PUEBLO NUEVO A RED LANTERN STORY
By Fr. Bob Kus
The purpose of the Red Lantern Foundation is to assist poor Catholic churches in Latin America fund small projects. “Small projects” include such things as fixing a leaky roof, buying tiles for a church floor, purchasing chairs for the sanctuary, and things of this nature. It is not designed for building new church buildings.
However, in August of 2018, I encountered a very poor community of Curarén. It sits on the side of a mountain surrounded by pine trees. The people had no church building, but they had abundant faith for a better future. This community does not yet have electricity.
Because they didn’t have a church, they worshiped in the school building. Like the other churches of the parish of San Francisco de Asís (Reitoca, F.M., Honduras), the Delegados de la Palabra conducted services in the school building every Thursday and Sunday.
In this photo, we see the people walking to the school building for services.
The main Delegado of the community, Israel Hernández, told me the community had a dream of building a church, and he showed me a picture they had drawn. He told me the project would cost a total of $16,000 (US dollars).
After thinking about it, I decided that such a project, though outside the official realm of the Red Lantern Foundation, would be an excellent way to begin our Foundation’s history. It would show that we have faith and hope that in time, our Foundation would grow, flourish, and provide many needed services. Plus, it would be a wonderful opportunity to lay the foundation for publicity and public relations. So, I said we’d help.
The people were ecstatic and went to work immediately. Fortunately, they have not only a close-knit community, they also have a very strong work ethic.
Even the little kids were excited as we see in this photo.
As the church construction began, we were able to visit the community to see how they were getting along. In this photo, the community members that were on hand the day I arrived came into the center of the project for a photo on February 27, 2019.
Two months later, April 27, 2019, I returned to the community, and this is what I found:
The inside of the church looked like this. Note the floor is simple concrete.
Israel said the community was thrilled with their new church, but now they needed a little extra money to buy tiles for the floor. So, the Foundation gave them a little more money for tiles. On February 3, 2020, on the patronal feast day of this church – Our Lady of Suyapa – the people celebrated a special Mass. This photo shows what they were able to do with not much money for tiles
Finally, on March 7, 2020, Fr. Bob Kus celebrated a Mass with the community of Pueblo Nuevo and dedicated their new church building.
Our Lady of Suyapa, Pueblo Nuevo, Curarén, F.M., Honduras – Dedication Day, March 7, 2020.
