Monday, January 21, 2008

HONDURAS -ALMOST KILED IN HURRICANE FIFI- 6000 DIED

     After we learned spanish in Costa Rica,  we moved to the Central American Country of Honduras.     What a  " Weird and Strange "  place it was.   The people for the most part were very kind and gracious.   But there were also some weirdos.  
     One day, very early in the morning -  about 5:00 a.m. , I heard a man yelling in front of our house, "Father, Father, come quickly!!"  in english .   That was strange because in our small town of Puerto Cortez, Hondursaid , nobody spoke english.  We lived on a dirt road just on the edge of town.     So I got up to see what was the problem.   And here was an american in the middle of the dirt road yelling toward our house.  He was very fearful and upset..  So I opened the door and had him come in to see if we could help this upset man.   He was shaking and very fearful.  He said that he had been in a small town near by with some friends he had met in a bar.   When they started talking about worshiping the Devil in some special ceremonies .   And then he said they took a chicken and sacrificed it to the Devil.  Finally, he left because he  felt that they were going to kill him next.   After praying with him to get saved , I told him to get back on his ship,  he was a merchant marine ,  and don't ever come back here again.   
      We had 2 towns in Honduras which were centers for witchcraft and Devil worship.  I generally  tried to stay away from such places.    Two years later we had the worst natural disaster in the history of Honduras : Hurricane Fifi hit killing over 6,000 people.  All communication were knocked out for 5 weeks.  And the world wide news reports said ,that everybody in our area had been killed.  We were right in the middle of the worst national disaster of the entire history of Honduras.   Our family thought that we were all dead.  And there was no way we could tell them otherwise.  Finally, after 5 weeks we were able to get a telegram to the mission that we were safe and sound.  And they notified our family and churches that we were O.K.   We did lose a truck in the storm trying to rescue some workers.  But I was able to walk in the storm,  about 4 blocks , back to our house.  So then we had no transportation for several months to follow.  
     It is amazing that in the 10 churches we were working with in this area , no one had been killed.  Some of  these people  even floated away inside their houses  in the middle of the night. But all of the church member turned up sooner or later.  
     However, when I went to survey the 2 towns that were the centers for witchcraft and Devil worship , I found that since they were beside rivers,   they were completely covered with 10 feet of sand and dirt.   As I walked over the area were the town had been , all you could see was about 1 foot of the roof sticking above the dirt.   The people were  buried alive in the middle of the night.  It was a terrible sight to see and think about.  Over 6,000 people died.   They never knew what hit them.    What a tragedy !   
     And yet the news outlets, forgot to mention that these 2 towns were the main centers for witchcraft in Honduras.   It is a weird and strange place indeed.        

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