“Only a woman, only she can reach another woman’s heart…”
I have always been moved by the expression of our founding Father: “Only a woman, only she can reach another woman’s heart…”
My Dear Sisters:
I want to share with you how this expression of our founding Father is heard by myself since I was in my internship and how it has marked my pastoral life with women in different countries…
Sisters, without taking out the first sense of these words, my experience is that “the woman,” with whom I have shared, and I still share the mission ordered to her, has always known how to reach my heart.
The expression “…only she can reach another woman’s heart” means in my context:
- To indicate the path to follow
- To touch the concrete reality
- To be “there”
- Walk together
- To listen, to understand and then to adapt the message to her reality…
To come to this conclusion, I developed an adapting process to the concrete reality…I remember that though I was still a novice in my first place of mission (Kabinda), when I went to teach my first workshop about literacy, I thought I was going to find the students on time in the classroom, but I found an unexpected reality: most of the students went to their farms, some went to find water and other students were accompanied by their grandmothers in the school. There were many things to do before starting the workshop…and I, I was anxious and nervous expecting for them.
In fact, in different opportunities the schedule was modified as well as the focus of my topic, which had been elaborated “from my community, with my brain, that is to say, in a comfortable and adequate environment, but without taking into account their reality.”
With time, I understood how important is not to do everything as planned, but to get into their reality to learn from it and to understand their situation. With their collaboration, the changing or transformation process really starts.
The woman who reached my heart with those simple steps did it before I reached hers.
Thank you.
