Pachín

Reflections of Ángel Camandona, nicknamed Pachín.

My Trajectory—December 1963 - January 1966 

It was the year 1963. I was in post graduate studies at the Bible Institute in Almafuerte. 

For six months I had been living in the Brethren Church in the city of Río Tercero, Córdoba province, Argentina, where Ángel (Cacho) Díaz and his wife Sara Siccardi had recently begun pastoring replacing pastor Jack Churchill who moved to the city of Almafuerte to be director of the Bible Institute. 

I helped Cacho with the youth group, the Sunday School, and visitation. 

Around this time, I received a letter from pastor Solon Hoyt, of the Brethren Church in Don Bosco in the province of Buenos Aires, Argentina. 

The letter was an invitation to take the pastorate of said church as he and his family would be moving. 

I was greatly surprised, of course! 

Naturally, I prayed, seeking the will of God. I sought the advice of my fiancée, Ester Galli, and also pastors Cacho, Churchill, and Siccardi. 

It was not an easy decision, but I understood it was God´s will. 

The challenge was enormous.

I had no experience as a pastor . . . I´d be replacing a giant, Pastor Hoyt . . . moving to Buenos Aires, a huge city, and I, a farm boy . . . with only an elementary education and five years of Bible Institute . . . it was to be my first pastorate . . . and I was about to be married . . . and later become a first time father.  

Even so, I accepted Pastor Hoyt´s invitation. 

After graduation and taking leave of the beloved Bible Institute in Almafuerte, and of my pastor Luis Siccardi and his family, Cacho and Sara Díaz and the congregation I had grown to love . . . and, of course, my folks in the country, father and siblings . . . I began my journey to the great capital. 

Pastor Hoyt and his family welcomed me lovingly to their home on Chiclana 1074 in Don Bosco, where I stayed a few days while they introduced me to the place and people, some I already knew, especially the young people from camp. 

I also worked with him a little on the parsonage he was building next to the church on the corner of Cramer and Bermúdez. 

He also took me to see the two outreaches in Quilmes Oeste and Villa Domínico, not far from Don Bosco. Both met in the streetcars that Pastor Hoyt obtained when they ceased to be used as means of transport in the city of Buenos Aires. Ingeniously, Pastor Hoyt, very hardworking, and his wife and a group of young people, cut them down the middle and joined them to form a meeting place complete with their original seats, two streetcars in each location. 

Shortly before Christmas of 1963, the Hoyts were to travel to the US on furlough, and would not be returning to live in Don Bosco. 

An emotional commissioning ceremony took place in the church in which Pastor Hoyt commended me to the Lord before the congregation. The brethren welcomed me with fraternal love. 

Of course, the people were very emotional as they bad farewell to Pastor Hoyt and his family. He had founded the congregation, and served them with love and tremendous effort spiritually and physically for many years. 

At that moment, I could not grasp fully what was happening. Today, with the distance of time, I realize I must have felt very unworthy to take his place. 

A few days later, many of us went to the airport in Ezeiza to see the family off . . . and watched until the plane disappeared on the horizon. 

Thus began my first pastorate! 

Undoubtedly the congregation felt the impact of that loss, yet their love and understanding in Christ was a great support for me. The group of young people shared the ministry with me, preaching, and working in the two outreach locations, especially with the children. 

So the months went by until the end of April 1964 when I travelled to the city of Córdoba. There I had to get the paperwork in order for my marriage to Ester Galli. The date was May 30. The ceremony was performed by Pastors Lynn Schrock and Jack Churchill. 

Following that special event and the honeymoon, we made our way to Don Bosco. My beautiful new wife Ester, barely 20 years old, and I, recently turned 26 years of age, arrived in Buenos Aires. 

We lived in the Hoyt´s furnished house which they graciously and lovingly shared with us. We enjoyed that home for a whole year. Meanwhile work on the parsonage continued. 

With Ester, we led the ministry in Don Bosco, Quilmes Oeste and Villa Domínico, mostly among the children and a few adults in the latter two locations. Ester taught Sunday School classes and I preached and we did visitation together. 

Ester became pregnant with our first daughter, Adriana, born March 8, 1965. 

Obviously this brought us great joy. The people who had welcomed us so beautifully after our honeymoon, now rejoiced with our news. There were little gifts and loving greetings. Ester was able to keep up with all her household responsibilities and was only slightly limited in other tasks. 

I do have an anecdote. At that time, there was a young woman, Ana Podestá, who came to church. She lived a block away from the Devesa family. Her father became ill and had the beginnings of dementia. Ester and I decided to walk her home some nights. One time, Mr. Podestá was shaving with a razor. I came near the bathroom and he did not recognize me. He attempted to attack me. He was big and burly, had been a butcher. Although I am also strong, I do not know what could have happened. His daughter Anita appeared and calmed him down. The Lord protected us.  

Sometime later, Mr. Podestá made a decision for Christ in a moment of lucidity. That year 1964, he died. The burial ceremony was only my second funeral during my ministry. The first time, earlier, was Mr. Devesa´s. Even though his wife and daughters were believers, he was very hardened. However, the Lord saved him in time!

Both were buried in the British cemetary for dissidents in Quilmes, which I did not know. I repeat these were the first in my minitry. 

Pastor Nelson Fay

One day Pastor Nelson Fay came to our home. He brought me the gift of a bicycle, an original Phillips from England. It had belonged to his late father, missionary in Paraguay. Although it was a bit small for me, it proved very useful in the ministry. I used it to go to Quilmes Oeste to work on the streetcars or to visit someone. The same with Villa Domínico. I did it with much joy by the grace of God. I was young and strong.  

That bicycle, which now in 2023 would be about 100 years old, accompanied me through my 44 years of ministry. Ii is a keepsake. 

The day of Adriana´s birth arrived. It was only then that we knew it was a girl. Thankfully the delivery went well. Also thanks to God, Ester was taken good care of in a clinic in the capital, by a good Armenian Christian doctor, Eduardo Bedrossian, who knew I was a pastor and did not charge us anything the entire time. 

Back home in Don Bosco, the brethren shared our joy. 

Soon after, we moved into the parsonage. 

God continued to bless us as a family and in the ministry. 

We had no bed. A widow, Mrs. Siles, gave us hers. 

We had no refrigerator. Pastor Marshall from Villa General Belgrano, gave us a Servel kerosene fridge. They also gave us a crib for Adriana. 

The Churchill family, before returning to the US, gave us a play pen. 

We can never forget all of this. 

I must mention again the Hoyts´ kindness allowing us the use of their home and everthing in it for more than a year. They returned after a year but only to move to Almafuerte to take charge of the Bible Institute. 

While living in the parsonage, we hosted Maisie Boore and Loida Enrici from Almafuerte, Córdoba, as best we could for three months. They were taking a Child Evangelism course with Miss Krieger, the head of LAPEN (Liga Argentina Pro Evangelización del Niño). 

The church gave us some money and we received offerings from individuals. Without taking away from anyone, I will only mention Mrs. Josefa Devesa who often stopped by with an empanada gallega (type of Spanish turnover), or Mrs. Princic who brought fresh eggs from her chickens. 

Ester went once a week to the open market, a block away from the church, and bought vegetables, fruit, meat, etc. at good prices. 

The years God gave us in Don Bosco, Quilmes Oeste, and Villa Domínico, are fresh in our minds, even at my 85 years of age, Ester's 79, and our 59 years of matrimony, with five children and eleven grandchildren. We cannot, nor ought we ever, to forget the two years we lived in Don Bosco, and the patience and love of the brethren to put up with us. I am conscious, with the passing of time, that I erred many times. I am aware that some were not happy with me in Don Bosco. I cannot now make amends. 

We began to realize that the Lord was bringing our time there to an end. Our time in the place that had become very dear to us was ending. So we decided to return to Córdoba. Ester was pregnant once again. 

We left in January of 1966. I had accepted an invitation from Pastor Schrock to teach a session on Philippians at camp. That was the last study I prepared at my desk in the loft of the Don Bosco church, and seated on a chair given to me by Mr. Rocobertón, a carpinter friend of Mr. Hoyt. 

I failed to mention that we did not have a washer. One of Ester´s aunts gave her an old wringer washing machine. She hung out the clothes on the rooftop terrace of the temple that Mr. Hoyt built. 

Thus far the Lord has helped us! 

The LORD is just. He will judge my conduct and the ministry of those years.