women of faith. . .

the other day i got an e-mail from my mom asking if i possibly wanted to go to a women of faith conference with her and some women from her church. thoughts of the difference between a women of faith conference at home in the states and the women's conference at the church here in haiti were running through my mind friday night was i went to the women's conference. i began to look at the woman who were sitting around me here in st. louis du nord, haiti.

the woman in front of me has at least 2-3 of her children with her, all in clean clothes, all sitting quietly through the service or singing along with the songs. she herself had on a gleaming white skirt, nicely ironed and an ironed t-shirt. i began to think about what it took for her to get there to church that night.

clean clothes - easy enough with a washer and dryer. a rather big challenge with no running water and doing your laundry in the river. also a challenge in a house that is probably a dirt floor.

ironed clothes - easy enough with an iron and ironing board. a rather big challenge with a charcoal heated iron (that let me tell you they are heavy irons!) and no ironing board.

i thought of edalia. she is a woman in my sewing project. her son jose is my little cutie. he is only three, but says i am his girlfriend. he came and sat on my lap. imagining her day prior to coming to churchthought about edalia and what it takes for her to get through a day, carrying water, buying food, cooking over an open fire, sweeping her yard every day, sweeping the trash out and the dust down. trying to make the food last just a little bit longer because she probably doesn't have money to buy for the next day. trying to care for and love her children. carrying two of her children at least a 20 minute walk down the mountain to come to the women's conference that night. both of her youngest boys were asleep on a towel on the concrete floor and edalia sat on the ledge outside the church because there weren't any seats left inside.

i am pretty sure that night i was at a women of faith conference!