The purpose of my visit to Jinja, Uganda
September/October 2009

The purpose of my visit to Jinja, Uganda, is best defined with a story. … As part of my role on the trip I was asked to preach at the Anglican Church in Jinja. Preparing for this preaching ministry I felt led to study the depth of the familiar beatitude “Blessed are the merciful…” (Matthew 5:7). My main point was that the effort to approach another person in order to get to know them was a merciful thing to do. It is merciful simply because of our need for love.

You can only imagine how much anxiety I felt when I considered preaching to people who live in a country foreign to mine. The King’s English is spoken in Uganda widely, as it was a British colony. But it is The King’s English and not the American Southwest version I use freely. More profoundly I knew that Ugandan folk would have unique idioms and may be quite confused by ours. And then I considered how my sermon idea was no traditional approach to this Beatitude. They may well have no clue what I would be talking about. I was miserably anxious! But in spite of my anxiety I still felt led; anxious, but led by a Spirit that would not be ignored.

            I flew into Entebbe, Uganda. And there I had an incredible experience! On the wall in the airport in Entebbe was a mural of several Africans gathered together, full of joy. The caption under the mural read: GREAT THINGS HAPPEN WHEN PEOPLE ARE GETTING TO KNOW ONE ANOTHER. I stood there in amazement, realizing that this simple idea I had to preach on was a value being expressed publicly in Uganda! And there I was reading it on my entry into this foreign society. And my anxiety fell away from me as if I had been washed clean.

            As a bereavement professional I was asked to give an in-service to the staff in Jinja but, as their means of communication was so very limited with many of their patients’ families, I realized that much of what I might say would be presumptuous. How we support the bereaved here is very different from there. In the in-service I spent time listening to their experience with grief. And I validated their care for the loved ones of these families and the kindness they showed to these family members. It was a good hour of bereavement conversations. … But what really was my purpose in Uganda?

My purpose had something to do with that sermon. I preached it on October 4. I let the Spirit validate the merciful acts of friendship in the lives of the people in that congregation. Then later as I reflected on my visit I realized that this really was my purpose for coming to Uganda, to meet people I had been supporting at a great distance, and for us to get to know one another. The nurses and staff of Hospice Jinja had heard about this program in Houston, Texas, that supported them, and now they met some of us and we were getting to know one another. And now I am sharing my new friends with the staff here in Houston, letting them get to know a hospice staff on the other side of the globe.
           
This message written on the wall of the airport in Entebbe spoke to me. I had no clue how broad its inspiration was when I first read it, though I was amazed at its first implications. In time I realized it was about the purpose of my trip, and it was about the purpose of our Partnership with Hospice Jinja.

I was in Africa

Bob Coberly
Bereavement Service Manager
VITAS Innovative Hospice Care
Houston, Texas