Hope

Written 8/16/12

As I sat in the teen pregnancy awareness meeting today with 20 girls from the community listening to what they want to do when they grow up, my heart broke. The number of girls that graduate high school without getting pregnant is getting lower, the number of girls that go to university is very low, the number of girls who graduate high school is lower than that of the boys who graduate due to dropping out to care for children or to satisfy their abusive boyfriends. So as I listen to the handful of girls that want to be doctors and the future nurses and lawyers tell me they have big plans for their lives, I can't help but wonder how many of the single moms with multiple babies from multiple fathers once had these very same ambitions. Talking to the girls in the class more, they don't know what it takes to accomplish those goals. They don't understand the cost or the fact that they would be a very very small minority that went to college and would have to fight every social norm in this town to get to Capetown to study. Not to mention the drive and determination it would take to study at the level they would need to. Don't get me wrong, I'm in no way saying they shouldn't try. I believe every single one of them should fight to make a life for themselves and to independently take care of themselves, but the more and more I learn about this community, the more I'm aware I'm a dreamer and not realistic in any way. We have learned that girls as young as 11 years old have babies here but the average age is around 16. Most of the families either don't have a father present or the father figure is a man that beats his wife and children so the boys grow up learning that's what a man does and the girls learn that you take the abuse. Drug abuse is rampant and kids don't know any other way than what their parents have done their entire lives. Countless babies are born addicted to drugs or with fetal alcohol syndrome. The reality of Lambert's Bay breaks my heart countless times a day. The injustice is so apparent that a blind man can see it. But then I hear these little girls say they want to be doctors, lawyers, singers, and nurses and even tho I know the reality that maybe only one or two of them will actually escape the statistics, I can't help but to think of the hope they have of something greater. We join with local ministries to help not just show hope, but to put hope into motion and teach the teens in the community how to accomplish those goals and how to change the mentality that women are worth less than men and that men can do whatever they want to women and subsequently whatever they want in every area of their lives.

Unfortunately, this hope has a long way to go. From my seat in the class today, I had a perfect view of a beautiful 15 year old colored girl, with a palm size bruise on her left cheek. While Mariki talked to the girls, she laughed at all the uncomfortable parts and seemed to be one of the more confident girls in the class and it was apparent that she wanted you to think that about her. She told the group she wanted to be a singer when she gets older and even shared some of her incredible God-given talent. But as she opened her awe-inspiring mouth to sing for us, I couldn't help but notice that when she sang, she seemed free. Those same eyes didn't look free as she laughed at Mariki. She did a very good job of covering up the truth, as many of the girls do here. I'm told they don't talk about abuse and no one asks, even if they know the truth for fear of a worse beating or being beaten to death for opening their mouth in a negative way about their significant other or father. As Mariki spoke, her eyes were heavy. She looked burdened and hurting but didn't want anyone to know. We never found out where the marks came from, but it doesn't matter. I blatantly saw, for the first time, the injustice that has such a stronghold on Lambert's Bay and many of the surrounding communities. My heart and life will never be the same, but this isn't about me. It's about the hundreds of women and girls that are under the impression that they are utterly defenseless to the men who provide for them. My prayer is not just that God would some way, somehow break through the strongholds and destroy the chains that hold the people of Lambert's Bay so strongly captive but that He would use them to spread His love and heart to the entire Western Cape and set this entire province and ultimately South Africa on fire for His name! There is potential. There are leaders. There is desire. There are ways. There is hope.