Maryknoll Lay Missioners from the Archdiocese of Baltimore serve in Kenyan mission

Two Baltimore-area parishioners are among the 13 Maryknoll Lay Missioners who recently arrived in Africa to serve in a variety of cross-cultural ministries.

Megan Hamilton, a parishioner of St. Vincent de Paul in Baltimore, and Francis Wayne, a parishioner of St. Matthew in Northwood, traveled to Kenya after their “Mission Sending Ceremony” Dec. 11 at the Queen of Apostles Chapel on the Maryknoll campus in Ossining, N.Y. They currently reside in Nairobi, where they are studying the Swahili language and undergoing cultural orientation before beginning their respective ministry assignments in Mombasa.

Ted Miles, a Baltimore native, has led the program as executive director of Maryknoll Lay Missioners for four consecutive years.

“Maryknoll Missioners commit to modeling the example of Jesus – leaving the world better than you found it and making a meaningful contribution, particularly to the lives of those who are often marginalized, alienated and impoverished,” Miles said.

Miles grew up in the parishes of St. Agnes in Catonsville and St. Louis in Clarksville. Before taking his current position in New York, he was a parishioner of St. Matthew.

In the Archdiocese of Baltimore, Miles worked as a youth minister at St. Michael in Poplar Springs and as a teacher at The Cardinal Gibbons School in Baltimore. He also served at Baltimore-based Catholic Relief Services.

“Baltimore helped to nurture the seeds of service and justice in me, and I think that’s what you see in Megan and Francis,” he said. 

Hamilton is a former art critic for Baltimore City Paper and one of the co-founders of the Creative Alliance in Highlandtown, where she was program director for more than 20 years.

She grew up Catholic until fourth grade, when her mother and she separated from the church. As she worked to overcome alcoholism, she said she had to find “a greater power than herself” as she followed a 12-step addiction recovery program. She suddenly became interested in finding a religion again.

In 2011, Hamilton was riding her bicycle when a woman ran a red light and hit her. It was a serious accident and reinforced her desire to embrace faith. In 2012, she re-engaged with her Catholic faith at St. Vincent de Paul, where she said she felt “instantly at home.” She received the sacrament of reconciliation and was welcomed again into the Catholic Church.

“St. Vincent was really inspiring,” she said. “There were a lot of amazing examples of service with the low-income and homeless people and Catholic education partnerships established in an economically challenged neighborhood. Seeing these people work their faith on the ground, in the street, in the park and next to the church was very important for me.”

She also has found inspiration in the mission work of the early Maryknoll Sisters, who had such a deep commitment to their overseas missions that they would die and be buried overseas.  

Hamilton has previously served as a missioner with the Franciscan Mission Service in Jamaica. In her Jamaica mission trip she used the 12-step program to minister to people who wanted to become sober. She helped with medicine, assisted religious sisters with dementia, volunteered at a soup kitchen and helped the marginalized. She previously volunteered with the Peace Corps in Albania.

Hamilton said the 12-step program in Baltimore helped her with her 29 years of sobriety. She noted that the U.S. National Survey on Drug Use and Health showed that more than 75 percent of Americans addicted to alcohol or drugs recover.

“I want to use my recovery story to help folks to get and stay sober,” she said. “It is one part of my international volunteer vocation.”

Although her mission assignment has not been finalized, she expects to do alcohol and drug recovery ministry in Mombasa. 

“I want to be the best missionary I can be,” she added. “I think I’m called to do this for the rest of my life.”

Wayne recalls having a prayer life since he was a young boy; he was an altar boy and would pray the rosary in the evenings.

He served as a Maryknoll Lay Missioner in Kenya from 1993 to 1996, teaching carpentry to boys in the Mathari Valley slums and building residences for the Irish Sisters of Mercy who cared for street children in Nairobi. He later became a stay-at-home father and took care of his two children. In his most recent years, he worked as a contractor in Riva for home repairs.

Wayne has volunteered for prison ministry, Alternatives for Violence, the Appalachian Service Project and Boys to Men.

“I enjoyed becoming a mentor and a listener,” he said when traveling with boys to Appalachia to repair homes in some of the poorest neighborhoods of the country. “To be a Christian is to be of service.”

After his children grew up, he felt a call again to serve as a missioner in 2018 at the Maryknoll Lay Mission Jubilee when he got a “calling card” from the Maryland area contact associate from the Maryknoll Lay Missioners. 

He recalls seeing disciples having lunch with the Maryknoll sisters and lay missioners across the table from him and desiring to become a missioner again. 

“It felt like God was fishing and he hooked my heart,” he said. “I thought, ‘I’m just going to surrender.’ It makes the mission a happy place to be.”

He was accepted once more to the Maryknoll Lay Missioners program in 2019 and was ready to go on mission in 2020. However, due to the coronavirus pandemic, his mission trip had to be postponed.

He expects his future ministry assignment to be related to his previous ministries and professional career life, such as teaching carpentry at a technical school, joining an active group with Alternatives for Violence and serving the homeless population in Mombasa.

According to a press release, the missioners commit themselves “to witness the Good News of Jesus Christ, in solidarity with our brothers and sisters who are marginalized and oppressed,” and, “to care for the earth, our common home, and to respond in service to help create a more just and compassionate world.”

The Maryknoll Lay Missioner program begins with an eight-week orientation and formation program and proceeds with a “Mission Sending Ceremony.” Missioners then receive language and cultural instruction at their mission country for approximately six months and then are sent to their specific mission assignment for three years. 

“I am a firm believer that God calls everybody,” Miles said. “Not everybody is called to live very simply and go around the world. Mission can happen in our own backyard.”

He added, “I would encourage people to look at their joys, strengths, and discern, ‘Where is God calling you?”

Email Priscila González de Doran at pdoran@CatholicReview.org

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