Life in Burkina Faso, the changing face of Brockton, and coping with multiple sclerosis would seem to have little in common. One of the rewards of the three shows currently at the Griffin Museum of Photography is that despite being so different in subject they share a common spirit. In a way that’s never sentimental or manipulative, David Pace’s “Burkina Faso: Night and Day,” Mary Beth Meehan’s “City of Champions,” and Patricia Lay-Dorsey’s “Falling Into Place” are matter-of-factly life-affirming — and casualness makes the affirmation all the more affecting. The shows run through March 3.

Burkina Faso is in west central Africa. Pace first went to a village there, Bereba, in 2007. He goes back every fall. “I have become a participant in the life of the village,” he says, “rather than an observer.” You can see the lively, loving results of that participation in the nearly 60 color photographs that make up “Burkina Faso: Night and Day.”