The paradox of lament and hope: to Burundi and back

Burundi, Bundibugyo, and Ituri/North Kivu provinces of the DRC are contiguous areas of the Albertine Rift, sharing overlaps of rainforest and culture and language roots, of equatorial heat and volcanic heights, of distance from the colonising coasts and from the centres of commerce and development, of political insecurity and injustice in recent years but also of eagerness for change and life. We have teams in all three areas, and just spent this past week visiting the Serge team in Burundi. This visit marks 10 years of our team's service and was timed to work on a new "Memorandum of Understanding", the documents that outline and define our partnerships on the ground.  That might sound administratively dry or tediously straightforward. But anytime you throw two very disparate-background groups of people into an intense work and life environment and have thousands of people to serve and hundreds of thousands of dollars to account for, the paperwork is far from dull.  

Our team leaders spent days in a working group prior to our arrival to create a draft, and then we spent a day preparing with them followed by a solidly long non-stop 8 hours around a table with the chairman of the church's board, the Rector of the University, and a legal advisor, combing through word by word, asking questions, expressing intentions, debating composition of committees or supervision of projects, making sure we understood each other and agreed. The next day we set aside to celebrate, to give speeches and look at numbers and marvel at what God has done. 

Ten years in a country that has known Burundi-level suffering must acknowledge lament. Our work has not been perfect, and our team has spent that decade face to face with some of the highest maternal and child mortality, hunger, poverty, and limited options, in the world. Our families were caught in the trauma of an attempted coup, and one experienced a violent break-in, robbery, assault. Every step forward seems to be followed by one or two back. Our partners have seen so much death including the loss of the Bishop we began our whole relationship with, and have faced the incredible risk of trusting foreigners who look like the same sorts of people that brought division and war to their doorstep. We lament together the lingering effects of conflict and COVID, of famine and failure. 

And yet a ten-year arc of story carries a hopeful weight of glory. The Kibuye Hope Hospital has treated 300,000 patients and performed 30,000 surgeries in that time, each an inflection point of a life beset by injury or disease that could have otherwise ended in permanent loss. Thousands can testify that God sees them and cares about their needs. 300 new doctors have been graduated from medical school, a noticeable inflection point upward in the graph of health care over time. The Rector's final comments focused on how these new doctors not only have excellent training in medicine, they have been shaped by the atmosphere of asking questions, going the extra mile, praying to God, creating community.  And that doesn't even mention the more visible, concrete (brick actually) evidence of a decade of good: power, water, wards, offices, homes, food. 

After our days in the capital with our partners, we drove up to the more central village where the team lives. Which is always a highlight, to not just banter documents and speeches, but to walk into life. To accompany rounds, talk to the kids at chapel, join in the pizza-evening tradition, listen and pray with various groups. The new Paediatric building draws the most complex kids from around the country. It was encouraging to welcome one doctor back from a national association of surgeons, where he collaborates with Burundians about the training and services all over. And get a demonstration of 3D virtual reality from another, for teaching anatomy. That perfectly highlights the spark that an outsider with surgical and computer skills can bring to remote central Africa while it's still cutting edge for the most prestigious schools in America.  These families labor in construction and accounting, in treating cancer and malnutrition, in teaching preschoolers and residents. 

The day we left, Team Leader Eric's article about his real-life Good Samaritan story came out in Christianity Today magazine. Read if for a more in-depth ponder of the toll of responding to a neighbour's need in the midst of our own neediness. This is the life Jesus modeled, and now empowers. We celebrate the seeds of change and growth and joy, but we do so with a sober view of our difficult reality. Lament and hope, gratitude and grief. On to the next ten years.