Making connections through song and prayer

Aurora Flores Avila is a sophomore nursing major with a minor in Spanish.

After a late night of singing and prayer we all awoke sleepy eyed and ready for another day of church camp. The day’s activities started with breakfast at 8:00 am. We were joined by Pastor Smiley and members of the church community.

So what is church camp? Every year members of Black Mountain Mennonite Church come together to share songs, prayers, and lots of delicious food! Usually church camp lasts 3-4 days. Church members bring their tents and set up camp right outside the church. Thus the name “church camp”.

Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, Black Mountain Mennonite Church was unable to celebrate church camp in 2020. This year many people were looking forward to it. You could see the excitement and joy in people’s faces as they reconnected with their friends and other members of the church community. Unfortunately, church camp was much smaller than previous years. Many people are still suffering from the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic. After exchanging a few words with Pastor Smiley, he said that less than half of the congregation joined us for church camp this year. Many people, even though they are vaccinated, still feel uneasy about being in public. He went on to say that he was not worried because people will make their way back at their own pace. “It takes time”, he said, “for people to start feeling comfortable again”.

We are thankful for those who were able to join us for church camp. We were able to connect and start relations with members of the community. One of the ways in which we bonded with members of the community was through singing. We have many talented vocalists among our group and also many people who enjoy singing. We realized quite quickly that members of the church community also love to sing. And so we sang! We sang for each other and we sang together.

One of the songs we sang together was “Jesus Loves Me” which in Navajo translates to “Jesus Ayóó’ áshó’ ní.” A woman from the congregation taught us how to sing this song in Navajo. It is true when people say that the Navajo language is one of the most difficult languages to learn. However, after a few hours of practice we reached the point where you could understand what we were singing. We performed this song as best as we could for the rest of the congregation at church camp and were met with rounds of applause and smiles.

As a result of church camp, we were also able to connect with families which would eventually become our host families. Church camp provided the space we needed to start building those relationships. By the end of church camp we all had an idea of who our host families would be.