refugees – Southwest Conference Blog

Love Letters From the Border

The Christian tradition has a long history of letter-writing. Parts of the Bible are letters written to others and these letters have been preserved. The epistles in the New Testament are great examples of letters written, delivered, read, and saved in the Bible. Besides those letters, the early Christians continued to send letters around as the church was gaining momentum and strength. There are many other examples of letter-writing in Christian history.

For example, according to tradition St. Valentine was a physician and priest in Rome in the third century. Valentine was arrested and imprisoned for his Christian faith in the One God. The emperor condemned him to death on February 14, 269 or 270 C.E. (That part is history, but there is more to this story.) My mother always told me the rest of this story when I was young. She told me that while he was imprisoned, Valentine converted his jailer to the Christian faith by restoring sight to the jailer’s daughter, Julia (who was born blind). On the eve of his death, Valentine wrote a note to Julia, reminding her to remain faithful to God. He signed it, “From your Valentine.” The story continues: in 496 C.E. Pope Gelasius set aside February 14 as a celebration of Valentine’s martyrdom.

A more recent example of religious letter-writing is a letter dated August 29, 2022. The letter was written to the Rev. Dr. William Lyons, who was the Conference Minister of the Southwest Conference of the United Church of Christ at that time. Sister Lika who ministers to migrants sent a “cordial invitation” inviting a group of us from the Southwest Conference to visit Casa de la Misericordia y de Todas las Naciones (The House of Mercy and All Nations) which is a migrant shelter located in Nogales, Sonora, Mexico. Sister Lika wrote in her letter, “We currently have a population of 120 people, most of them under 18 years of age from different parts of the Mexican Republic and Central America. Your presence will be a living testimony of a God who listens and accompanies.” Wow! I wanted to be a “living testimony.” My bags were packed in a flash, and I could not wait to get to the shelter on the Mexican side of the border!

The people whom I met at the shelter were seeking asylum in the USA, and they all had remarkable (often heart-breaking and terrifying) stories of why they would leave behind their belongings, their homes, and even family members to find their way to northern Mexico and (hopefully) enter the U.S.A. legally. Through translators, I heard with my own ears real stories of real migrants.

One of the most striking things about my visit to border shelter is this: migrants spend time at this shelter waiting for legal entry into the U.S.A.; some migrants wait only four weeks, and some migrants wait up to a year. Migrants who wait have time for writing letters. Upon leaving the shelter some migrants take a bit of time to write “thank you” notes to those who had helped them along the way. The shelter has plenty of colored paper and markers and pens for writing. As migrants continue their journey, many of them leave behind colorful hand-written notes of thanks and gratitude to those who have helped them.

Besides the memories that I made and the stories that I heard while at the shelter, I have a handful of these letters written by those migrants who wait. Besides sharing part of my visit-to-the-border-story at an adult education forum at our church, I was able to engage some friends in the congregation to help me with translation. These are a few pieces of just two of those many letters:

“Esteemed ladies and gentlemen, I have the pleasure of thanking you for all your help… In these most difficult moments you demonstrate warmth, care, and affection. You offered your hand when we most needed it. With your help, you make us feel cared for. Many thanks, Cano Reyna Family”

(Translated by Sasha and shared with her permission. Sasha is a freshman in high school and attends the United Church of Santa Fe with her family.)

“Permit me with all respect to write to you in this way. I know that we don’t know each other, and that speaks to the great goodness you have in your hearts to help, no matter who it is. I ask you to continue with this great work… Thanks for helping us without knowing us and without expecting anything in return, other than sincere thanks. Thank you for what you [all] have done for my family. From The Ramos Barrera Family”

(Translated by Faith and shared with her permission. Faith is a member of our Immigration Task Force at the United Church of Santa Fe.)

Letter-writing, note-writing, and Valentine-sending has taken on a new meaning for me now that I have obtained and have read these letters from some migrants at the border shelter. We can all use Valentine’s Day as a reminder to send messages of love (or thanks or affirmation) to those who have been important to us or who have had an impact on our lives. Writing a note (or sending a text message or an email message or making a phone call) might be just the message that someone needs to read (or hear).

To learn more about the ministry and mission of Casa de la Misericordia y de Todas Las Naciones, watch this brief video:

Our Trip to the Border

by Jane McNamara, Chair, Immigration Task Force, First Church UCC Phoenix

Hidden along the edge of the concrete ramp were 20 or 25 coins. I carefully picked them out of the sand and put them in the back pocket of my jeans. Nearby were torn pieces of paper money from Cuba – and strewn everywhere were shoelaces, belts, clothing items of all kinds, backpacks and shoes. Lots of shoes.

There is an explanation for what we saw at the border last week. Our guides, Fernie and Nathalie with the non-profit AZCA Humanitarian Coalition, said that Border Patrol agents require all migrants to leave their possessions behind. Agents say they don’t have the personnel to do the needed security checks. So, when they process migrants seeking asylum after they’ve crossed the border into the United States, migrants are given a clear plastic bag for their papers and perhaps a phone – and that is what they bring with them to the Welcome Center in Phoenix.

And the shoes? Since many cross water, they leave their muddy, wet shoes and wear someone else’s that have dried in the sun. An explanation, perhaps, for why so many guests at the Welcome Center are wearing shoes that fit them so poorly.

It was clear from our visit that Fernie and Nathalie would like to find ways to reuse more belongings but there isn’t the volunteer network that would be needed to undertake such a project. Instead, the AZCA Humanitarian Coalition organizes border aid trips, leaving water and fruit for asylum-seekers and, importantly, “restoring” the land. Five of us helped them one morning last week, following them along the dirt road by the border from Yuma to San Luis, making six stops and encountering migrants in many places along the way. And yes there are gaps in the wall near Yuma – and the wall will never be “finished.” Farmers demand access to water and the federal wall ends where the Cocopah Reservation begins.

We did not see Border Patrol process any asylum-seekers while we were there, but the evidence that they do indeed require everyone to throw away their personal possessions is everywhere. We filled bags and bags of “trash” and left them in the dumpsters parked along the border. In a few places, migrants picked up bags and helped us.

And afterwards, some of us brought items we found on the border to the Welcome Center. I washed hundreds of shoelaces in hopes our visitors to the Ropa (clothing) Room might be able to use them. My sister brought in the white confirmation dress she found and pinned it on a wall in the Ropa Room, thinking the mother who left it behind might visit us and see it, just waiting for her to reclaim it.

And I kept the coins I had found in my pocket.

Late last Saturday afternoon, four women who had chosen some clothing items from the Ropa Room were sitting on benches in the hallway, and one of the women was crying. I gave her a small stuffed dog and asked if she missed her family. One of the other women said she had been talking to her mother in Peru. Peru? I had never met anyone at the Welcome Center from Peru, but the coins in my pocket were Peruvian. I gave them to her and she placed them in her hand and stroked them ever so gently.

It was surely another one of the “God things” we witness so often at the Welcome Center.

We are truly blessed to be able to help welcome our newest immigrants to this country, and assist them as they pass through Phoenix on their way to sponsors throughout the country. And everyone who has donated clothing or shoes or tote bags or who has contributed to our meal fund is part of our First Church team. We are making a difference in people’s lives. Thank you.

Thank You

by Mike Lonergan, minister of Church of the Painted Hills UCC

Rev. Michael Lonergan at the SaveAsylum event.

Our event, SaveAsylum: Protesting the Dismantling of Asylum, had just finished. The event took place in Nogales on both sides of the monument to hate and fear on our southern border. As the master of ceremonies on the U.S. side I offered an opening prayer and read a statement reminding everyone that U. S. law gives people the right to apply for asylum. Then we heard the testimonies of six children of God whose quest for asylum was being held up because the republican administration refuses to obey the law and is now using COVID 19 as a cover for its bigotry.

We listened to a recording of a Guatemalan woman’s testimony. She fled her home after she and her family received death threats and the authorities would not help her. She still fears for her safety and would not appear publicly to tell her story.

After listening to that recording we heard directly from our neighbors from Nicaragua, Venezuela, Cuba and Mexico who shared their stories of fleeing violence and persecution at home and suffering abuse as they tried to reach the U. S. to apply for asylum. After each testimony was offered on the Mexican side, an assurance of support was offered by the people gathered on the U. S. side, who then heard the English translation of the testimony.

The event ended with a call to action, followed by a powerful reading of a modern statement of blessings and woes. This reading listed the blessings the asylum seekers will receive and it offered warnings to those responsible for the horrendous treatment these asylum seekers receive.

After the event concluded I was talking to a colleague on the other side of the wall. When my conversation with the person on the other side of the wall finished, the woman standing next to them placed her hand on the mesh between the posts. The mesh, an additional layer of cruelty added to prevent divided families from sharing meals with each other or children of God from sharing communion. The woman placed her hand on the mesh, and with a look of gratitude I will never forget, looked in my eyes and said “thank you.” I put my hand on the mesh against her hand and looked back and said “you’re welcome.”

In that instance the mesh failed. The mesh that is intended to add to the dehumanization of people on the southern side of the border did not stop me from experiencing my common humanity with the child of God whose hand was on the mesh against mine.

That simple, humble act of gratitude will stay with me. It will be my motivation to submit a comment against yet another rule change proposed by the republican administration to prevent children of God from seeking asylum as U. S. and international law permits and to keep contacting our senators and representatives demanding that they make public statements opposing the republican administration’s suspension of the processing of asylum applications. My common humanity with the child of God whose hand was against mine on the mesh requires this of me, at a minimum.

images credits: Leslie Carlson and Mike Lonergan.

Global Ministries Partners Making Huge Impact for Migrant Communities

by Randy J. Mayer, The Good Shepherd UCC

In the last five or ten years, the world has stepped into a sweeping global immigration epidemic where one in every seven people are being pushed by war, violence, climate change, or poverty out of their home countries and pulled into countries that are often resisting their arrival. In many ways, it is an exodus of biblical proportion from the global south to the north. The UCC and Disciples adopted parallel resolutions at General Synod and General Assembly this summer on the state of Global Forced Migration, which can be found by clicking these links:

UCC link
Disciples link

The United States started to experience the impact of this exodus as early as 1993 even before the NAFTA free trade agreement was signed. For more than 25 years there has been a steady flow of migrants, refugees and asylum seekers traveling through the Sonoran Desert. In 2000 the Good Shepherd UCC in Sahuarita, Arizona had no choice but to get involved in the humanitarian movement. What else can a faith community do when desperate people are knocking at your door asking for water and help? What else can a faith community do when dead bodies are found in your neighborhood in alarming numbers? You start asking questions, developing programs to help the people knocking at your doors, you start going up the river to see why so many dead bodies are appearing in your neighborhood. Never would we have dreamed that 20 years later we would still have knocks on our doors and dead bodies in our neighborhoods.

Being on the front-lines of the immigration struggle along the US/Mexico border has created natural connections with our global partners around the world that are now finding themselves in the midst of the flow of immigration into their communities. Recently, my wife Norma and I were able to visit our denominational partners in Italy and Greece and observe first hand their faithful hospitality to the stranger.

Our relationship with the Waldensian Church in Italy began six years ago when we received a call from Global Ministries requesting that we host a group coming from Italy that was just beginning to get involved in the growing immigration situation in the Mediterranean Sea. We hosted them and began to make a powerful connection that the call to care for the stranger was the same in the Mediterranean Sea as the Sonoran Desert. Now, years later we have had multiple visits and exchanges. Gaining perspective from another part of the world has given us both a different angle to glimpse the struggle and gain valuable insight on how to do faithful ministry, as the global politics moves toward building walls and abandoning the principles of inclusion and welcome of the stranger. Today the Waldensian Church is a leading voice in Europe as they put their faith on the line to finance and work on the rescue boats named, “Sea Watch” and “Open Arms.” They are performing dramatic rescues of desperate people, abandoned by their smugglers in the Mediterranean Sea. They also have developed a project called, “humanitarian corridors” that is an agreement with their government that allows the church to legally and safely bring a set number of asylum seekers into Italy each year and resettle them in their communities. While we were attending the Waldensian Synod in Torre Pellice the Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte in a speech to the Italian Lower House, called for concrete initiatives “such as the setting up of European humanitarian corridors” to enable the European Union to “leave behind emergency management” of the migration crisis. A powerful example of how people of faith can inject themselves into the political discourse and human tragedy to create healthy models that address the immigration struggle.

From Italy we traveled to Katerini, Greece to visit the Evangelical Church of Greece, an historic church with a long tradition of putting justice into action. We spent five days with them learning about their incredible immigration and refugee program called Perichoresis. It began in 2015 as a simple act of Christian hospitality as they responded to the arrival of thousands upon thousands of Middle Eastern refugees to camps near the border of Greece and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. They went to the camps to offer support and supplies, which led to welcoming the asylum seekers into their homes, which led to the development of large scale programs to receive and care for the asylum seekers. Today, Perichoresis has fifty staff members giving medical care, legal and psychological support, and housing managers that have created living facilities that are safe and stable. Perichoresis now rents 126 apartments to temporarily house 600 vulnerable asylum seekers escaping the horrors of war and exploitation. They have rented an additional 10 apartments to integrate and permanently settle families in their community. Their resettlement and integration program is so well established that the United Nations Human Rights Council Union has lifted up the work of Perichoresis as the premier resettlement program that should be implemented throughout Europe to successfully settle and integrate asylum seekers and migrants into Europe.

Small bands of believers making a huge difference and showing the rest of us how to be faithful and welcome the stranger. Small protestant churches sprinkled like leaven and salt, barely visible to the dominant church and culture in their countries, but they are doing big things in the eyes of God and the building of the Kin-dom on earth as it is in heaven. Thank God for our UCC and Disciples global partners, may they continue to inspire and lead us in the ways of faithful living.

Empire Stories

by Abigail Conley

Here is a story of the Empire I trust in, hope for, pray with:

We’re renting a bouncy castle. It’s a princess 5-in-1 combo sure to delight the five-year-old for whom it is intended. She’s getting adopted, officially a forever family. Rumor is there will be TWO cakes for this Very Big Party.

And so more than seventy people got together and funded a bouncy castle, along with plenty more to buy all sorts of books for that same five-year-old. I recommended We Don’t Eat Our Classmates, a very reign of God sort of book that doesn’t look like it all.

It’s this beautiful celebration across many miles for a little girl and her mom. Those of us who won’t be able to go to the Very Big Party still join in this way. We are anxious to see pictures of this little girl who we’ve come to love from a distance, still in foster care for a few more days.

The whole thing is a beautiful, joyful experience of being able to do something to make a little kid’s Very Big Party on her Very Big Day that much more full of love.

It is one of the few times I can remember where it was so easy to give a kid something that would bring a great deal of joy. The other that comes to mind was when I had a youth group on an outing around Christmas and paid for a carriage ride around the outside mall. The driver gave me a good deal because she could see the excitement in the kids’ eyes. The kids couldn’t stop talking about it for weeks. Beautiful abundance in simple things always strikes me as more fully the Reign of God than most anything else.

Here is a story of the Empire I trust God and those working toward God’s Reign are overthrowing:

We’re buying teddy bears and shoelaces. Some of those same people who got together and funded a bouncy castle Venmoed me money or sent a check in the mail because I was able to fulfill requests locally for people being released from detention. I bought up all the shoelaces in store because stores don’t seem to stock many of those. I found teddy bears that would fit small hands and arms. That one day, those kids and their families had more of what they needed. I don’t know if they had a single thing they wanted. I don’t know what to do with the reality of shoelaces being the thing that brought a smile that day. I keep telling that story over and over, but with kids still in detention, it seems that I probably should keep telling it.

And I wish I had a single story.

But I remember sitting with a church leader, planning out gifts for the family we were sponsoring for Christmas. “Can I just buy them socks and underwear?” she asked. “If they’re asking for socks and underwear, they should get socks and underwear.” So we agreed on behalf of the church that we would exceed the number limit placed on gifts so that kids would get socks and underwear for Christmas, along with things they wanted.

Those some people funding the bounce house also explained children’s clothing sizes to me one day. There was no clear conversion for chubby children’s sizes to underwear. I needed to buy clothes for a child in my church whose mom could not manage it. Finances were part of the problem, but so was mental illness. Those things that parents of children seem to magically know eluded her, and so I was filling in the gaps as best I could, despite having no children of my own.

Those are the children’s stories that come to mind. But most days, I see a crowdfunding page for a funeral or medical needs or housing. I am reminded of the jars by cash registers so common in the small town where I grew up. They were the precursor to crowdfunding pages, a town working to pay the medical expenses of someone with no insurance. Flyers dotted the bulletin boards of those same places, asking people to attend a benefit auction or concert.

These are the stories of our empire. And these are not the stories I want to tell. I want to tell stories of a community choosing to give a little extra money to fund things that feed the soul, like bouncy castles and books. I don’t think it takes much Spirit to realize that this is the better thing, to get to offer joy and delight rather than fulfilling the most basic of needs.

Hear the words of the Good Shepherd, whose Empire has no end: “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.” John 10:10

Lazarus Must Be Rolling Over in Her Grave!

by John Indermark

In case you were wondering: the title is not mistaken in its gender pronoun usage. I do not have in mind the Lazarus, beloved brother of Mary and Martha, who already experienced rolling out of his grave according to John’s gospel. No, the Lazarus I have in mind is Emma, beloved daughter of Moses and Esther – and the poet who penned the words engraved on a bronze plaque that now (at least for the time being) stands displayed in the museum at the Statue of Liberty. Its closing words, taken from a longer poem of hers, would once have been the stuff of Fourth of July picnics and elementary school recitations and civics classes.

“Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me.”

I say “once would have been” because some Very Important People in Very High Places have definite ideas about who should be let in and particularly who should be kept out of our nation these days, ideas that seem to take a sand blaster to Lazarus’ inscription. The most recent rule put forth by the Trump administration regarding immigration reinterprets provisions of “public charge” in Draconian ways – or, given its likely architect, Millerian ways. Mind you, the rule aims not at illegal immigrants, but LEGAL immigrants. If you need most any form of public assistance to help get your feet on the ground, fugetaboutit. All such objections go away, of course, according to the fine print of the rule, if you can show your income is 250% or more of the federal poverty line. If it is, c’mon in! If it’s not, maybe the deportation venues will at least have the honesty to play Ray Charles (“Hit the Road, Jack, and don’t you come back . . .”). And perhaps the National Park Service will be directed by Mr. Miller to update Emma’s plaque:

Give me your hired, your secure,

Your globe-trotting investors yearning to be regulation-free,

The targeted folk of north European shores,

Send these, the classy, upper-crust to me.

As I said, Lazarus must be rolling over in her grave, and not just because of the words of her poem with which we are most familiar. Did you know the title she gives to the Statue in the poem is not Lady Liberty, but Mother of Exiles? What would she say to those who seek asylum today, driven by violence and despair literally into exiles – only to be met with pejoratives of “murderers” and “rapists?” I believe Emma’s answer can be discerned in the phrase she used in the poem: “From her beacon-hand glows world-wide welcome.”

Today, in addressing the new rule, the administration’s Director of Immigration Services was asked how this policy set with the Statue’s invitation to “your tired, your poor, your, huddled masses.” His answer? “I’m certainly not prepared to take anything down off the Statue of Liberty. We have a long history of being one of the most welcoming nations in the world.”

Unfortunately, history is no guarantor of the future, and befogged nostalgia can be the future’s worst enemy. The question is: Are we NOW to be who we advertise ourselves to be? Hypocrisy is not a problem limited to the church. It gnaws away at national identities. If this rule stands, Lazarus’ poem and its “Mother of Exiles” will cease to be our aspiration –and be transformed into our self-inflicted indictment of nativism and greed.

Here we are again.

by Karen Richter

By my account, we are here at Immigrations and Customs Enforcement for the 55th time… beginning in December 2014. We mark this anniversary – the month by month by month recognition of the entry of our friend Misael Perez Cabrera into sanctuary at Shadow Rock United Church of Christ. We didn’t know then that Misael would be in sanctuary for over 100 days. We didn’t know that we would welcome others into sanctuary. We didn’t know what it would cost our fellowship.

We didn’t know the blessings this work would bring to us either. How we would welcome Misael’s beautiful baby boy. How we would rally around a family to take a child to Lego camp, to make possible family reunions and sports teams and tutoring. How we would stand with a woman who chose to return to Mexico to be with her husband who was deported. How some of us would come to embrace a new vision of borders as a place where people can meet and learn from one another peacefully.

Yesterday, I taught a class… I’m a teacher in the way I move through the world so much more than an activist or rabble rouser. In this class we talked about the tasks and callings that are entrusted to us – personally and as part of groups and communities that we are part of. There are things that are entrusted to me, to Karen… my children, my friendships, my calling as teacher and spiritual director. What is entrusted to those of us gathered here today? To progressive people of conscience? To Christians who see the face of Christ in every immigrant neighbor, every refugee, every asylum seeker?

What is entrusted to us? The people in sanctuary, the asylum seekers who pass through our shelters and church buildings – their safety and wellbeing are entrusted to us. The idea that immigrants bring immeasurable gifts to our neighborhoods – this hopeful idea is entrusted to us. The understanding of our scripture that includes the repeated command to care for the immigrant, the widow, the orphan – this sacred duty is entrusted to us.

So here we are again. We stand here in hope, in faithfulness, in community. We persist. We pray.

Please join me in prayer. We begin in silence.

Spirit of Life; Spirit of Love:

We are thankful for the opportunity to speak here today, for the privilege of standing with our sanctuary guests. We ask for energy to work for justice, for deepening compassion, for spiritual courage. May our hope match the hope of our migrant neighbors. Give us softened hearts to reach out in friendship and trust. Be with us as we continue to advocate for our vision of compassionate immigration policy. We pray today with the confident faith of Jesus, child migrant, teacher, brother.

AMEN.

Being prosecuted for compassion

by Bill Lyons

The Gospel tells Christians that giving food, drink, welcome, shelter, clothing, care, and accompaniment to strangers equates to feeding, quenching the thirst of, sheltering, clothing, caring for, and accompanying Jesus himself.[i] Jesus teaches us that these actions have eternal implications because they are God’s basic expectations for all human relationships.

And yet, the federal government in Tucson, Arizona is prosecuting humanitarian aid worker Scott Warren for providing food, water, shelter, rest, and orienting two men who had been in Arizona’s deadly desert for two days. Warren is charged with harboring and conspiring to transport undocumented migrants, felonies that carry decades of possible prison time. [ii]

On May 5, U. S. Customs and Border Protection Agents arrested, held, and continue to intimidate Ana Adlerstein for accompanying a Central American migrant into the Lukeville, Arizona border crossing after prearranging their appearance with the port of entry supervisor. Adlerstein was accused of “alien smuggling” although she has not been charged with a crime.[iii]

These are not isolated incidents. Similar arrests and intimidation of U.S. citizens living their faith’s values have been reported all along America’s southern border. Prosecutions for harboring undocumented migrants has risen from 3,461 to 4,532 in the last three years – a 30% increase. In an NPR interview Teresa Todd, a four-term city and county attorney in west Texas, framed the situation this way, “It makes people have to question, ‘Can I be compassionate’?” Todd was arrested and continues to be harassed by federal and state law enforcement officials for giving a migrant shelter in her car until medical help could arrive. [iv]

Living our faith in relationship to our neighbors regardless of their citizenship should never be a crime. Preventing the deaths of people in the desert is what God asks of us. Law enforcement officials should never be permitted to arrest, harass, or intimidate people of faith for embodying the hospitality the Bible describes and to which Jesus enjoins us. People of faith should never be afraid to live compassionate lives. And yet those are the realities many people of faith in America’s border states experience every day. U. S. immigration policy should not make the desert a death sentence.

As a Christian leader I feel compelled to bring these assaults on our core value of compassion into the light. Silence as a faith leader in this moment surrenders our Constitutionally protected religious right to love our neighbors. Not only am I praying for change, I am working for it in the public square. I invite you to be present, speak truth to power, and take action with me to preserve our core values to feed, quench the thirst of, welcome, shelter, clothe, care for, and accompany our neighbors of every immigration and documentation status without fear of reprisals, prosecution, intimidation, or threats against our liberty from government authorities. May the Spirit of the Christ who calls us to love one another as we have been loved by God bolster our courage and strengthen our resolve to protect and preserve the dignity of every person created in God’s image, and to create the loving world Jesus envisioned.

– Rev. Dr. William Lyons, Conference Minister, Southwest Conference UCC

[i] Matthew 25:31-46

[ii] https://www.google.com/search?q=migrant+deaths+in+the+sonoran+desert&rlz=1C1CHBF_enUS759US759&oq=migrant+deaths+in+the+sonoran+desert&aqs=chrome..69i57.6548j1j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

[iii] https://tucson.com/news/local/steller-column-intimidation-campaign-intensifies-against-border-humanitarians/article_e6cef226-0d05-55e6-ab0f-6b9d3a2661b8.html

[iv] https://www.npr.org/2019/05/28/725716169/extending-zero-tolerance-to-people-who-help-migrants-along-the-border

image credit: Dan Sorensen on flickr

July 24, 2018

by Abigail Conley

I woke up early, sick to my stomach because I ate things I shouldn’t of the night before. I stayed up and wrote a sermon.

I ate a late breakfast, watched some TV, took a shower, and headed to Costco.

On Sunday, I’d received an email asking for goods to be donated to help families being reunified following separation under Trump’s zero tolerance immigration policy. On Sunday afternoon, I sent out an email to the congregation asking for water, pads, stuffed animals, snacks, backpacks and a few other things. We needed them all by Tuesday night. With the limited time frame, several people sent money instead of dropping off goods. I was headed to Costco to spend that money on what was needed.

I put giants boxes of Always brand pads in my cart, along with boxes of trail mix and boxes of granola bars. I went to the back of the store to get water, but settled on Gatorade instead. I don’t get stomach bugs often, so it was not too long ago that I found out that Gatorade can be a magical elixir. It seemed that people recently released from detention might need that magical elixir, even if it was much more expensive.

I checked out and went on my way. As I was walking out of the doors, my phone rang. A colleague in Tucson was calling. Were we doing anything? They money donated for immediate needs. Could we get stuff there? I told her I would gladly turn around and buy more supplies if she told me how much. I hadn’t been able to find my Costco card before leaving home, so I went back for a temporary one a second time. I grabbed a cart a second time. I bought nuts instead of trail mix this time, but still pads, Gatorade, and granola bars. I loaded these items into my car.

I called my partner as I left the parking lot to tell him it was a good thing I’d gotten his car instead of my much smaller one. When I got to the church, I unloaded so that everything could be better reloaded later. I added to the stash of what was already waiting in the classroom.

Then, I called my contact at the social service agency to confirm a drop-off time and see if any needs had changed. The needs had, in fact, changed some. The families had requested Bibles in Spanish, men’s deodorant, a broader assortment of hygiene items, and shoelaces for kids and adults. Detention, after all, is a form of jail. Of course, the officers took everyone’s shoelaces, even the kids’.

I sat at my desk and cried. The horror settled in. My government, my neighbors see these kids and their parents as dangerous enough to lock them up, even taking away their shoelaces. I’d always assumed that when someone was released, whatever items were taken were returned to them. Apparently, this is not true. These kids and their parents need shoelaces.

Sometimes, we count atrocities in both humanizing and terrifying ways. I’ve never been able to shake the sight of the piles of shoes in the Holocaust Museum in D.C. Now, I’m wondering, where are there piles of shoelaces? Can they be counted? What is done with them? Who keeps them? Who notices the workboot laces and purple sparkles of children’s laces in the same bins? Where are all of those shoelaces now? Somewhere, there are thousands of shoelaces. Somewhere, there is this tangible record of this horror unfolding on our borders. I wonder who is bearing witness to these piles of shoelaces.

Time ran slowly for a while. I sat, shocked by the weight of the terrible. I know my horror pales in comparison to what my neighbors are going through. I cannot imagine what it is like to have your life fall apart so completely that you must ask neighbors for shoelaces.

I cannot forget those shoelaces. I imagine that from now on, every time I touch shoelaces, I will remember this day.

More friends and colleagues donated money that afternoon. I stopped to get food for myself at the grocery store because my packed lunch was insufficient. Deodorant was on sale, as were school supplies, so I gathered up backpacks and deodorant, $90 worth. When I got to the register, I stumbled into a sale, so it was only $65. I was in a hurry, needing to be back at work, so I didn’t go back for more.

Back at church, I unlocked the doors. Friends I had not seen in quite some time brought supplies. Another friend and I sorted through donations, getting them ready to go. At 7, I loaded my car. For some unknown reason, I reserved this task for myself, wanting to somehow count, know what was loaded.

Having money left from donations and some more thrown in over the course of the afternoon, I stopped at Target and bought every single pair of shoelaces I could find that might possibly be of use. They only had laces for men’s shoes, but I bought them. Workboot laces and sneaker laces and dress shoe laces. Seventeen pairs. The total was within 20¢ of the money I had left. I added the shoelaces to everything else and went home, so very tired.

Once upon a time, I would have said exhausted. That is not true. I was very tired. I was not exhausted. People who need shoelaces are exhausted, not me, who curled up in bed and watched a movie before drifting off to sleep, safe and secure in my own home.

May God have mercy on our neighbors who need shoelaces. I don’t know how to ask for God’s mercy for the rest of us.