Dear Friend,

I was recently afforded the opportunity to visit El Salvador as part of a SHARE Foundation delegation. This was a rare and precious opportunity for me to experience the struggles of a developing nation first-hand through the people who live these struggles every day. I would like to share with you some of my impressions of the land and its people.

I was somewhat unprepared, emotionally, for what I would experience on my first visit to this tiny, but proud nation. From the moment our plane touched down at the airport my senses were overwhelmed. The air was hot and muggy at 6:00am as we all crammed into a small SHARE Foundation bus for the trip to our hotel in central San Salvador. During the ride of several miles to the hotel I viewed a broken landscape; a dry and defoliated landscape of barren hillsides and oceans of slums. Diesel smoke from highway vehicles mixed with the fumes of burning garbage to create a noxious cocktail that stung my eyes and tied my stomach into knots. Men, women and children carried heavy loads along the highway as pigs and chickens ran underfoot.
In San Salvador, buildings from the most humble street-side shops to the mansions on the hilltops were crowned with concertina wire.
The scenery was like so much of the news footage I have seen of far off war-torn lands in poverty, but this time it was real and it was at arms reach, and this time I could feel the heat and smell the scent of real destitution. I thought to myself that this is too much for me to take in all at once. This is too much for me to do anything about. What am I doing here anyway?

My feelings or fear and doubt, however, were quickly washed away by the spirit of love and or hope that I encountered in the Salvadorans that I met. From theological lectures at the Central American University, listening to simulcast translation of a discourse on Liberation Theology lying on the grass with parrots chattering in the trees overhead, to the poor but vital communities that I visited in the Department of San Vicente, I was overwhelmed with the sense that passion, hope, and love are the qualities that define the poor of El Salvador. I quickly felt comfortable and even at home in this new land. Everywhere our group went in the impoverished countryside, people opened their communities and their hearts to us, sharing what little they had with warmth and gladness.

By way of contrast I live in a low-income neighborhood in the United States where crime and drugs are pervasive. I am frightened of these elements in my own community and often I am scared to be out on the streets after dark. These are not the feelings I had while staying in a poor, rural community in San Vicente. I felt safe and secure with these people. To be honest, I felt so comfortable in El Salvador with my new friends, that it took me weeks to become reaccustomed to the United States where materialism and self satisfaction seem to be the dominant cultural values.

I was especially struck by how well organized were each of the Salvadoran communities we visited. We were introduced to various committees or ministries made-up of local residents. Each group was responsible for a different aspect of the social fabric of the community from caring for the sick and elderly to educating the youth. We were introduced to local artistic groups and to local cooperative economic initiatives (such as
cheese-making and cashew processing). Some of the communities had formed youth athletic programs. One community, under the leadership of the local women, was able to rid itself of alcoholism and the domestic violence and despair that alcoholism supports. It is through SHARE's partnership with local grassroots organizations, such as the group that empowers women for leadership, that successes like this have been achieved. SHARE's partnership with these groups has also helped these formerly disenfranchised communities to begin to have a voice in the local and even the national political process despite the obstacle of establishment-controlled media. I don't fool myself into thinking that the situation is as rosy everywhere across El Salvador, but SHARE has had some great successes in helping to build healthy communities in many parts of the country by partnering with local organizations. This is a process that SHARE calls "Accompaniment", and I believe that Accompaniment can work to save El Salvador for a new era of peace and prosperity. I think that Americans and Salvadorans have much to offer each other.

Even in spite of all this hope for the future there are some very serious threats to everything that SHARE has helped to build over the last 13 years since the Peace Accords were signed ending the civil war. Political repression is again on the rise in El Salvador, threatening to silence the voices that speak out in support of the poor. International trade pacts, such as the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) threaten to open El Salvador up further to large-scale industry that would undermine the
grassroots economic initiatives like those I mentioned, and force these proud and spirited people into inhumane working conditions in sweatshop factories. This type of subjugation would threaten the fabric of community that was painstakingly built up from the ashes of the civil war. I am very worried about these threats to the well-being of poor Salvadorans, but I do believe that El Salvador is a country where, if Americans and Salvadorans work together on a grassroots level, we can realize a new day of peace and
social justice.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Partsch
University Lutheran Chapel,
Berkeley, California