Once again I find myself asking for prayers of strength, determination and fierce love in the face of desperate acts.

"Our church has been robbed," Viviana, the pastor and close friend of mine, struggled to tell me on the phone. "They took everything and I don't know what we're going to do".

The church I attend is a small, but tight-knit community of approximately 50. The pastors and family live in the house where we congregate, so clearly, they also were burglarized. We did not have much in the way of instruments, nor the did family have much in the way of anything, but what was there was cherished, and it has been taken.

The burglary does not seem to have been politically motivated, and everyone is safe, so thank God for that.

However, the instruments in the church were stolen, computers, televisions, and credit cards, which have already been maxed and have indebted the person who owned them.

Perhaps scariest - or perhaps most miraculous - is that the children of the pastors were just walking in the door of the house while the robbers were still there, and the elder heard something and was wise enough to decide to leave and go to an aunt's house until her parents returned home. Commonly in Bogotá robbery is armed and people are often hurt. It is also likely that the perpetrators live in the same neighbourhood as our church, and that they are connected with illegal groups who run the delinquent crime in the area.

We ask now that you pray for us.

Pray for strength to not allow fear to grip us and guide our actions or thoughts.
Pray for determination to stand firm in our ministries of social justice and peace building despite the difficulties that confront us.
Pray for fierce love, to enter our hearts to forgive and understand that these acts are done out of a desperation born from seemingly impossible reality.

This Sunday my church will gather and celebrate the love feast, as we are celebrating the month of love and friendship in Colombia. I hope you will join us in spirit and laughter as we find ourselves celebrating without instruments, but with music that will not be silenced.

In peace and blind hope,

Rebecca