The Franciscan Connection
While in New Mexico recently, I met a man who prays and then acts. He seems
to have a deep prayer life, somewhat contemplative, which opens him up
to hearing the promptings of God.
His name is Don Ryder. He's a Secular Franciscan. And he was in Albuquerque
to accept the National Franciscan Peace Award from the Secular
Franciscan Order.
He has worked in soup kitchens and shelters. He has traveled with church
groups to Jamaica to build churches, clinics, and homes for the poor.
While in Jamaica, he met a missionary priest from Kenya who suggested a
visit to his African homeland.
That led to a trip to Kenya to help build a church and repair homes. While
there, he got to visit a Maasai tribal village in the semi-arid Great
Rift Valley. Six months after returning home to Wausau, Wisconsin, Don
got an email from the Vatican describing a worsening drought in Kenya.
He emailed a Kenyan contact, who confirmed the Maasai were particularly
hard-hit. Livestock were dying. People were sick and dying. Infant
mortality was high. Maasai women had to travel by foot up to 15 miles
one way to fetch water from dirty waterholes or contaminated streams.
Some were getting raped enroute.
Don prayed. He decided to open the Bible at random. His eyes fell to John's
Gospel, where Jesus, hanging on the cross, cries out, "I thirst."
"That impacted me," Don recalled. "It hit me that the Passion continues today with our Maasai sisters and brothers."
But he also thought, "Who am I? What can I do?"
He tried to put it out of his mind. He couldn't. A few days later he
opened the Bible again, deliberately avoiding the Gospel of John. This
time his fingers fell to a passage in Mathew where Jesus says, "I was
thirsty and you gave me drink."
"Bam!" he said.
He recalled thinking, "I'll see what I can do, but it's in your hands, Lord."
He did some research and decided to raise money to drill a well. It would cost over $60,000.
He spoke to his parish priest about it and the parish got involved. He
brought it up to Secular Franciscans and his fraternity jumped on
board. Romey Wagner, the man who would become his co-leader, stepped
forward.
Soon donations started coming. Coins from school children. $2,000 from a
young couple. Word spread. Dollars arrived from all over the country.
They completed one well, drilling down 400 feet. It has a tank and pump
house powered by a diesel engine. It's now providing clean water for
between 4,000 and 5,000 Maasai and 100,000 head of cattle. Just last
month they completed a second well, further north. This one is powered
by a windmill. They ran pipe to a school with 400 students and are
running pipe to a dispensary. Now that it will have running water, Don
hopes it will be upgraded to a hospital.
Since the scarcity of water can lead to harm, even war, the Kenyan water
project caught the imagination of the Peace Award Committee.
The award came with a $2,000 stipend. It didn't take long for Don to give
it away, wiring it to a priest in Kenya who helped with the water
project and who, with funds from the Vatican, built a church in the
vicinity of the second well. But he ran out of money and couldn't
furnish it. Then Don learned the priest and the people decided to
dedicate the church to St. Francis of Assisi.
So now there is a St. Francis Church in Kenya's Great Rift Valley that's
going to have pews and other furnishings, thanks to Don's Franciscan
Peace Award.
-- Bob Stronach, SFO
