A letter from JoElla Holman
August 2011
Dear Friends in Christ,
What do you get when you put 170 Dominican church women together for four days? Worship, activities, education, singing, dancing, and lots of good food! Such was the scene at the church camp in Bani, Dominican Republic (DR), for four days in August. Women leaders from congregations around the country came together for the annual gathering. Buses rolled in all day with their arrivals, the kitchen was full of workers preparing meals, and organizers directed women to their dormitories. Rev. Nidia Morales, who served as chaplain for the event, was busily preparing for evening worship.
The Iglesia Evangelica Dominicana (IED), our partner church in the DR, is the oldest Protestant denomination in the country and will be celebrating its 90th birthday in 2012. The product of a variety of Protestant churches' missionary efforts, including those of English Wesleyans and U.S. Presbyterians and United Methodists, this denomination has been part of our PC(USA) mission story for all of these years. Presbyterian pastors served as some of the first executive secretaries of the young denomination and a number of PC(USA) mission workers have served with them over the years. The IED Women’s Association (AMIED) has been an active force within this church and country since 1947.
Bread making demonstration
The women LOVE to come to this annual Women’s Camp, where they see friends from across the church they may not see for another year. Groups can be seen scattered around the campgrounds, chatting, laughing, hugging. Worship is lively, with lots of singing. And there are special educational sessions with the expectations that the women will take their new learnings back to their home churches.
This year’s educational focus was on Peacemaking: Creating Cultures and Families of Peace. So far in 2011 the news media reports that 105 women have been killed by their domestic partners or ex-partners. The IED’s women are responding to God’s call to peace and peacemaking in a society that is increasingly violent. This year’s Women’s Camp focused its educational sessions on the problem of domestic violence and how the church is being called to respond—particularly through its women reaching out to women.
Under the able leadership of Rev. Betonia Figueroa, the IED has implemented a pilot project on Creating Cultures of Peace. Women Association leaders from local churches in the capital and the south/central area of the country have gathered for all-day educational sessions every two weeks since March to learn about an aspect of violence within families and responses that can be made locally. After each session, the women take that day’s learning back to their local churches and communities to teach another group of women there. At the end of this pilot and its evaluation, the IED hopes to take this program to its congregations in other regions of the country.
The Women’s Camp activities also included mini workshops on a variety of topics of interest, some of which had money-making potential: bread making; decorating sandals; beauty products and regimens; jewelry making. And the nights echoed with laughter at skits and special singing, and dancing the traditional carallas from the peninsula of Samana. It was an unforgettable few days and I’m already looking forward to next year’s gathering.
Please join me in prayer for the IED Women’s Association and for their ministry, especially their new undertaking toward promoting peace in families in the midst of much violence.
Blessings to each of you, your families, and your ministires. May the God of Peace give you peace and joy.
Jo Ella
The 2011 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 280
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