The Priviledged Touch

Love For Myanmar Ministries Update

Christ Centered, Servant Hearted, Myanmar Focused

“God is big enough to understand suffering, wise enough to allow it, and powerful enough to use it for greater good than any of us can imagine.” Joni Eareckson Tada

For over a decade, Love for Myanmar has provided both spiritual and humanitarian care to the leprosy patients and families in a Mon State hospital and their nearby villages through our chaplaincy and education services. The true devastation isn’t only physical. It’s social—being rejected and forced from their home villages.

The following is a brief story about just one of those lepers who was cast aside by her family and neighbors.

The Privileged Touch

Although I quietly and slowly entered the ward, several patients immediately noticed my presence, and with their eyes invited me closer. For some time, through an interpreter, I engaged each patient in a conversation, trying to move beyond just pleasantries towards more personal matters. Several heartbreaking stories were shared.

As I continued around the ward, I came upon a woman laying on her side facing the wall. Her bed was positioned in such a way that she was separated from the other patients.

We spoke softly to one another as we stood beside her bed thinking she was asleep. However, as I began to pray for her, I heard her turn our way and I opened my eyes. She had her hand stretched towards me. I embraced her hand in both of mine as the interpreter joined us.

Following the prayer, I learned that she couldn’t remember the last time she had a visitor. Aside from the periodic interaction with the hospital staff and her fellow patients, she hadn’t felt the touch of another human being in a very long time. She said she started to turn towards us because she heard an unfamiliar voice in a gentle, reassuring tone and she wanted to know what was being said. I wasn’t using the interpreter in the beginning because we thought she was asleep.

As she turned more our way and her body began to unfold from its side, the interpreter began to share my words with her. My eyes steadied upon her face looking past her withering, distorted shape. I began to see the tears meander down her cheeks forming a small pool of joy just beyond her chin. Our hands tenderly nestled together, our eyes now closed, and while the words drifted between our hearts, I saw, momentarily, what God sees. Hidden beneath her wounds was a loving mother who enjoyed her family. On the other side of her disfigurement was a devoted neighbor who cared for her friends. Beyond the disease was a delightful person around whom everyone felt welcomed.

Now, she is covered by a thinning sheet of failing skin as if that person never existed; left to begin life again in a deformed, frightful body as a stranger, to not only her family and friends, but herself.

A Buddhist and a Christian, hands still clasped, connected by God who was, through prayer, exchanging respect for abandonment, dignity for shame, and love for loneliness. I was overwhelmed with the privilege of being blessed by the touch of a leper.

Gary Watkins, LFM Co-founder

You are invited to consider reaching out to touch the lives of Myanmar’s lepers through our ministry. You can soften the reality of their lives by expressing your compassion through a heartfelt financial gift.

1. As Myanmar’s military continues its offensives in both eastern and western Bago Region—separated by the Bago Yoma mountain range—an estimated 8,000 residents have been forced to flee. There is no official IDP camp. The displaced have to build their own temporary bamboo huts in whatever space they can find in the forest and forage for food themselves.
2. The U.N. Human Rights Council has proposed Kelley Currie as the next Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar, after the term of current mandate holder Tom Andrews comes to an end this month. Currie is a former U.S. ambassador-at-large for global women’s issues and has worked on Myanmar pro-democracy issues at the U.N. for over 30 years.
3. Myanmar has become a major supplier of rare earth elements to China, with exports exceeding $4 billion since the coup. These materials are essential for technologies such as electric vehicle batteries and smartphones. However, the extraction process introduces large amounts of toxic chemicals directly into soil and groundwater. Heavy metals such as mercury and cyanide are entering Myanmar waterways, threatening both ecosystems and human health.
4. Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, acting in his capacity as head of the National Defence and Security Council signed into law the Myanmar Passport Law. Human rights groups and legal analysts describe it as a strategic tool to suppress dissent. By codifying broad powers to refuse and revoke passports, the junta has created a legal mechanism to strand political opponents, activists, and participants in the Civil Disobedience Movement within the country.

Click on photo then on arrows

Myanmar coup: 1,888 days

Prayer request

Please pray that our God not only brings healing to the bodies, minds, and souls of Myanmar’s lepers, but removes their pain and fear of social isolation.

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