Operazione Colomba

Mission time

“Those who do not weep, do not see” (Victor Hugo)

For the Catholics, October is the “Missionary” month, dedicated to whom, believer or not, woman or man of any age, offers her/his own life to carry out a mandate anywhere in the world, often outside the country of origin.
But I like to think about the word “mission” in a wider perspective according to which particular places or spaces or skills are not necessary to perform it because mission is wherever there is a challenge, wherever injustice exists, wherever a right is violated.
In this way, everyone will find his/her own mission easily and none would need a suit, a profession or a specific skill, rather a lot of courage and consistency.
Would it be too much thinking that we will change the world this way?
I don’t think so, because it will mean that everyone, none excluded, can make at least one mission of justice in our lifetime.
And furthermore, I like to think and hope that, since our childhood, we can be protagonists in a change of direction that would lead humanity toward hospitality and tenderness.

About Fear and Courage

Don Joaquin hardly moves across the village,
leaning on a walking stick,
step by step,
as though every movement required him an effort,

his face and hair are gray like someone who has seen many things go by,
both beautiful and ugly,
how life can be.

When he speaks he stares at you,
weighing his words,
observing if you are really listening to him.

"Me entiendes?"
"Do you understand me?"

At the end of the line

The paramilitary groups came on Saturday. More specifically, they came on Saturday, 8th July 2000. They entered the village of Union, where dozens of families from the Peace Community had just come back after spending a lot of time in San José to feel safe during the conflict. They came, and were coordinated by the Brigada XVII of the army. There were twenty hooded paramilitary soldiers and they came in the afternoon, around 3 p.m.. They gathered all the people in the square of the village, shouting and asking who their leaders were. The members of the Community replied all together that there was no leader, as everyone was the leader.
So the armed soldiers chose 7 men randomly: Rigoberto Guzman, his brother Jaime Guzman, Elodino Rivera, Diofanor Diaz Correa, Humberto Sepulveda, Pedro Zapata and Eliecer Guzman, who was only fourteen, and was Rigoberto’s and Jaime’s nephew.

The voice of oppressed people

They will call me subversive: and I will tell them: “I am. For my struggling people, I live. With my people on the march, I walk”. (Father Casaldàliga)

For several days, thousands of Colombian citizens have been taking to the streets in the main cities of the country to march peacefully and express their dissent over the tax reform. The reform represents a real guillotine for many families who are already paying, on one hand, the economic consequences of the pandemic and, on the other, the violence against social and environmental leaders perpetrated by neo-paramilitary units, the dissidence of the former FARC-EP and the ELN guerrillas which control many areas of the country thus hindering the possibility to live in peace.
From the beginning, the protests seemed the continuation of that cry for social justice and rule of law that had begun just a few months before the pandemic in Chile as well as in Colombia.

24th birthday and the Maize Fair

“...if we keep silent, they’ll kill us, if we speak, they’ll kill us anyway. This is why we are going to speak”
(Cristina Bautista, indigenous leader killed in October 2019)

On March 23rd the Peace Community of San José de Apartadó celebrated its 24 years of life and fights. No one like the Peace Community has been able to resist and persist. Their members have transformed in hope the pain of a conflict which has been lasting for years and has been marking the bodies and souls of all these farmers.
This year, as usual, the Peace Community recalled some of the most memorable steps of its history. Their members read the Constitution of their Community, they sang their songs about resilience and sacrifice all day long, while their anthem was resonating across the hills from dawn to dusk. They listened to the words of the deceased members of the Community, which had been recorded years before in distant countries by crackling microphones. But despite the years and the crackle, you could still hear the most important words in their speeches loud and clear: justice, peace, truth.
This year, as usual, people gathered around the entrance gate grabbing in their hands and holding in their chests the pictures of the Community members who have sacrificed their lives in the name of their dream of freedom. All the Community together walked to reach the places where new innocent people had been killed even in these months. These people were not members of the Community, but they still deserved a prayer and a thought, because oblivion can kill twice.