Songs kept bringing me back.

Going to church on a Sunday morning in Tegucigalpa meant being prepared for befuddling catcalls, long walks, and sweaty colectivo taxi rides. And yet, for the experience to stand alongside the congregation and sing new-to-me songs in Spanish with the congregation, it was worth it.

As a heavily-churched girl, I’d sung just about every hymn in a typical North American English songbook. I knew that each page contained not only a tune, but also a message about who we were and who we ought to be—often pious and self-assured.

But in my two years in Honduras, I started to learn a new repertoire—one that frequently brought tears to my eyes as it seamlessly represented the multifaceted stories and faith of people I was growing to know and love.

During offering in a service, I heard strains of longing in “Saber Que Vendrás” by Jesús García Torralba:

This simple melody captures the group’s week: of long work days, generosity, and unjust and unresolved experiences. In preparation for communion and without offering quick answers, the song held radical hope for a time of enough: food, rest, peace.

It’s fitting that “Saber Que Vendrás” follows in a legacy of moving compositions. The tune is used in Bob Dylan’s “Blowin’ in the Wind,” a Civil Rights Movement anthem, which itself is based off an African-American anti-slavery spiritual, “No More African Block.”

I find offering one of the most vulnerable moments in a church service, so to sing this song then spoke to our gifts purpose and agency behind our gifts. It was impossible to sing and remain disconnected from the physical realities of my pewmate, to not ask how to contribute to the fulfillment of the prophetic statement.

***

Months later, at a devotional, a co-worker led us through a creed—an affirmation of who and what we believe. But instead of reciting somber lines, she sang at an energetic, riveting pace about God’s creation of beauty:

In one breath, she’d celebrated creation and decried environmental exploitation, and my ears perked up. Where was this song going?

Nicaraguan songwriter Carlos Mejía Godoy wrote “Creo en Vos” in the 70s as part of a new mass for his community, melding regional tunes and liberation theology. Thus, the song’s lyrics uphold God’s solidarity with the laborers:

“Creo en Vos” affirms Jesus’ resurrection after dying at the hands of “imperial Romans,” and it believes resurrection is present in those who “struggle to defend the people from exploitation.” Because God is alive and present “in the fields, in the factories, in the schools,” our work there is a testament to our belief in new life.

In these songs, which center the experiences of those living through conditions of poverty and violence, a desire for justice isn’t an occasional theme; it is the key in which faith was sung.

***

I had an opportunity to put this integration into practice while co-facilitating a series of worship sessions with Latina pastor, worship leader, and advocate Sandra Van Opstal. Years before, I’d been moved by her writing that “Worship should foster prophetic imagination that forms us, transforms our communities, and moves us forward in God’s work.” She emphasized that our worship should reflect values of reconciling all things, relocating us in place, and redistributing power in whose stories get told. To find a song in that spirit, I turned to “Danos un Corazón,” or “Give Us God, A New Heart,” an insistent prayer to receive a stronger, bigger heart that loves and acts for others.

In an adaptation by Chilean Cristobel Fones, women are celebrated as divinely-inspired leaders of change:

In the context of the church’s historic exclusion of women, we needed to shout this clear affirmation of women’s belonging and agency. The anthem is also a beautiful testament to dual, interconnected desires: to denounce what is broken, while holding ourselves responsible to be part of the healing; to be transformed, and aim for a transformed world.

***

I give thanks for the gift of those days, as we progressively confessed, affirmed, and called out. And on my favorite days, we’d close with steady claps and a festive step to “Danza a mí País,” or “Dance for My Country.”

The previous songs were directed at God, but this one converses with a neighbor and thus highlights the coexisting realities of life in a country like Honduras:

• To deeply love your people, though your country continuously breaks hearts and even takes lives.
• The possibility of migration and the certainty of never forgetting where one comes from.
• The forces that try to silence voices for peace and the forces that carry on

Without shame or glorifying suffering, “Danza” defiantly and joyously reminds its singers that there is something oppressors can never take away—a dance of hope.

On that day, the day before, and the one to come, experiences of injustice could be overwhelming enough to stamp out sparks of hope and resistance.

But with songs, the people keep coming back.

Note: The translations are far from perfect, but I hope they pay a semblance of tribute to these songs’ deep meaning in Spanish.

Comfort Sampong

Comfort Sampong’s heart is sparked by fried plantains, tropical foliage and the stories of women thriving and creating a way out of no way. She graduated in 2018 with majors in economics and international development. Now she lives in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, where she works on English communications for the Association for a More Just Society, a Honduran non-profit fighting for justice and peace.