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	A letter from Karla Koll in Guatemala

	June 2003 Ana Nicolasa Yac Colop was one of my students. She was already part of the CEDEPCA group working at the Bible institute level in Pachaj, Cantel, when I started accompanying the group at the beginning of 2001. As we studied how to relate the biblical text to the context of indigenous communities in Guatemala, Ana Nicolasa brought to our discussions the knowledge about conditions throughout the countryside she had gained through her work with different non-governmental organizations. In 2002, Ana Nicolasa joined the university-level theology seminar I led on gender and identity in Quetzaltenango. Ana Nicolasa knew what it was to confront the prejudices of her community concerning gender in order to develop her gifts and live out her calling in Christ to serve others. As she began secondary school, her parents stopped paying for her education. They believed that education would be wasted on a woman who was destined to get married. Ana Nicolasa found scholarship help that allowed her to finish her secondary degree as a home economics teacher. She loved her work in community development, though she often had to travel alone.

	Rafael Escobar, General Coordinator of CEDEPCA, at Ana Nicolasa's grave.		In Maya K'iche' culture, women generally aren't considered adults until they are married. Ana Nicolasa had managed to become an adult in the eyes of her community as a single woman. She was the first single woman chosen to be a deaconess in the Gethsemane Presbyterian Church in Pachaj. Though her church would not ordain her as an elder because she was a woman, they asked her to be the church treasurer, an office in which she served with careful efficiency for two years. She also worked beyond her own church community in many ways, including her own radio program on a community station and by teaching CEDEPCA classes on healthy relationships to young people in a nearby Catholic parish. Ana Nicolasa also had become an active participant in CEDEPCA events in Guatemala City and elsewhere.

	As 2003 began, Ana Nicolasa, who had been out of work for several months, started a new job with Intervida, a Spanish development agency. She was very excited, even though the job meant that she left her home at 3:00 AM on Monday mornings to travel to the village in the department of El Quiche where she was helping a group of widows devise a development plan. She didn't return to Pachaj until late on Friday nights.

	On April 4, Ana Nicolasa and a group of her co-workers were returning from El Quiche when the vehicle in which they were riding was involved in an accident. After twelve days in a coma in a hospital in Guatemala City, Ana Nicolasa died on Holy Wednesday. She was twenty-nine years old. Her wake was held on Maundy Thursday in the concrete-block house she had built for herself within the adobe walls of her parents' yard. The next day, Good Friday, hundreds of people, evangelicals and Catholics together, filled the streets of Cantel as we buried her. In her death, as in her life, she had brought the community together.		Ana Nicolasa's nieces, along with a neighbor girl.

	Ana Nicolasa's death occurred just as I was putting the finishing touches on my doctoral dissertation, which I successfully defended at Princeton Theological Seminary on May 16. A few months ago, a visitor from Minnesota asked me if I was looking forward to having an advanced degree. I realized then that I have learned far more over the years from Central American sisters and brothers like Ana Nicolasa than I could have possibly learned from any graduate program. I am grateful for the privilege of having known Ana Nicolasa. She inspired me with her courage. She prodded me with her questions. With her gentle ways and quiet wisdom she reminded me often that the struggle to bring positive changes to the lives of Mayan women in Guatemala will be long. There will be no magic solutions, but we must be faithful and work for life with dignity for all, for this is what God calls us to do. Ana Nicolasa left behind seven nieces, ages two to ten. I spent many hours with these girls as we mourned together. Though these girls have now lost an important role model, my prayer is that they will have the opportunity to develop their gifts, so that they might serve their communities as Ana Nicolasa did. I think of these girls often, as Tamara and I are now far away from them in the United States on interpretation assignment. Tamara and I will be returning to Guatemala on August 9. Javier joined us for a week, but he has returned to his studies in Guatemala. While we are in the States you may contact us at kakjtb@yahoo.com. Blessings, Karla For all of us The 2003 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, page 244

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