You have no idea what it means to pray until you have driven in Kampala.

There are no signs. The rules are unwritten. The most dangerous driver is a cautious mzungu (white person). Francis, our driver, is fast, nimble, and seems to have a prophetic gift for knowing when there will be enough space in traffic to get through what seem to be countless obstacles.

One constant fixture is the Toyota taxi-bus overfilled with passengers, usually with colorful names (such as this one) emblazoned on the back window. Most of these are the same model. If two of them run into each other, the rule is they both pull over and exchange parts by the side of the road, the one at fault giving up a new fender or door to the victim. Most of the time they work it out because they know if they have to get the police involved it will be expensive for everybody.

Another is the boda-boda; these are motorbikes that carry individual passengers hanging on to the driver for dear life as they thread through the other traffic at high speed. Yes, people die. Don’t ever take one anywhere.

And remember the words of Saint Paul: pray constantly.

If you come to East Africa, you must be prepared for the frequent invocation of these seven words.

I’m always interested to see how Americans react to the frequent shifts in schedule brought about by conditions on the ground in a country like Uganda, where poor infrastructure, rapid-fire cellphone communications, and a cultural disposition generally toward the flexibility of time, all combine. Schedules are, at best, estimates, sketches of leading possibilities, which may be altered drastically at any moment. Some Yanks get completely undone by this, others easily go with the flow. The best way to view time, here, is as an ongoing portal for the Holy Spirit. Time is not something inanimate to be carved up into chunks. It is more like an inseparable element in a jazz composition that can only be written down after it has happened. You know where you were and what you did, more or less, but not really where you are going or what you will do. If you can’t live with that, you might want to explore mission in Switzerland instead.

Hellen Grace Akwii

Yesterday began as planned. I met with the Kampala leadership staff of Pilgrim for their weekly Monday morning devotions, led by our in-country co-ordinator, Hellen Grace Akwii. Hellen is the former Anglican Observer to the UN and is able to handle just about anything anywhere at any time. I am constantly impressed by her competence, resourcefulness and good humor. She is co-ordinating all the aspects of my visit, and I simply could not be in better hands. So, I led a meditation on 1 Thessalonians 1: 6-8 on how God has used Pilgrim staff to broadcast His glory even in a time and place of such affliction as post-war Teso, through the joy of the Holy Spirit which I see in their work and in their faces, and which I hear about everywhere. Continue reading →

I arrived at three in the morning, Kampala time. After a couple of hours’ sleep, I was up and dressed and on my way to church in Namuwongo. This is fairly typical of the urban slums in East Africa: small earthen huts with corrugated iron roofs jammed together, sewage running in ditches through narrow alleys, children everywhere, garbage everywhere. The walk from the main road to the church takes about five minutes, unless you are Pastor Wilson Opio.

Pastor Wilson is in charge of Namuwongo Revival Church, a Pentecostal congregation he founded in 1993.  On Sunday mornings, he dresses in an immaculate dark suit, white shirt and bright tie, his shoes polished, and he walks through the mud and the garbage to the church.  The trip takes him easily a half-hour.  People come out of their homes to greet him.  He stops to talk with nearly everyone he meets, including several small children, shakes their hands, asks how they are doing, sometimes lays hands on them and prays for them.   Today he is in Rwanda on mission, so I am walking with his assistant, Brother William Omara.  Even though we take our time, it takes seven minutes.  People are polite as we pass, but they do not give us their hearts as they do Pastor Wilson.  They do not know me, but they all know him. Continue reading →

Since 2007, I have helped direct Pilgrim Africa, an ecumenical ministry of evangelism and redevelopment for northeast Uganda.  I will be writing and supplying updates over the course of my current trip to that region.

I am sitting on a plane in Istanbul, about to head to Entebbe, Uganda.  From my window I can see the minarets of a mosque, and around me is a swirl of languages — European, Asian and African.

The Wi-Fi situation at the airport here turned out to be hopeless, so I will have to wait until Sunday to post something longer..

For now, know that I am going to renew old friendships; support the work of Pilgrim Africa in public health, malaria control, education, and agriculture; build relationships for the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh with the churches of Uganda; and, explore mission possibilities for us as a diocese, especially in the areas of medicine and education.  I will be meeting with bishops, pastors, physicians, teachers, lots of schoolchildren, farmers, midwives, government ministers, social workers and dozens of Pilgrim field staff.

I hope you will see this as an exciting opportunity for the Diocese of Pittsburgh to begin to make new friendships with a community I have known for years, and that builds on work some of you have already started in western Uganda and Rwanda.  Please pray for my journey, that God will be glorified in all I say and do here. You are all in my prayers and I know I bring you with me in spirit and in my heart.

Fondly in Christ,
+Dorsey
crux est mundi medicina