“I’m Not Leaving Because I’m Needed Here”
Like many in this country, I am on edge. Last week I started crying when Rosiris, the Colombian massage therapist who has been easing my back pain for years, told me: “I’m not leaving Venezuela because I’m needed here. I have to relieve my clients’ pain and tension so they can keep working and win back their country.”
This story may seem very simple, but it isn’t. It would be much more comfortable for this woman to go back to her native country, where she already has her house, her grown children with jobs, social security, peace of mind and so on. But she says she owes Venezuela a great deal and will not abandon it when it needs her most.
Those are the things that shake you and help you keep going in the land where you were born. Those are the things that remind you that love of one’s Homeland is something real, something lived and felt in the mind, the soul and the heart. It is so real that even the Catechism of the Catholic Church, under the Fourth Commandment, paragraph 2239, states that “love and service of one’s country follow from the duty of gratitude and belong to the order of charity.”
But more than what the Catechism says, I think many of us feel love of our Homeland as an immense passion, as something that binds us to our land, to our roots, to our families, to our fellow Venezuelans, to our history, to so many memories, feelings, scents and flavors that are imprinted on our minds, our souls and our hearts in an inexplicably complex way.
Every time I think about how hard it is to stay here, knowing perfectly well that death could come for us at any moment (or, worse, for a child or a grandchild), I think of Saint John Paul II, who lived through two terrible totalitarian states. Yet he loved his Poland with all his heart, and together with many Poles who stayed in their land praying and fighting tirelessly, they won their Freedom.
On Sunday I had a different experience of Mother’s Day. We did not want to miss our family gathering, because those gatherings, I’ll say it again, help us relax and gather strength to keep going. But this time everything was very different. Many mothers who are fighting for a better future for our country dressed in black that day, because we were in mourning for so many unjust deaths and for so much tragedy in our Homeland in recent years, and in recent months.
The mothers who have lost their children, or whose children are unjustly imprisoned, and who could not hug or kiss them on Sunday, were in our thoughts the whole time; our black clothes reminded us. And when the time came to pick up the instruments and liven up the gathering with our Venezuelan music, those of us who had come together to celebrate (at least in my family) cried as we never had before. Because all the injustice hurts us deeply.
When my sister-in-law saw me crying, she said, with tears in her eyes: “Do you think, sis, that we could leave here and abandon Venezuela?” And I told her: “Of course not. I could never live in peace.”
So on Sunday we ate and danced, but we also cried! And we did it in front of many children who were running around with their cousins and playing, and couldn’t understand why their mothers were crying. My daughter asked me: “Mommy, what hurts?” and I answered: “Nothing, sweetheart, don’t worry.” I couldn’t tell her that my soul and my heart were hurting, because she wouldn’t have understood! Our student children who were there did understand. Their eyes said it all. Those pure eyes, full of hope, full of dreams and longing… It was tremendously moving when we sang “Happy Birthday” for that month’s birthdays (there were six), and at the end we all started shouting: “Students!”… clap, clap… “Students!”… clap, clap…
How proud I am to live in Venezuela right now! We are making history. And I love the history of my country. I love my Homeland madly. I love my Venezuelans madly.
Today I give a thousand thanks to those who came to this country and are staying now to help us. It is truly admirable! I give infinite thanks to so many fathers, mothers, grandparents, teachers… people of integrity and good example who are here supporting a generation of young people unlike any other in our history. That generation will make Venezuela live in Truth, with Freedom, Justice and Peace for all. That is what so many of us are praying and working for!
Long live our beloved Venezuela! May God and the Most Holy Virgin of Coromoto keep giving us the strength and wisdom to put an end to hatred and injustice, so that Love and honesty may shine in every corner of our beloved Homeland. And so it will be. I am absolutely certain of it!