Earthquake, Letter of Sr. Pushpa

This is the letter of Sister Pushpa Canis Macwan to her Provincial. Sister Pushpa serves God in Chile. She is from Mariyampura,Petlad in Gujarat in India. In this letter she has described the Chile 8.8 scaled Earthquake.

Hello friends,

I know that many of you are eagerly waiting to hear the news of the earthquake in Chile. Thanks to all of you, who showed concern in our pain and fear. I am not able to communicate to all who wrote asking the situation in Chile. Here go our stories of sorrows and pain..........

27th of February at 3.35 a.m. we could feel little tremor but it went on increasing so rapidly that we three sisters could not come down easily from the first floor because the house was shaking so much. Any how after grate struggle we could come down dashing all over in the dark. With the noise of the earthquake and the shaking of the house everyone was panic. We were worried how to save 56 old ladies out of which only 17 are able to move. Since electricity never fails here they have no torches, no emergency lights were functioning. One side the ladies from all the three blocks were crying in fear and anxiety. We were really lost altogether. The things were falling so strongly that we thought let us face what comes to gather. After almost 8 minutes we felt that the earth was tired of her work and began breathing slowly and so we were there safe in her lap. Went around with the lighted candles to see how were our ladies. All were happy to see that we were with them many of them were unable to speak with the shock.

After 7 am. we went around in the house to see the damage. St. Joseph patron of the house has saved each one of us and also the house. We are glad.










We were sorry to see one big statue of our mother St. Teresa on the floor in to pieces to which many of our old ladies use to pray, since it was in the centre of the house. We lost many glass wears and other things. Even so many Televisions of our ladies were fallen and broken in to pieces.After that we were without light and water. You can imagine the struggle we past through. Here there is no system of storage of water. Now we have water and the light too. But there are in the town so many areas that still do not have light, communication and the water.

Many of our sisters still do not have any information from their families. Today I went with one of my sisters of the community to visit the house of our sister who is in far away community .I was sad to see her house. It has so many cracks that it looks just now it will fall. All our houses and the sisters are safe. Only minor repairs are needed.

But it is heart breaking to see the churches. Most of the Churches are collapsed.In my diocese there are 103 churches out of which 43 are fallen down. My parish too is damaged very badly. All the statues and the alters are fallen and broken in to pieces. No priest is able to celebrate mass in the church. Yesterday Sunday we had mass in the park.


Still we are living in panic because continuously we are experiencing the tremors.If it happens during the day we have many people to help us to save the old ladies but night we are only 3 sisters with 3 persons having night duties. I do not know how to express in words the experience that we are going through.

Please continue praying for us. We can not reach out to more affected areas because of our work with the old ladies. Still there are so many villages that the help is not reached. We did not know also how much damage has taken place in the country. Because we did not have Television or the radio news. Just today's begun functioning the Media. It is said that the earthquake in Chile is 50 times more than Haiti.

-Nothing more. May God bless us all. Pushpa c.m.


Courtesy: Mr.Jagdish Christian
Website:www.jagadishchristian.com