Journals
Posted on December 16, 2022 Christmas is a Time of Hope
Sofía of Purulha, Baja Verapaz, Guatemala
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Léelo en español

The light shines in the darkness,
and the darkness can never extinguish it.

John 1:5

New Living Translation

Christmas is a Time of Hope

The redeemer is born in the darkest night, drives back the darkness, brings light.

Sometimes we think that all is lost, but as Mercedes Sosa says, who says that all is lost? I come to offer my heart. As long as there are sons and daughters of God who fight with determination, there is and will be hope. The powers of the world crush, absorb everything into their logic and fight all opposition, but there are always places from which light radiates. A child who was born in dark times, facing the crushing and profane submission of governments; a poetry that was read and reread of a Messiah who would come; and that he came, and it is Christ the Savior, and that he comes when we set our eyes on him and follow him tenaciously.

Some stories inspire the hope of the redeemer who comes in dark times.

 

 

Sofía of Purulha, Baja Verapaz, Guatemala

From her indigenous and female pain, she rose to defend her Achi, Pocomchí, Qeqchi Mayan people. She helped the people during natural disasters. She defended the people from the grabbing of water by hydroelectric megaprojects. She demanded that the municipal authorities respect the people in making decisions that affect them. She undertook a fight for the recovery of ancestral territories with old property titles. Sofia confronts the powerful (landowners, companies and governments), mobilizes the people, and with tenacious determination stops dams, taxes and recovers land.

They have wanted to silence her many times, assassinate her, too, she is criminalized, in permanent harassment. To crush hope is what the powerful want. However, Sofia, who is part of our network of women guardians of creation, affirms that we are the legitimate owners of the land in this Common House. Although they persecute us for having a view beyond, for us insisting on protecting the land, the mountains and the brothers and sisters, we will continue to fight for life.

Sofia’s light brings justice and generates life.

 

Christmas calls to push back the darkness with the light of Christ. May the hope of the child that is born, which is the people who do not accommodate themselves, who is Him, lift us up to care for creation, to accompany those who struggle and to fight, be Christ with us in this celebration of life and in the coming new year!

 

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