MALTA!
So small, so beautiful!
So far yet so near
and
dear to my heart!

This is Fr. Alfred Valerian Mercieca writing from Bolivia. Have been a Carmelite Missionary working in South America for 36 years, spending most of the time in the Republic of Bolivia. Yet I have worked too in neighboring Peru in the early sixties, Brasil in the late seventies and later helped in the Republic of Columbia, before coming back again to La Paz, Bolivia, where again, I have been living for the last 10 years.

Although I have been living in this continent for a lifetime now, far away from my country, right in the middle of the Andes Mountains, at an altitude of twelve thousand feet above sea level, I wonder what were the plans of the good Lord for me, to share my little existence, so far away from my country, with these beautiful people.

Reminiscences of Malta? Of course, they do come. And many! When? Precisely when I feel exhausted and tired, after a hard-long-day of work. Since I left Malta for the missions in Bolivia at a very young age,(24), memories of a happy childhood and adolescence take hold of my inner self.

Although I hail from St.Venera, I enjoyed going to my school at Hamrun. I still cherish with nostalgia the month of May in school, whenever I remember all of us singing "Fil-Hlewwa ta Mejju", first thing before entering into our respective classrooms....

Christmas Mass at midnight at St. Venera little old church, was a tiny bit of Heaven on earth, I'll never forget. I did not understand latin, then, but I loved and enjoyed every piece of the liturgy.

Who would tell me then, that someday in the future, I would be one of those Carmelite Fathers, who would give the mass myself for poverty stricken children and marginated poeple in Bolivia, Peru, Brasil and Colombia? It was in the northeast of Brasil, one Christmas night, where I passed all night on the road, driving an old open Willys, hopping from one Chapel to another, to say Mass for saintly people, all them waiting for the father, to have their Christmas mass too. After attending four mission stations in a row, the last mission station to have mass was after 2 o'clock in the morning!

The street where I was born..and grew up?
All the neighbours where one nice big family; we children, all good friends. "Let's play cowboys. Today, you're the horse, I'm the cowboy.." The day after, we would make it to the fields, overlooking Msida Valley to catch butterflies. Yes, I still cannot forget my jumping over rocks and looking for "narcis" to take back home with me and put them before the statue of Our Lady...

Summertime!
Somewhere after supper, many families used to share praying the Rosary together, while everybody kept sitting enjoying the nights peace and breeze, in front of their respective house.

And what about our maltese beaches! Bolivia lost the coast to neighboring Chile, a hundred years ago. We are a landlocked country. So we see no sea at all. Lake Titicaca, the highest navigable lake on earth, is two hours away from where I live, and it lies at 3.800 meters above sea level. Its greenish-blue cristal waters remind me of our beautiful Mediterranean, but it is cold all year round, the temperature being always low, and it makes it difficult for the body to support. Swimming and enjoying our incomparable maltese beaches in summer afternoons at the Exiles, is what I miss most.

What a peaceful sensation is mine, when I dream of walking in short sleeves, around Sliema Promenade, chatting all the way with some friend of mine. I mention this, because in La Paz, Capital city of Bolivia, you always have to wear heavy underwear and jumpers, as if it were winter all year round.

My work in Bolivia has been different, according to the local church`s needs during my stay over here. Been a Pastor for a long time, and after finishing building the local parish church, I was asked by the Archbishop to take over the Coordination of Christian Base Communities.

After five years as Coordinator, I felt I was called by the Lord to work for a Bolivian Carmelite Community, and thus build the foundations of the Carmelite Order in Bolivia, this time with local carmelite vocations.

For this end, we have been living through donations and alms of friends the Lord sends us on the way. Until now we have been able to survive. More young people like the project and have asked us to take them in whenever our budget can make ends meets.

My work then, is actually, formation work. We have already two professed bolivian carmelite brothers who are studying Theology at the Catholic University. Another one is a Pre-novice, and is doing his Pre-University preparations.

Simultaneously, I am supporting two foreign Missionary Congregations of Women Religious, helping them to put their roots in Bolivia. One is Peruvian and the other one is Italian. Of course, I have been a spiritual counsellor of the Congregation of Good Sheperd for over twenty years.

E-mail to: Fr. Val Mercieca

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