Mission Trip To Catania, Italy

The letter that follows is something I wrote to family and friends as a follow up to my recent mission trip to Catania, Italy (Sicily). In it, I joke with the readers about "lying" to them. In my initial letter, the "lie" was the fact that I was indeed going on a big trip (not long before that, some family had recently asked me if anything was on the calendar in the near future; I said no, then things promptly changed and suddenly I was going on a trip!). The second "lie" was...well, you can read about that one yourself.

Of course, I think all this is very funny...but you'll have to decide for yourself whether or not it really is--or, if it was just one of those "I guess you had to be there" kinds of things. If nothing else, I hope you enjoy the read.

Here's the letter...

Dear Family and Friends,

I have a confession to make: I lied to you. Again. Well, not really—but sort of. I’m so sorry. What’s wrong with me, anyway?! This is how I started my last letter to you!!! Then again, I didn’t mean to lie… More to the point, I didn’t know that I was lying—so maybe it’s not lying after all???

What in Catania is he talking about?!?!

I told you in my initial letter about my mission trip to Italy that you wouldn’t have to be concerned that I might end up sipping cappuccinos in a chaise lounge chair on the beach. Well…as a point of confession to you, I got dangerously close to doing just that!

Let me explain. The youth camp in Catania took place just a couple hundred yards from a beautiful, private, well-groomed, and palm-thatched umbrella-filled beach along the shore of the Mediterranean Sea. Well, this beach was the location of one of the daily activities on the youth camp schedule. The activity: playing on the beach! (We also enjoyed breakfast there on several mornings. The breakfast consisted of a cup of “granita”—basically a sorbet—a “brioche” roll—a light sweet bread—and a shot of yummy espresso.) This daily fun time at the beach left me feeling almost guilty on several occasions—especially when I recalled my statement to you in my initial letter! (By the way, there were dozens of umbrellas with chaise lounge chairs… But I resisted the temptation to lay down on them lest I break my word to you! I DID, however, take advantage of the opportunity for several early morning swims in the “Med’s” unusually salty water.)

In addition to being a fun, relaxing, and refreshing time (the water was great!), these beach times did provide great opportunities to build relationships with both our Swiss and Italian friends. These instances of being together, along with serving projects (picking up garbage on an adjacent unmaintained beach), Bible studies, worship, sharing of testimonies, meals together, and a memorable trip to the city center, culminated in a teary goodbye by the time we departed.

There is something very striking about the view of the city of Catania from that stretch of beach we frequented. First, the coastline in between “our” beach and the harbor near the city was several miles long and dotted with probably thousands of those palm-thatched umbrellas, arranged in scores of neat rows. Since you have to pay to enter these beaches, we quickly became aware of the importance of tourism to the economy of Catania. Stacked up behind the foreground of beaches, boats in the harbor and the cityscape, were tiers of houses and apartments ascending the foothills. The portrait is completed by the dramatic silhouette of Mt Etna—the 10,000 foot active volcano whose eruptions have buried the city three times throughout history! (The last sizable eruptions caused moderate damage in 2002.) The image of that volcano (not to mention the wowing views during our two flights over the majestic Swiss Alps) remains in my mind as an example of the beauty and power of God’s creation.

Having up to this point in my letter to you given so much attention to descriptions of the environment, I would be MAJORLY remiss if I left you, dear reader, thinking that somehow that were the point of this trip. That was an added bonus—but it wasn’t the point.

The point of our trip was to be used by God—in whatever ways He deemed best—to serve and build relationship with a small group of people from Catania, Sicily. In one way, that can seem like a tall order; and in another, it can almost seem insignificant. Thankfully, it wasn’t (and isn’t) ultimately on us to “make something happen.” It was (and is) on us to make ourselves available—then God did (does) the rest. What was the impact? We can’t know all of the things that were accomplished during our time. Things like picking up garbage on a beach produce immediate identifiable results. Things having to do with seeds of encouragement sown in people’s lives, for example, aren’t so immediately quantifiable. We just did our part. Like Paul says in his letter to the church in Corinth (and I’m paraphrasing): “One person plants, another waters…but God brings the growth.” I love that we got to be a part of something about which we might never get to see the full return on our investment.

I’ll begin to wrap it up with this: This was a fantastic trip. It was challenging, of course, as any mission trip should be—and I’m not just talking about the 35 hours that had elapsed from the time we left our homes ridiculously early the Monday morning of our departure (most would say late Sunday night) until we arrived at the airport in Catania, 5 flights (many of them delayed) later!!! The cultural differences and language barrier were much greater than we anticipated. (I mean, come on, doesn’t everyone speak English? Apparently not in Sicily! =) In Catania, our Italian friends were happy to teach us Italian—but even more excited to pass along expressions from their local dialect (they called it “Catanese”!). In the end, we overcame these potential obstacles, as we experienced the building of relationships with our new friends on the other side of the globe.

Also fantastic was discovering how “rich” we are in our spiritual home here at The Coastlands. Please don’t misinterpret this as bragging about our church; it isn’t. It is, however, a statement of gratefulness. You see, here in this family, we have had the amazing privilege of being mentored by numerous people who have counted it a great blessing to lay down their lives for the sake of teaching and loving others. In Catania, we got to see a young church in the very early stages of its development. Knowing that we might have added something to the potential for them to experience the kind of life-investments we have received brings a satisfaction to my heart and a smile to my face. Thank you, God, for that…and thanks again to all of you for your support and partnership.

Catania, round two? Hmmm… We’ll just have to wait and see.

Grateful and satisfied,

Josh