Once again God is always faithful and good. This was our second optometric mission to San Francisco de Asis parish in Texiquat, Honduras, about 4 hours by bus southeast of Tegucigalpa. On our first trip in January we held clinic on four days in the town of Texiguat and were able to serve the people there and other nearby villages who chose to walk several hours to restore their sight. This time it was decided to go to 4 villages at distant points in the parish to serve patients more easily in those regions. They were only 10 miles or so, but took an hour or so to traverse the mountainous dirt/rock roads. We feared rains might damage our cases, but God held off the rains for us even though this is their rainy season. We will be buying the plastic cases just in case God decides they need the rain more than we need to protect our cases in the future.

What a difference being in the more rural areas made. We had more farmers that had severe cataracts and this limited our ability to provide glasses for a few. Some of our group were repeaters from the first mission and this helped with improved skill and organization. From our first trip we knew we would need more readers and sunglasses, so we doubled our quantities this time. We dispensed all of the sunglasses, but had some of the mid-range readers left over. Sor Dorly the parish nun/nurse will keep this supply and dispense to her clients until we return in January. She worked extensively with the readers during the clinics so she will be able to help many more of our amigos in Texiguat.

Again working together, praying together (we had Mass or a prayer service before each clinic), eating, playing, talking and laughing together has brought our communities together as one body in Christ. The strong faith and love of most of these people in spite of their lack of material “things” has been a valuable lesson for our entire group.