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We set out, cards in hand, to give out invitations. We're beginning an outreach specifically for girls in our neighborhood, those from 12 to 18 years old. Our hope is to gather weekly and share an activity and some purposeful conversation and some food and some fun and maybe even some transparency, one with another. It's a new thing.

It takes only a few steps to remember that we are not in American suburbia. We comment cheerfully that the street is finally dry. After all, just a week or so ago, green waters lapped the sidewalks, the deep where two streets intersect. A product of bad drainage and a pump project gone bad, the pond had been a fixture since the beginning of the year. Now finally, all that remained is dusty dry mud tracks, petrified dune bumpers on the edges of the road.

As we pass by, my landlord calls us over cheerfully. Chickens peck around his driveway and a couple of dogs and cats lounge lazy in the heat. His birthday is coming up and preparations for the annual celebration have begun. His family is slaughtering a pig to be roasted, and he invites us up the driveway to see. We congratulate him on another year, but cheerfully decline a closer look at tomorrow's dinner.

We turn the corner and see flashing lights at the end of the street, probably an ambulance. We're not the only ones wondering what is happening- lots of neighbors have come out to gaze and guess. We talk to some boys we haven't seen in a while, and exchange the traditional handshake fist bump, reminding them of our weekly community center activities. We greet the parents of one of our girls and leave an invitation. We see her eyes in her dad and her smile on her mom and her face in miniature in her as her little sister peeks up at us.

We go to a corner store, the workplace of a mom of one of our girls. The store owner and my teammate exchange compliments on each other's clothing and we laugh. We learn our girl has moved, and backtrack in search of her. We find her at home a couple of blocks away, in a house without glass in the windows, one some might think abandoned. She greets us with a smile and hurries to change her clothes and put on shoes and join our merry band. We cross the street to meet a neighbor and extend an invitation to two more girls.

The search continues. We walk down streets and look for girls along the way. We give invitations to two girls on their way out of the house. We step into a nearby papelería, lotería cards and wrapping paper hanging from the walls. We crowd through the doorway and lean across a glass-topped case, and leave another invitation with the mom behind the counter.  

We stop at the house of another friend, and find her grandma sitting out front. A family member opens the gate for us and extends a hand and a hello. We greet grandma with a handshake and a kiss on the cheek and ask about her grandkids. She promises to give our invitation to her teen.

We walk towards our young friend's house again. "I like going with you all," she tells us. "Everyone smiles and is nice to you." We laugh, because really it is true. We have no concerns as we walk up and down our streets amongst our neighbors. And yet, I also sigh, because I know that if she weren't with us, the situation would be much different. We have seen how some men look at these girls. All of our kids know stories about violence. We have heard from them threats of robbery and of kidnapping.

We know that our God has been here from the beginning of time, and He is yet bringing light into darkness in this very place.
Be alert, be present. I’m about to do something brand-new.    It’s bursting out! Don’t you see it? (Isaiah 43:19)
Yes, yes we do.