Mission work has improved the lives and enlivened the faith of rural Peruvians.
By Fr. Paul Prendergast

When I celebrated my 40th anniversary of ordination in my native New Zealand a couple of years ago, I naturally looked back over these years as my life as a priest. It has always been a satisfying experience; I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way.

A lot of my fond memories come from the fact that the Columbans got it right when they sent me to Peru as a missionary. It has been a good fit, and I have been in Peru on and off during my entire priesthood.

When I arrived in Lima in 1966, my first parish was St. Martin de Porres. Most of the parishioners were originally from the mountains and always seemed to speak of the lack of priests and poor church services there.

They had to walk for days to get a baptism or a wedding accomplished. At some stage, a couple from the Ayacucho area in the mountains south of Lima invited me to stay in their small town for a couple of weeks. This visit confirmed a lot of what I had been hearing.

People asked me to visit their towns in the area. Their idea was traditional: taking a priest along to celebrate feasts. A group of people asked why we didn’t establish a mission in these places instead of just visiting. We could teach catechism and prepare them for the sacraments, these people said. The people in the parish feel good about themselves and their faith, they told us.

After hearing this, we established a missionary group designed to bring the Church to these mountain villages. We met three times a week to prepare 20 lay people who spoke Quechua, the local language, to assist us.

Making A Difference Over Time
When we started these small mission efforts, we were not supposed to leave Lima. But we realized that only a few hours of travel outside Lima would take you to villages that had never been visited by a priest. We talked with a couple of parish priests in those areas, and we were invited to visit.

We would go to the villages on Fridays and come back on Sundays. The parish priest set up a timetable so we could visit six to eight different villages. In each one, we would celebrate Masses, the sacraments, pray for the dead and teach catechism. We made it clear that the Catholic Church was interested in these people and their lives.

Fr. Paul Prendergast is greeted by a Peruvian woman in a village where Columbans serve in rural Peru.

During my second stint in Peru, I was assigned to Sicuani, southeast of Cusco, the ancient capital of the Inca Empire.

I went to the nearby village of Yanaoca, where I still work. At first, I was frightened by the high altitude; most of the area is more than 12,000 feet above sea level.

When I arrived, two American and three Peruvian Religious Sisters already living there had set up comedores (communal food kitchens). There was a parish radio station, technical school and boarding house where girls who lived far from town stayed.

We had about 12 well-prepared and interested catechists in Yanaoca who visited about 15 villages, performing most of the pastoral work. Overall, about 20 people evangelize in the area.

We also train catechists, many of whom have 40 to 50 years in the Church. We send them to a catechist training course in Sicuani, which gives them confidence, and they feel they belong to the Church.

When the Sisters left Yanaoca, they closed the boarding house. I took over the projects they had been running, and the Columbans’ generous benefactors helped me out financially to keep the school and the food kitchen afloat.

About 300 people visit the food kitchen each day, and we feed them regardless if they can afford to pay us or not.

The students leave home for school early and don’t have time for a proper meal before setting out for the day. They bring lunches of corn or boiled potatoes, which are not very nourishing. They study all morning, finishing their classes at 1:30 p.m. before the two-hour hike back to their homes. The healthy lunches we provide make a great difference to their health and their ability to study.

The other main organization in Yanaoca is the technical school. For three years, about 90 to 100 students are taught carpentry and motor mechanics, which will help them get jobs and improve their self-image.

Peruvian Sisters in Yanaoca do pastoral work, specializing in helping women who have suffered sexual or physical abuse in their homes. Their work is well-accepted, because there is a great need for it.

The villagers in the mountains of Peru don’t have a bad life. The people are poor, but they live within their traditional culture, so they have strong community and family bonds. They live comfortably and work well together.

For me, my life in Peru is about the simple reality of being there together with them.