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January 2002 Update |
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What causes so many teens in cities such as St. Louis and Houston, and in cities and towns all over Honduras to join violent gangs? Why do kids in comfortable suburban communities smuggle guns into their high schools in order to shoot innocent classmates? And for what reason do young men and women join terrorist organizations such as Al Qaeda, willing to die for the cause? All three questions lead to an even greater one: What is missing in the lives of today’s youth? An article in the Jan. 14, 2002 issue of “People” magazine about Richard Reid, a terrorist who tried to set off a bomb in his shoe on an airline flight in December, gives one answer to these complex and troubling questions. According to a friend of the thwarted terrorist, he “was always in search for an identity.” Could that same search for identity in this lost and increasingly godless world be the reason why teens in Chicago will join a gang and teens in Saudi Arabia or England will join a terrorist cell? Would a teen-ager commit a violent act against innocent people in order to avoid living a purposeless and drifting life? Frighteningly, its seems that the answer to this question is a tragic “yes.” In Honduras, juvenile violence is spinning out-of-control. This is especially true in the sprawling slums, where life can be short, mean and literally “every man for himself.” Not a day goes by in which a picture of slaughtered teens is not splashed across the front pages of the Honduran newspapers. Buses and taxis are afraid to go into the slums for fear of being caught on gang turf. The Micah boys who live in these areas will sometimes go to visit their families, but will always escape their neighborhoods by three p.m. to avoid being caught after dark without sporting a “Mara Salvatrucha” or “18” gang tattoo. But what else is there for kids in the slums? Education is not an option for most of them. And, not being literate, the only jobs they can get are hawking wares in the outdoor marketplace, where they are just as likely to get involved in gangs as in their own slums. And their homes?
If they have a father at home, more often than not he is drowning
his own sense of powerlessness in a bottle of guaro, the local
alcohol. Why stay at home,
where they are likely to encounter only hunger, poverty and domestic
abuse? Gangs, at least, offer camaraderie, activity, and a kind
of violent power over other people’s lives that masks the
powerlessness of their own. Those kids who don’t get involved in gangs often flee to the streets to avoid the dead-end life that the slums offer. But other teens look for different means of escape. That was the tragic case of a teen last month in the Micah Project neighborhood. Misael is a slight, quiet 14 year-old. I’ve seen him riding his bike in our busy neighborhood on many occasions. Once, last October, when I ran in to him in one of the many home mini-markets (called “pulperias” in Spanish) in our neighborhood, I asked him what grade he was in. He replied that he had dropped out of school after the sixth grade, and when I asked him if he worked, he again replied negatively. Here was an intelligent and well-spoken boy with no goals, no dreams, and no options. In other words, a typical Tegucigalpa teenager. On New Years Eve, the day I returned from a week’s trip to the U.S., two of the Micah boys signaled that they wanted to talk with me after Misael passed by our front door on his bike. They told me that four days earlier, his fifteen year-old brother had committed suicide by hanging himself in their shared bedroom. How does a fourteen year-old deal with such a profound personal tragedy? I sent one of the boys to get Misael, and invited him into the Micah House. He was pale and hunched over as he took a seat in my office, his eyes hidden behind a baseball cap pulled low over his face. I told him how sorry I was for his loss and asked him if he wanted to talk. Although we hadn’t talked apart from our brief interaction last October, he began to spill out his brother’s story. He pulled out a CD case from the deep pocket of his carpenter pants. Instead of a CD, however, the case contained a ragged and well-worn newspaper report of his brother’s death. He began to cry as I read it, saying that the newspaper article was all lies. I realized that I was probably the first person with whom he had talked about his brother’s death. How many times had he read and re-read that article, alone in his grief? When Misael was done crying, he got up to leave. I asked him to come to the Micah House as often as he liked. Over the next few days, he did just that. And, little by little, he began to see that our boys are very different from the average Tegucigalpa teenager. Far from viewing life as meaningless, the Micah boys understand God’s deep love for them, and based on their unmovable identity as His children, they are seeing how He is and will continue using them to advance His kingdom. As the days pass, I’ve seen Misael smile more-and-more. He seems comfortable, if somewhat awed, by the flurry of meaningful activity in the Micah House. After much prayer, I asked him to join our educational program. Last Wednesday, he started as a seventh grader in the Micah Institute! Helping these boys understand God’s love, and helping them discover the marvelous ways in which He will work in them and through them—this is truly the Micah Project’s calling in this lost society. It is easy for me to get overwhelmed sometimes—so many kids being driven to the brink of destruction! That we could be a beacon of God’s love and purpose to all of them!
At the same time, I’ve seen well-meaning organizations take on too many kids and programs, only to find themselves too swamped to be able to give each child the love and support that he or she truly needs. We invest so much love, energy and time into each Micah boy that I am confident that we are working with exactly the right number at this time in our ministry. As much as I would like to reach out to each one of the innumerable hurting children in this city, the Micah Project must rely on God’s guidance to help us grow in a wise and healthy way.
And our ministry will grow this year! Next week, we will open our community library to kids in our neighborhoods and some street kids. Sure, we want them to be turned on to reading through our library. But even more importantly, how many of them will find that same seed of hope that Misael found when first entering the Micah family? How many of them will have an interaction in our library that will turn the tide of meaninglessness in their lives?
We will also be supporting our first teenager with a college scholarship fund this year. As I mentioned in my last letter, Darwin Pavon, from our Villa Linda Miller project (www.villalindamiller.thinkhost.com), managed to graduate high school despite losing his home in a hurricane and his dad in a car wreck, all during his high school years. He will stay with us five days a week while he begins his studies in the National University in February. Our scholarship also provides enough to allow Darwin to help put food on the table for his widowed mother and six siblings.
This will also be an important year for our boys, several of whom will be turning seventeen or eighteen. We have formed a ministry committee among the boys to allow them to decide where and how they will do their outreach this year. We are preparing these boys to be Christian leaders in this fallen world; thus, they must begin to seek God’s will for their personal ministry even now, at a young age. Just last Friday, the boys presented a powerful skit and song about the need for Christian unity at a prayer service sponsored by eight or nine Honduran churches from a variety of denominations. They were the only youth to participate in the service, and people literally swarmed up to them afterwards to tell them how touched they were by the boys’ presentation.
Joining us in our ministry this year are Erin MacLean, Becca Hogan, and Lauri Deniakos, three talented young women from Chicago, St. Louis and Houston respectively. With so much support, I believe that God will use our boys this year to begin to push back the clouds of evil that threaten to destroy the youth of this city and country!
I hope that you will consider being a part of the Micah Project in this powerful year for our ministry. I know that almost a hundred of you will come to participate hand-in-hand in the Micah Project’s ministry this year. For the rest of you, we very much need your prayers for the boys and for all those to whom we will minister this year. This truly is a battle between good and evil, and your prayers can provide us a strong foundation for this fight.
Also, we very much depend on your financial support for the Micah Project. We have current commitments for about 65% of our operational funds for the year 2002. Additionally, we are raising funds for our College scholarship endowment fund, which we hope to have available to support our boys when they begin to graduate from high school and begin college in the next three or four years.
The boys’ ministry has already begun in 2002. Last week, Oscar came back to the house, excitedly sharing the news that two people accepted Christ through a group Bible study he attends. At the same time, Cristino was preparing Sunday school lessons, Danilo was helping some young children practice a dance to perform at their church, and Jarvin was writing a new skit about street kids. There is one thing that shines clearly in all of their eyes: hope! And it is hope that will turn teen violence into teen victory! Please join us as we support these boys…agents of God’s hope in this desperate city! Your brother in Christ, Michael Miller P.S. See some great pictures and read more about our programs on our website, www.micahcentral.org. Also, have a friend who is looking to be an agent of God’s hope this year? We would be pleased if you would share this update. We are looking for partners in this ministry!
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