"Get on the Truck!"

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I barely started the Holy Mass in one of my rural village chapels, when a truck stopped just in front of the gate and honked its horn loudly. “Everyone, get on the truck, the plantation owner wanted us to plant sugar cane this morning!” the “cabo”, known as the head of the workers, shouted in a megaphone. I observed that the churchgoers looked aghast at each other and politely told me that they had to go, since they were just merely workers of a landlord, from whom many of them owed a lot of money. I was left with one Eucharistic minister and a handful of elderly women, pregnant women and children. Even then, I pushed through with the scheduled liturgical service. Back at the parish convent, I wondered at what took place in the village. “Maybe, “I thought to myself, “people are really so indebted to the landlord so much that they could sacrifice the salvation of soul.” If the church has no answer to the socio-economic issues that daily hound their survival, how can we effectively preach to these people? As usual, faith issues will not be a priority to them, if the church remains indifferent to their needs, in terms of policy-making. I promised to myself to do it differently, at least before my term ends as a parish priest of this small village. This is how our Grameen banking system was born in the parish. The system encapsulates in the pre-membership seminars: Christian value formation in 12 modules. In the modules, the social teachings of the church and the scripture are intertwined. Photo credits: Pixabay