to the Sisters in
Haiti. May the Lord be their
reward!
Let us confide these coming months to Saint
Vincent, the patron of charitable works and to Saint
Louise, the patroness of social workers, that through their
intercession, the Lord will bless all the efforts made, so that they
may bear abundant fruit to assist our brothers and sisters who are
suffering.
With my devoted
affection,
Sister Evelyne
Franc
Daughter of
Charity
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