Belize

In my work-life, I've been a tourist in the Caribbean and on the company's nickel to boot. Ship the software on time, take my reward, have a good vacation with the family and co-workers and it was great, nice entertainment, beautiful places.

Now, I'm not going overboard here, we all need our time off and somebody's got to pay, so what's my point? There are personal vacations and there are spiritual vacations, you know, a time for service, refreshment and renewal. For the last two years I've been spending April School Vacation in Belize (formerly British Honduras) serving the greater Anglican community and I guess I was a short-term missionary. I met several long-term missionaries and they impressed the hell out of me, someday I might pursue such a vocation, but my gifts are still in their extremely early stage of development, just a baby soul have I.

What qualifies you as a missionary? As a Biblical Scholar, I can barely keep ahead of my Rite-13 students, as a human being I've got issues, as a trip leader, well a good, but short track record. As a Christian computer geek, Halleluiah, I am ready to spread the word. All I need is a little electricity, a Swiss Army knife and a nearby connection to the Internet and voila, something reasonable will happen. Thanks to several donations and the hard work of several members of my last mission team, we delivered 4 new and used computers (complete and first world street legal), a wireless network, Printer/Scanner/Copier, and rehabilitated two existing PCs on site. All software and documentation was delivered in duplicate and an orientation for the teachers at St. Andrew's Primary School in San Ignacio, Belize was held. Plenty of existing computer hardware and savvy in San Ignacio town before I arrived, but the Anglican Diocese of Belize sent four mission teams to the school to complete the new computer room and deliver the computer resources. The outside resources helped make it happen, the teachers, parents and students continue to make it happen in whatever way they believe is fitting.

Keith Hatfield

St. Paul’s, Newton