Transformation happens to all of us
-an interview with Ali Hunt

Home church:

Christian Life Center, Santa Cruz, CA during volunteer work, now University Presbyterian Church, Seattle, WA

Vocation:

Medical Student

How did you get connected with ENLACE?

I became a Christian during college, but I attended a liberal school, the University of California Santa Cruz. I didn’t have much of an idea about missionaries other than their being post-colonial vestiges of power and influence. Basically, I thought they were one more arm of colonial power in countries around the world masquerading under the banner of “do-gooding.” When my passion for the materially poor came together with my desire to share the love of Christ I had experienced, I wanted to find a special missions organization, one that shared this love without trying to control people. My Pastor at the time, Jason Garcia, had been watching me research organizations all over the world. One day he walked into the church office (I was working as an office assistant and local soccer coach) and said, “Ali, You should check out ENLACE. In all my years of being a pastor, I have never seen such a unique approach to missions work.” This piqued my interest as he had been a pastor interested in missions work for years. So I checked out the small NGO in El Salvador and I really liked their approach, too. They employed local Salvadorans and worked small; they had intimate, committed relationships with the communities with whom they worked. Their work was unique in every community, created in a collaborative effort between community leaders and local resources. However, my parents weren’t so keen on their daughter going to El Salvador. “No daughter of mine is going to El Salvador,” my father had said. Being a newer Christian, I was more conscientious of honoring my parents than ever before in my life. So I found myself conflicted.

A few months later, I got a phone call. It was both my parents together. They told me, “Ali, you’re going to El Salvador.” I just about fell off my chair. “Excuse me?” I said. “Yes,” they said, “God wants you to go to El Salvador and we support you.” Okay, my dad doesn’t do God-talk or christianese. Something big had happened. You need to understand that my mom teaches microbiology at a small community college in a rural part of Northern California. The statistical chances of the following story make me either the life-destiny-lottery winner of the century or blessed by God. I think the latter must be true. My Mom proceeded to explain, “I was teaching class today and I went up to my student Jorge. I asked him where he was from and he said El Salvador. I told him that my daughter wanted to go to El Salvador and that she wanted to work with some group called ENLACE.”

“ENLACE?!” He asked with his face lit up. It turned out that he was a long-time friend of ENLACE’s local social worker Doris Evangelista. He had worked with ENLACE and could vouch for the fact that he loved what the organization was doing for his country. He convinced my parents that I would be safe and well-taken care of. Not only had he worked with ENLACE, he had worked with midwives. I was looking at going to midwifery school upon returning from a year of missionary volunteer work! I needed the funds to live and work in the country for a year. Amazingly and totally unplanned by any person, Ron Bueno’s father (a long-time missionary in El Salvador) was coming to speak at my church for missions week. He helped me ask the congregation for the funds and the need was met in one offering ($3500). The local ENLACE doctor had been praying for 2 weeks for someone to travel with her up to the rural Salvadoran village of Los Abelines. I ended up working as her assistant for ten months. She worked for two weeks before I got there and for two weeks after I left. Her own health led her on to other work. The point is, God was answering prayers and that is how I got connected with ENLACE.

What about the ministry moved your heart?

The embodiment of the love of Christ in the work of ENLACE is what moved my heart. I was blessed to have the testimony of a Salvadoran student of my mother’s (see above) regarding the loving and effective nature of ENLACE’s work. ENLACE doesn’t force itself on communities in manipulative ways. It works with community leaders in a way that fosters dignity and collaboration. The ministry allows for a mutuality that grows the God-given talents of both those traditionally seen as the “givers” and those traditionally seen as the “receivers.” This mutuality is what I believe is the meaning of the unity and integrity of the body of Christ. One part of the body may have more material wealth bedazzling it, but the less outwardly noticeable parts of the body have much to give in the life-blood of love. All parts of the body of Christ have much to receive and much to give. Together with the Spirit of God, the ministry of ENLACE links not only communities and resources, but the body parts of Christ into a whole being. It allows each person involved to become a joyful giver-receiver, giving and receiving one another’s talents in a dance of mutual empowerment.

Why do you support the ministry?

I support the ministry because I have experienced firsthand the transformation that affects the giver-receiver. I have seen women who never spoke before in public become powerful community leaders. I have watched myself be transformed from a cowering mess of self-pity into an intrepid medical student. This is the kind of change that comes out of ENLACE’s focus on relationships and collaboration with communities, seeing them as people who have much to give. This is the kind of lasting internal, spiritual change that allows individuals and communities to be transformed for generations rather than just-as-long-as-the pipes on the new water project don’t break. This is the kind of spiritual change that is passed on to friends, children, and ultimately survives earthquakes, war, the ravages of time, and death.

On the way down from Abelines this June (2008), I got to ride with Lisa Cranmer and Pastor Victorio. She asked him what the biggest changes were in his church and people since the arrival of ENLACE. Pastor Victorio spoke of two things. He said (paraphrased & translated), “First of all, as you already know, the people here were very shy (curaña). They had a hard time talking at all and an even harder time talking to each other. When ENLACE came, they started showing us how to talk to each other and giving us the example of how to reach out to our community to help one another, how to build friendships. The people started to awaken (Se despierta la gente…). Secondly, we saw your example of being willing to come so far away from home, away from friends and family, struggling with our language, being extremely different, not knowing anyone here and despite all that being able to successfully communicate, build friendships, and collaborate with people in our community. This example made us realize that if you could do this, then we could overcome our shyness and reach out to our community to build relationships, too.”

I strongly believe that it is often such unintended consequences that God uses to transform communities. That is why we must never forget that it is God’s work as long as we show up! What Pastor Victorio said is very much in line with a piece of Henry Nouwen’s writing:

“The more I think about the meaning of living and acting in the name of Christ, the more I realize that what I have to offer to others is not my intelligence, skill, power, influence, or connections, but my own human brokenness through which the love of God can manifest itself. The celebrant in Leonard Bernstein’s Mass says: “Glass shines brighter when it’s broken….I never noticed that.” This, to me, is what ministry and mission are all about. Ministry is entering with our human brokenness into communion with others and speaking a word of hope. This hope is not based on any power to solve the problems of those with whom we live, but on the love of God, which becomes visible when we let go of our fears of being out of control and enter into his presence in a shared confession of weakness. This is a hard vocation. It goes against the grain of our need for self-affirmation, self-fulfillment, and self-realization. It is a call to true humility. I, therefore, think that for those who are pulled away from their familiar surroundings and brought into a strange land where they feel again like babies, the Lord offers a unique chance not only for personal conversion but also for an authentic ministry.”

-Grácias, by Henry Nouwen

How has the ministry encouraged/challenged your own faith walk?

Simply put, my life will never be the same. If it weren’t for the courage, friendship, and love of those in the community of Los Abelines, I would still be wallowing in some self-help isle of the bookstore trying to figure out why my self-esteem was so shot. Interestingly, it just occurred to me that the challenge I faced while working with the ministry of ENLACE is what ultimately led to my encouragement. The example of unwavering faith in the face of horrific war and life circumstances that I saw in El Salvador really challenged me. I still struggle with asking God why he let such things happen. Seeing the resolve of the people in Los Abelines transformed me. I no longer thought it was right to sit around telling myself I was too stupid to pursue my lifelong dream of becoming a doctor. Opportunities abounded in my home country of the United States, especially for women. How dare I wallow in self-imposed self-pity? Though I may never be able to answer the question that remains the greatest challenge for me when I work with ENLACE, that of why God allows such great suffering, the talents of their faith and resolve have transformed me and encouraged me to set aside the fear of failure and try to live life in the fullest. When I first arrived, two of the community leaders, who are now some of my dearest friends, teased me, saying I was from a “cama de oro” (bed of gold). I hope someday they may know that it does no good to come from a bed of gold if you are always asleep. It was their community awakening that got me out of bed.