Travel and first day of arrival 12th July

Travelling to Mozambique. The flight to Heathrow was delayed in part due to rain and in part to technical problems at air traffic control in Swindon. We missed our Heathrow connection and ended up travelling via Lagos in Nigeria. This was a longer flight with an additional change and thus we arrived 30 plus hours later than anticipated.

Moving through Lagos airport was an experience. The military took our passports and escorted us to baggage collection. Mine seemed to take for ages to arrive on the conveyor. Perhaps it was still in Heathrow somewhere and the communion ware bought for the parishes here from various closed churches would never see the light of day again. Then we were frog marched, through a crowded airport and through security so we departed from the airport and then along the front of the airport to arrivals, in African heat and bustle. All the time the military guy holding our, by then the group's, 14 passports. We were processed through departures and through security. Then we received our passports back. Johannesburg would have been much easier.

We were met at Mozambique airport and driven straight to Antioch a 2.5 hour drive where the 125th meeting of the synod was already in full swing. After lunch with huge chunks of special birthday cake for IPM we joined the sessions even though tired.

Note on Antioch: The Swiss Mission Church planted their first station on this hill and therefore this special synod was held here. The first mission church burnt down. Other buildings are now derelict following the confiscation of much property by the government in the civil war and due to lack of resources for rebuilding the infrastructure from that time. However in the last year much work has been done on this significant piece of land. New accommodation has been built including the white house built especially for the President of Mozambique’s visit so that he can use the facilities. Synod agreed further finance to restore a derelict large house. It is hoped that the hospital built for the synod can be sustained. The largest project though has been putting electricity in – although its reliability was proven to be patchy over the synod meeting.

Synod Meeting: This equivalent of the URC General Assembly took place from Tues-Fri and we were only part of the last two and bit days. It took place in Portuguese rather than Shanghana, the local language as that is the only language in common across the country as a former Portuguese colony. The North of Mozambique uses a different local language. Translation was patchy and therefore it is difficult to fully aware of the subtleties of what was being discussed. There was an emotive discussion about alcohol and drug abuse and recognition that it is difficult for the church to challenge people of this when pastors are often drinkers. Someone proposed that pastors who drank should be suspended and lay people disciplined. I wondered what the reaction to this debate might have been if it had happened on the floor of the URC Assembly as the issue is similar. In the end this was left to Presbyteries (our synods) to decide.

As with the URC finance is a big issue for the IPM. They currently have no accountant and this is a concern. There is also a massive deficit on the equivalent to the M&M fund. This means that central staff and pastors in poor areas have not been paid for several months. At this point we were exhausted having been travelling all night and the electricity failed so that IPM were concerned about us coping with finding our accommodation so we left without knowing the outcome.

Accommodation for synod and jubilee: We were taken to a guest house but the assumption was we were married so there was not enough space unless we shared a room. So we were driven to the local pastor’s house and a key for another place was found. This has two rooms and was ours on our own until Christine from the Swiss Mission church joined us for the final night. It was basic, no flushing toilet and only a cold shower that at best trickled. But the mosquitoes were not rampant thankfully. For neighbours we had chickens and very loud early morning music from the shack next door.