Your Distressing Disguise

He rolled around the Sprouts parking lot in his wheelchair, one leg extended, the other absent underneath the loosely hanging grey pant leg. I noticed him first, and moved to the next aisle, heading for my car. But he was quick, obviously adept at getting himself around on the streets. As soon as he asked for cash, I looked away, offering instead a knee-jerk “not today.” But as I walked off with a bag filled with unnecessary groceries, I relented. It’s true, these were items I had bought on sale, but most of them were indulgences, really, like the jar of Silly Cow hot chocolate and the organic lotion bar, the tin of Gingerbread tea and the navel oranges to add to the half dozen already waiting for me at home. 

“You can give the guy a buck, for God’s sake, Pauline.”

And so begins my piece recently published in NCR – a vulnerable and perfect example of my false self, or lower nature, at work.  A piece that reveals the self-awareness and humble willingness it takes to meet the not-so-nice places within myself. A willingness to observe myself honestly. And not be afraid of what I see.

Thankfully, that’s what happened when I witnessed my reaction to this homeless man asking for money. A man who had placed himself a little too close for comfort. And then reacted in a most ungrateful manner that set me off.

In publishing the piece on this sensitive subject of homelessness, the NCR editor was careful to remove some words that might offend. Words like “distressing” and “pissed.” But, in my limited sight at the time, distressing is how I initially saw this man. And pissed is what I clearly felt when he asked for an unreasonable amount of money upon my return.

Honestly, I believe most of us have these negative reactions to people who make us feel uncomfortable. People who don’t meet our expectations.

The gift is being able to pause and observe yourself in the midst of it. The gift of grace helped me do that.

(You can read the article in its entirety here: https://www.ncronline.org/spirituality/soul-seeing/learning-see-different-eyes)

I returned to my car and retrieved one of the single dollar bills I’d learned to keep in the pocket of my door so I’d be prepared at the corner stoplight where the growing number of homeless stationed themselves. I was accustomed to seeing people asking for money, but usually not this close. And the man in the wheelchair was not someone I recognized from the usual community. He had ventured far beyond the perimeters of the traffic light corner, wheeling himself closer and closer to the Sprouts entrance and exit doors, certain to catch the attention of shoppers before they got into their cars and approached the light.

“Here,” I said, as I handed him the dollar. And then, as if trying to explain my return, “I had this in my car.”

He looked at the bill, his face a fist of wrinkled displeasure. He not only didn’t smile or thank me, but scorned the offering.

“C’mon,” he scowled. “Give me $100.”

I must have blinked, maybe even jolted in place. “I don’t have $100,” I said, feeling a little riled at his rudeness.

“Well, how about $25 then?”

“How about you just take the dollar?” And I walked off, regretting my attempt to give anything at all and feeling simultaneously prideful and gullible as my negative inner talk got the best of me.

Until I paused to unlock my car door.

Wait. Who was I doing this for anyway? For myself? To receive an expectant “thank you” and a smile of appreciation? To feel good about my little act of charity? Or was it truly an act of kindness for a person in need in front of me. A man who may not know how to be thankful or kind. A man whose life I knew nothing about.

Suddenly, my imagination took over. It was as if Jesus were talking to me through this stranger’s face. 

Can you still love me when I look like this? When I act like this? When I don’t meet your expectations?

As Jesus’ sweet voice came through the face of this man, I realized what was being asked of me. To see with different eyes. To love with the heart of God.

My heart softened, even though the man’s scowling countenance did not. He appeared before my imagination just as disheveled and distasteful as before. But the Christ within him now shone in a way that my judging self would not have been able to see. There was a warm spark buried within him that layers of pain and woundedness concealed.

True, I had to put my prideful ego aside. But wasn’t this my intention? To discover You in all your many disguises? And You poked me right here in the supermarket parking lot. In the dark shadow of a one-legged man slumped in a wheelchair on an ugly blacktop with engines idling all around, car fumes emitting into my lungs and, instead of angelic choirs, the clanking sound of shopping carts crashing into a queue.

Not at all what I expected.

“You want to love me better?” You ask. “I’m right here.”

[A note of of thanks to Pixabay photographers reidy68, stevepb, and anwar Ramadhan]

El Paso Is Not a Mess

_{El Paso star by artist Candy Mayer}

Every once in a while new folks come to town and remind me what I love about El Paso. Whether it’s someone volunteering for a year with the Annunciation House network or a college or church group wanting to experience a weeklong border orientation, people who visit El Paso for the first time always leave having been surprised by what they’ve discovered and changed by the experience.

This time her name was Theresa.

She came to El Paso, along with two other women, for several weeks of orientation with the Maryknoll lay missioner program before she was to leave on assignment in Kenya. Maryknoll is a Roman Catholic organization that accompanies people in foreign countries living on the margins. It promotes nonviolence, justice, compassion, and care for the earth. For years Maryknoll offered its orientation in New York. But this year they moved it to El Paso, which, for Theresa and her friends and family, was a concern.

Somehow going to Kenya didn’t seem to be as much of an issue.

When they discovered Theresa was headed for the southern border, her friends warned, “You won’t be safe there. El Paso is a mess.”

And she believed it, too.

After all, most Americans only know about El Paso through the news or social media, the sound bites that refer to “illegal invasions,” “criminal caravans,” and “drug cartels” flowing like wild, unmanageable streams through the Rio Grande into the U.S. TV images show poorly dressed, brown-skinned people cozying up on downtown streets under Red Cross blankets and makeshift homesteads. Or lining up outside Sacred Heart Church for the luncheon meal.

From what’s presented on your screen, it’s easy to think things are crazy and unsafe in El Paso.

Until you spend some time here.

Like I have. Here I am mashing potatoes as I join some of my many friends in preparing Sacred Heart’s annual Thanksgiving meal for the poor and the migrants.

It’s been nearly 10 years since I first came to El Paso to volunteer. More than 7 since I left my Virginia home and moved here. So I was anxious to hear what Theresa had to say about this community I easily came to love.

Tall and white, Theresa stands out in El Paso. She’s a minority here, as am I. She’s also older and has lived in various U.S. states, so she’s got some experience with different types of communities.

During their six weeks with us, Theresa and her little group participated in local events and ministries on both sides of the border. They visited some of the many humanitarian organizations, went to migrant shelters, listened to folks accompanying the marginalized, and participated in the everyday life of the culture.

As she was nearing the end of her stay, we gathered at a friend’s home, and I asked about her experience.

“El Paso is such a gentle place,” she offered.

The word “gentle” struck me. I’d not heard that adjective used to describe El Paso before.

She explained how she had thought her rural community back in Kentucky was the gentlest and warmest community she’d ever known.

Until she came to El Paso.

“People are even gentler and kinder here.”

She gave me one example that sounded very familiar.

Needing to buy some groceries last week, she’d gone to the local Albertsons with only $23 cash to spend. No credit card. When she got to the checkout, she realized she’d not estimated her costs well, because the total was $25 and change. She explained her situation to the cashier and asked to remove some items.

“Hold on,” the cashier said. “I’ve got my Albertson’s card. I can apply it to your bill and I bet that’ll take care of it.”

But even with the card, her new total was $23.57. Still more than she had on her.

Then the bagger stepped in. “I can take care of that,” he said. And he dished into his pocket for the needed change.

Theresa left the store with everything she’d intended to buy and genuine gratitude for the kindness of these two strangers.

“I couldn’t believe how both of them stepped in to help me,” she said. “I don’t know of anywhere else in the U.S. where this would happen.”

I heard the surprise and delight in her voice. And I was delighted with her.

Because, at a time when our country is sourly divided, when we teeter on the verge of denying “outsiders” the basic right to seek asylum, when our politicians can’t risk acting humanely for fear of losing their power and status, I find myself turning to El Paso with deep gratitude.

This is what I would like the world to look like. Generous, gentle, kind, and welcoming.

No, El Paso is not perfect, and, yes, it’s a bit messy. But it is not a mess.

Come to think of it, not unlike a stable in Bethlehem where a baby was born so many years ago.

No Good Behavior

I was driving down Route 33 in Greene County, in the middle of my visit to Virginia, when I spotted a call coming in on my mobile from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. I pulled over to talk to the agent.

His call wasn’t unexpected. In fact, I’d been waiting several days for him to question me about why I wanted to sponsor Sofia (not her real name), an asylum seeker from Colombia. Sofia is a 33-year-old wife and mother who could easily be my daughter. I’ve never met her, but we’ve had a giddy conversation on the phone, in which she promised to cook and clean for me if she was released from detention, so happy was she that I was willing to sponsor her.

I was beside myself with embarrassment.

Her situation had only brought home more keenly the luxurious freedoms I enjoy as a U.S. citizen and the immense unearned privilege I have over Sofia simply by being born in a different country. There was no way I felt she owed me anything.

On the contrary, I wanted to apologize to her, for the treatment she’d received in our hands.

Back in her country, Sofia had been politically active and outspoken against the reigning political party. That made her a target. She was violently attacked, sexually violated, lost her business, and finally was threatened to the point that she knew she had to leave or risk losing her life.

It had to come to that. Otherwise, she would never have left behind her husband and daughter – the two most important people in her life.

That’s a feeling I could relate to. My husband and son were my reason for living. I know what it’s like to be a wife and mother whose life is suddenly upended and uncertain beyond her control.

And yet, there’s no way I could compare my life to Sofia’s.

She had no safe alternative. No reasonable choices. Sofia fled to the U.S., to legally ask for asylum, believing that a country that values democracy, freedom, and human rights would harbor her. Like many before her, she did not expect to be put into a detention center, a locked facility surrounded by barbed wire, upon presenting herself at the border and requesting asylum.

Sadly, this is a story I’ve told over and over again.

But it’s getting worse.

For-profit immigration detention centers like the one currently holding Sofia are on the rise. Yet, we know little about how poorly people are treated behind the walls of these privatized prisons. There is no accountability and no public purview.

So when I discovered the opportunity to sponsor Sofia and get her out of the hellhole I know she’s in, I quickly jumped on it. I provided all the necessary financial and supporting info, along with a letter explaining why I felt connected to Sofia and wanted to sponsor her. Despite there being nothing questionable about my character or desire and ability to support her, in the end Sofia’s deportation officer denied her request.

What’s worse is I’ve since discovered just how cruel this officer is. And not only to Sofia, but to other women in her cell as well.

But why keep a woman with a legitimate asylum claim in prison when she’s asked for parole and has someone like me who’s agreed to give her shelter, be responsible for her, and is willing to support her while she awaits her case?

Because you can. Because you don’t have to answer to anyone for your behavior.

Profiteering off of suffering people is bad enough, but denying such a person basic rights is unconscionable. Even long-standing criminals in our prison system are eligible for parole with good behavior.

But there is no reasonable rule for good behavior in our immigration detention system. And Sofia, who is not a criminal, is being treated worse than one, with no rights and no voice. I worry about how she’ll persevere in her current situation. And what other suffering might be inflicted upon her.

Yet Sofia is only one of thousands of asylum seekers in our nation’s detention centers run by private companies who profit from the suffering of others. And are supported by our tax dollars.

It’s not coincidental that I was visiting my former home and small-town community when all this was unfolding. The 30 years spent in Virginia embody the best years of my life. My family circle expanded when we moved to Greene County. These are folks I truly care about, and they, me. The sweetness of that community still tugs on my heart.

But it was clear to me as I reconnected with friends, rejuvenated my spirit with the lush springtime of the Shenandoah Valley, filled my senses and delighted in memories, that what constitutes my circle of connection has expanded too far for me to return. No matter the love and beauty that surrounded me while there, I couldn’t let go of a young woman struggling in a detention center at the southern border.

NOTE: photo credits to Dr. Michael A. Milton (Blue Ridge Mountains), Jupi Lu (mother and child), and Barbara Rosner (detention facilities)

Venezuela Is Bleeding

Venezuela is bleeding. A deep, dark flow from her insides pouring out over the land and into neighboring countries.

Daily she bleeds. A kind of hemorrhaging of her people that no one seems able to stop. Many complain about it. Many others mourn the loss.

Sources say that, on average, 5,000 people per day are leaving Venezuela. The country has been drained of an estimated 20% of her population. Maybe more.

For years, her people have tumbled into Colombia, Chile, Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru. And now the flow is streaming farther north, to the United States.

But much of the way is clogged. And so they wait, in Ciudad Juárez, a place that’s become a stopgap. But Juarez has its own share of poor who wander the lanes of traffic that inches its way to the international bridge trying to sell their wares, candies and trinkets in hand, dirty rags to wash windshields. The Venezuelans join the locals, competing for meager coins to buy meager meals.

I pass them by when I walk over the bridge into Juarez to help serve the free meals for migrants at the cathedral. I spot the Venezuelans easily. Parents hoisting their children upon their shoulders to appeal to drivers. They speak without using words.

“See, I have a family to feed.”

“Won’t you help this child I’m carrying?”

“See, we’ve come a very long way. We are hungry.” Some carry images of the Venezuelan flag.

But they have endured much more than hunger to get here.

They’ve traveled through “the world’s deadliest jungle,” Panama’s Darien Gap.  Some have stepped past dead bodies, heard the cries of others, saw images they’ll never forget along the way. Only to be halted and targeted by cartels and even police. Shaken down for the pittance they’ve earned. Or worse.

They await their fate living on the streets or in shabby shelters, migrant holding cells or hotels. The latter if they’re blessed enough to have meager funds or receive some of the limited support available for temporary shelter.

But even sturdy, hopeful people have their limits. Tensions rise. Frustration grows.

Monday night a fire broke out at one of the Mexican government-run centers for male migrants in Juarez. The cause is under investigation. Most difficult to understand, the guards did not unlock the cells for the men to flee. They left them behind. Three government migration officials and two private security guards have since been arrested.

Dozens died.

More blood flows.

_{Volunteers at the cathedral created a cross of 39 candles to honor those who died in the fire}

The wound grows deeper.

And it becomes easier to grow numb. To desensitize, not want to feel or acknowledge the pain of others. It’s overwhelming, after all.

There’s so much bleeding.

Mexico is saturated with her own blood. Years of femicides, disappearances, slaying of journalists. The list goes on.

My country, too, has spilled much blood since its inception. The blood of innocents seeped below the earth where we try to dismiss it. Or gaslight it.

Just stop the flow north, we say. Then things will be better. I hear the angry voices. I see the twisted news stories. Slanted to instigate fearful and knee-jerk reactions.

Those of us who want to help say it’s too much. What can we do?

In her diaries, Dorothy Day laments how even good-hearted people regard the poor and down-and-out with bitterness and frustration. They ask what’s the use? What can I accomplish anyway?

I know I don’t have answers. I lack control over any of it.

But I try to live by what Dorothy advises, knowing that I often fail.

“If we start in by admitting that what we can do is very small—a drop in the bucket—and try to do that very well, it is a beginning and really a great deal.” (From The Duty of Delight: The Diaries of Dorothy Day)

So, I pick up my bucket and begin once again. Mopping up the drops before me. Trusting that my small effort is making a difference. Even if I can’t make the bleeding stop.

_{Kelly Latimor Icons}

No Limit

There is no limit to the people coming. I’m told more arrive every day.

But I’m not at one of the shelters accompanying migrants in El Paso. I’ve crossed the border into Juarez to help at Nuestra Seῇora de Guadalupe Cathedral on the plaza where, under the auspices of the Missionaries of St. Columban, volunteers serve almuerzo (lunch) to some 400-600 migrants Monday through Friday. I’d heard they could use help, so I walk over the bridge on Thursdays. A sinfully simple undertaking for me, a white U.S. citizen with a passport.

Meanwhile, all U.S. ports of entry remain closed to asylum seekers as Title 42 continues to serve as a stopgap, causing a growing, seemingly endless number of migrants to make their way across Mexico and land in Juarez. When the number stuck on the streets began escalating, the Columbans and the diocese of Ciudad Juárez chose to set up tables in the parish hall and make sure they ate at least one meal a day.

_{Cathedral in Ciudad Juarez plaza}

People line up outside before the doors open. Men, women, children waiting for a free meal. No questions asked. All that’s required is that you stand for the benediction, eat quickly, and pick up after yourself so that we can seat the next round of folks. Fourteen tables, eight to a table. That’s 112 people per round. And tables will be filled several times before the day is over.

I hadn’t thought about how impractical love is until I started serving plate after plate of warmed-over spaghetti, beans, and rolls to table after table of migrants.

Here, unlike the shelters in El Paso, there’s no quantifiable outcome to my efforts. No one to call to come drive the families to the airport or bus so we can know they’ll soon be in the safe harbor of their sponsor. Instead, they eat and pool back onto the streets or their room, for those who have money to afford one.

When the spaghetti runs out – and it inevitably does – volunteers quickly improvise by opening can after can of tuna, corn, and peas, throwing in huge dollops of mayonnaise, to create a semi-satisfying alternative. That, too, may run out, depending on how many stragglers will show up before the cathedral closes its doors later this afternoon.

How do you even know if someone won’t show up in line again later? I ask one of the volunteers.

She shrugs. Her quizzical expression says, why does it matter?

I only do this one day a week, yet I notice I have attitude issues. I want assurances. Sensible rules. Measurable results.

_{Volunteers serving lunch}

When I volunteered in El Paso, we had order, a structure to the scenario of people arriving seeking asylum. We served a steady stream of migrants, but a manageable one. And many had legitimate claims for asylum. But not all. Still, there was a process. ICE would check each asylee, vet and bring them to our shelters. And we had a good system going, feed them, give them a hot shower and a change of clothes, tell their relatives to buy airline or bus tickets, and get them on to the next leg of their journey. It was a relatively smooth process. And I felt as though I was part of a humanitarian effort with a clear purpose.

Until the arrivals started to grow. And grow. Migration no longer a methodical ebb and flow, but a stubborn tide that refused to go out.

Now I wonder, and worry, where will it all end?

I grow tired rushing from table to table, balancing paper plates, Styrofoam cups with sugar-watery oatmeal. I react, interiorly, to diners who don’t acknowledge the plate of food I’ve set before them with a thank-you. I feel disgusted with the person who sneaks a second meal when so many still needing to be fed sit on folding chairs waiting outside our doors. And I’m beyond frustrated with systems of governing that create the kind of greed, exploitation, and desperation that causes so many to leave home and prevents them from simply existing. Some days I rant with better alternatives. As if I could rule the world. Or would be good at it.

Staring out at this sea of people, I’m secretly deciphering who deserves to be here. Certainly the woman who has stuffed her mop of unkempt hair into a faded black hoodie, stained with the dust of the desert. Her soiled jeans reveal bare ankles fit into sole-flapping sneakers. But not the Venezuelan couple at the next table, charging their phones while ignoring everyone around them. From his bright, obviously-dyed blond cropped hairstyle and her long curls cascading down the length of her clean black coat, I’ve deduced they’ve shuffled in from a hotel room.

I’m clearly no Mother Teresa. Nor Dorothy Day. Apparently, I can accompany people only so far.

Dorothy Day and Mother Teresa (Photo by Jim Forest/Flickr)

Aware that I need an attitude check, I turn to my fellow volunteers for encouragement. Of course, there are stalwart, selfless Catholic sisters among us. Models I don’t even want to try to emulate. But there are also many sweet, youthful faces. I haven’t yet discovered what has brought these 20-something-year-olds to volunteer at least four hours of their weekdays to serve destitute people. But I’ve come to know a few of them. Like Jaime Jesus, the Venezuelan migrant, who arrives every day to tend to other migrants like himself.

At 23, he’s shouldering the responsibility of caring for his ill parents and younger sister back in Venezuela. The day his mother could only feed him and his sister and tried to pretend she and his dad had already eaten, he knew he had to leave home to support them.

On a break between wiping tables and waiting for the next procession to pile in, I ask Jaime about his job. I’d heard he was working as a barista at a local café. He says he starts at 3 p.m., which is basically right after he leaves here, and works until 11. Every day. Then he goes to sleep for a few hours until the alarm wakes him so he can check the CBP One mobile app. Like thousands of other Venezuelan migrants, he’s seeking a “humanitarian exception” to Title 42 to enter the U.S. But whenever he tries to file for an appointment online, the saturated system crashes. So, he keeps rising early and trying.

He makes me wish I had control over that process. I’d quickly decide who was worthy of a chance to apply for a “humanitarian exemption.” Jaime – worthy. Couple with the stylish haircuts – not worthy.

Incredulously, I ask, with such a busy schedule, why then does he volunteer here every day?

“It fills my soul to help my friends,” he says.

I stare for a moment, knowing that if I were him, I’d probably be napping right now, catching up on all those missed hours of sleep instead of feeding fellow competitors in the endless line to enter the land of opportunity.

While Jaime is learning English from us, I’m learning humility from him.

Unbidden, the words of Jim Finley, one of my spiritual teachers, come to mind. “Love won’t let us live on our own terms.”

That’s for sure. Because, if it did, I would naturally put limits on love, conditions that must be met before I can open my heart fully. No such conditions exist with Jaime.

Nor with God. Which is why, at the end of a full day, I choose to sit like an unlearned child in the silence of the lap of God. I need to mellow out and soak up that love. Again.

I settle onto my meditation mat and open the New Testament, expecting to practice lectio divina. The marked, tattered pages of 1Corinthians fall open before me. I’ve highlighted the infamous chapter 13 all over the place. Those overused verses at weddings that caused guests’ eyes to cloud over.

But my eyes fall to this line: “There is no limit to love’s forbearance, to its trust, its hope, its power to endure.”

No limit!

I read it again. I think of the migrants at the cathedral. I see Jaime‘s boyish smile welcoming them.

The message seeps in.

Am I being asked to live up to that? That kind of limitless love? Can I possibly get myself out of the way and let such an impractical, extravagant love order my life?

Certainly not on my own.

I close my eyes and open my hands. Waiting in the silence.

When the gong on my meditation timer app goes off, Nicholas of Flue’s ethereal ending prayer pops up. “My Lord and my God, detach me from myself to give my all to you.”

My God, my all? Yes, I know, it’s the only way.

Note: a version of this essay will appear in NCR’s Soul Seeing column this spring.

Part of a Miracle

Me (seated) and my sister

I am praying to be part of a miracle. As a light-hearted 6-year-old, full of joy, imagination, spontaneity, and unbridled love, I trusted in miracles.

By the time I was 7 or 8, my world of innocence was changing drastically. The abusive authority present in my life, on many levels, taught me to be cautious, protective, stifled. I began to write stories to entertain myself, to create safe spaces that I could control. When I turned 9, my world fell apart. I became more distrustful, disillusioned, disenchanted. Less inclined to believe in miracles, confining them to Bible stories.

It took me many years and lots of challenging inner work to recognize and release those internalized abusive voices and unnecessary fears. Little by little I reconnected with that creative, expressive, imaginative, life-giving spirit. As I allowed myself to be more vulnerable, I began to trust. As I opened my heart, I became more willing to feel, more willing to be present to the pain – my own and that of others.

I could envision something new rather than believe the images and illusions I’d been taught. And I began to “see” the miracles again.

Through accompanying immigrant families at our southern border, I’ve realized that it’s possible for me to be part of the miracle. By offering compassion, love, mercy, kindness, forgiveness into a situation that may appear overwhelming, I become part of a positive movement in which all things are possible. In a more open-hearted, more life-giving response, the abundance of a loving God is tangible.

It’s true! I’ve witnessed it for myself here in El Paso.

And now we face such a moment in our nation. Something new, more beautiful and unifying, more life-giving for all people is possible. Whether or not this miracle comes into being depends on our response. Mine and yours.

The other day I watched a short video that Insight Meditation Teacher Tara Brach had recommended on Van Jones’ response to racism. Mr. Jones has been entering my radar quite a bit lately, and I’m glad. He’s impressed me with his thoughtful, compassionate, well-balanced, and wise words regarding the divisions in our country and how and why it’s important we come together. This from a man who clearly has experienced and witnessed racism and, from what he’s shared, had to work through much rage during his younger years.

But it was the end of this video that really got to me. A moment when he couldn’t hold it together as he tried to express what this moment unfolding before us means to him. He called it “a great awakening” in which “much more is possible than we dared to hope for,” because something has happened that never happened before: people of all skin colors, all backgrounds, are coming together to speak out against racial injustice. To show they care. Van Jones, this professional, emotionally-mature man, cried as he said, “Somebody killed a black man, and everybody cares. It’s a miracle.”

He wept and I was deeply moved. Moved because I felt the pain of how much he’s been carrying as a black man living in this country trying to work through this maze. Yet I could only feel the fringes of this pain, because as a white woman of privilege, I have not experienced it.

Still, I am certain that my personal experiences of authorities wielding injustices and cruelties, oppressing the vulnerable and victimized, have sensitized me to the oppression of others. What strikes me about Van Jones’ story, and the reality for many others, is that the abusive authorities over black and brown lives are real. Unlike my reality, they’re not part of the past or of someone’s childhood.

They still exist.

Imagining and creating something new, more beautiful and loving, more open-hearted than what we have now requires that we be willing to “see” with new eyes rather than believe the images and myths we’ve been taught. It requires being grounded in the Love that brought us here, sustains us in everything, and exists in all of us.

It also requires letting go of the outcome. Trusting that creating a space imbued with compassion, love, mercy, kindness, forgiveness, and peace will manifest into the miracle that is needed.

I am praying to be part of that miracle.

Hard to Love

I am weary.

Lately I feel overwhelmed. Like I’m trying to manage the unmanageable.

That’s understandable when I’ve got 140 people, or more, at the Nazareth center and only two volunteers to help me.

Rarely do I feel in control of what’s going on around me. I veer from one hot priority to another.

Before, my fellow volunteers and I called it “organized chaos.” Now, I organize nothing. I’m never able to successfully complete a task before being pulled away to something else and then often forgetting what I’d put aside. We have so many needs, I’m always neglecting something.

The reason?

Over the past several weeks, the number of immigrant families requesting asylum at the El Paso border has spiked. These days ICE processes and releases anywhere from 500-700 people a day to our community’s hospitality shelters!

And it doesn’t appear that will slow down. Nothing positive’s being done to address the root causes. Money is not being spent in these countries to counter the lies smugglers are spreading.

Yet, what’s amazing to me is that our community has continued to step up. Every time I marvel at the number we’ve assisted, we’re asked to do more.

And we do.

Somehow another church opens its space. The bishop makes an appeal and more volunteers show up. A local grocer makes another delivery of fresh fruit.

Someone drops off more bottled water or packages of new underwear.

But it’s a drop in the bucket.

Still, we keep going. Even when it’s hard.

As Kim, my friend who volunteers at two of the hotels that receive families daily, reminds me, “I do it because I know, this is not about me.”

We all know there’s a bigger picture here.

And we keep responding because, for us, the alternative is unacceptable.

To drop these very vulnerable people onto the streets with no resources, no money, no food, no idea of how to get to where they’re going – that’s not something we can or want to do.

Yet, this “work” challenges me. It challenges me to love even when I don’t feel like it. Even when I’m exhausted. And even when, in my limited mind, I deem someone “not worthy.”

There are those who will tear at your heart. And those who will try your patience.

Even worse, there are many who prey on immigrants. Like the smugglers in their countries who are egging them on, charging $7,000 to $8,000 per family now, with fake promises of visas and work once they get here. And like some folks in our country who are making money and taking advantage of the situation.

Greed has a way of showing up in the most vulnerable of places.

Wiped out and weary, I’ve turned to Dorothy Day. Her writings help me. It certainly wasn’t easy for her to serve the desperately poor and homeless, day in and day out. Live in squalor conditions with them. At times endure their ungratefulness or attempts to take advantage.

Dorothy struggled too. The work was endless. At the end of the day, much was left undone. Especially difficult was that she daily recognized the enormity of the suffering around her.

But Dorothy was grounded in God and in her spiritual practices.  Her connection to the love of Christ sustained her.

She writes:

“It is no use saying that we are born 2,000 years too late to give room to Christ. Nor will those who live at the end of the world have been born too late. Christ is always with us, always asking for room in our hearts….And giving shelter or food to anyone who asks for it, or needs it, is giving it to Christ.” (“A Room for Christ,” December 1945)

Dorothy not only believed this, she lived it. She challenges me to love, even when I don’t feel like it. Even when I feel inadequate.

And to remember why I’m asked to do so.

In a 1964 issue of The Catholic Worker, she asked herself, “What are we accomplishing for them anyway, or for the world or for the common good?”

What is it I think I am doing anyway, giving my energy and time to these immigrants, most of whom will be deported, the majority of whom will not be relieved of their suffering in this lifetime?

She wrote in her essay To Love Is to Suffer, “If we share in the suffering of the world, then some will not have to endure so heavy an affliction.”

There’s my answer. My fellow volunteers and I are doing the small things we can do.

We are giving these people back their dignity. At least for a while.

We are keeping vulnerable people from being deposited onto the streets.

We are offering kindness and compassion. Even when we’re exhausted. Even when it’s hard.

“If we could only learn that the only important thing is to love…to keep on loving, and showing that love, and expressing that love, over and over, whether we feel it or not….It is a hard, hard doctrine.”

I hear you, Dorothy. It’s a hard, hard practice. Only by grounding myself in God can this make any sense.

 

Merton on Men, Animals, and God’s Will

I struggle with how to respond to words and actions that strike at the heart.

“They’re animals.”

“They’re criminals. They don’t deserve consideration and compassion.”

“We have lost our soul.” These last words from Ruben Garcia at the recent Voice of the Voiceless fundraising dinner for Annunciation House, with the theme “If the World Knew,” especially struck my heart. “Our country has lost its soul,” he told us.

Is it true?

I don’t know how to respond.

I wonder how do I convey, through my words, the haunting wails of a child separated from his mother? Or the pain expressed by a woman whose husband – her sole supporter – is forcibly taken from her without her being able to say goodbye? What words exemplify the distress I have been feeling that these “deeds” are done in our name?

What could I possibly write? And how is God asking me to respond?

Part of my assignment with the Living School of Contemplation and Action is to read mystics like Thomas Merton. This morning, I spontaneously opened his book, New Seeds of Contemplation, and discovered the words I was searching for.

So I will let him write this post for me.

Just as a forewarning, having written this in 1961, Merton uses a lot of male pronouns and nouns. I have occasionally added “woman” to this excerpt, and I have italicized and boldened some text that especially speaks to me, but his message shines through nonetheless.

“If you want to know what is meant by ‘God’s will’ in man’s life, this is one way to get a good idea of it. ‘God’s will’ is certainly found in anything that is required of us in order that we may be united with one another in love. You can call this, if you like, the basic tenet of the Natural Law, which is that we should treat others as we would like them to treat us, that we should not do to one another what we would not want another to do to us. In other words, the natural law is simply that we should recognize in every other human being the same nature, the same needs, the same rights, the same destiny as in ourselves. The plainest summary of all the natural law is: to treat other [men and women] as if they were [men/women]. Not to act as if I alone were a man, and every other human were an animal or a piece of furniture.

“Everything that is demanded of me, in order that I may treat every other [man/woman] effectively as a human being, ‘is willed for me by God under the natural law.’ Whether or not I find the formula satisfactory, it is obvious that I cannot live a truly human life if I consistently disobey this fundamental principle.

“But I cannot treat other men as men unless I have compassion for them. I must have at least enough compassion to realize that when they suffer they feel somewhat as I do when I suffer. And if for some reason I do not spontaneously feel this kind of sympathy for others, then it is God’s will that I do what I can to learn how. I must learn to share with others their joys, their sufferings, their ideas, their needs, their desires. I must learn to do this not only in the cases of those who are of the same class, the same profession, the same race, the same nation as myself, but when men who suffer belong to other groups, even to groups that are regarded as hostile. If I do this, I obey God. If I refuse to do it, I disobey Him. It is not therefore a matter left open to subjective caprice.

“…Christianity is not merely a doctrine or a system of beliefs, it is Christ living in us and uniting [men/women] to one another in His own Life and unity. ‘I in them, and Thou, Father in Me, that they may be made perfect in One…And the glory which Thou hast given me I have given them, that they may be One as we also are One.’” (New Seeds of Contemplation, pp. 76-77)

The Best I Can Do

It was such a precious thing.

To have a little 4-year-old, previously a stranger to me, trust me with her knotted tresses. Trust me enough to allow me to secure her between my knees as I sat down and attempted to untangle her long, wavy locks.

Lint and other particles from her weeks-long journey from Honduras had nested in Yoselin’s curls and refused to disentangle themselves.

It felt like a nearly impossible task. Especially with only a thin comb as my tool.

She never made a sound. Never winced. Yoselin stood quietly, patiently, while her 7-year-old sister and her appreciative father watched.

I finally threw my hands up.

“It’s the best I can do. Es la mejor que puedo hacer.”

I gave a pleading look to her dad and twisted a hair band around her tresses, securing any loose ends. Even after I pulled her hair back into a ponytail, Yoselin didn’t budge. She remained perched between my legs, unmovable. I gave her a little nudge.

“I need to get up,” I gently said. Necesito levantarme.

Reluctantly she moved away and I went off to prepare lunch so she and her family could eat before they boarded the bus to Tennessee in a few hours.

It felt like such a small thing. And yet very precious.

I didn’t know the next time this child would receive such a gentle, loving touch. Her innocence and complete vulnerability and trust at my hands made me want to cry.

Sometimes it’s not just children who are innocent and vulnerable and trusting in our hands.

I’ve become familiar with so many suffering people who have come here completely vulnerable and trusting in a country known as the greatest defender of human rights and democracy.

Like my guy in detention “Mathias.” He was shocked when, after explaining to U.S. Customs and Border Protection his reason for seeking international asylum, they handcuffed and confined him in a detention facility.

I’ve been visiting Mathias for months. I’ve gotten to know him and care about him. Even took the morning off to attend his court hearing, as his main support system and concerned friend. But he lost his case. It doesn’t appear he has much chance for appeal. His health has been deteriorating since he arrived at the El Paso detention facility. Yet El Paso has one of the better facilities.

If he doesn’t appeal, he will soon be transferred to another facility as he awaits deportation. And his situation could get much worse.

My fear is he’ll be transferred to a private facility in Sierra Blanca, Texas, where African immigrants, in particular, are being abused and beaten, according to a recent report by immigrant and civil rights groups. This is not surprising, based on what we hear from other volunteers and immigration attorneys.

It deeply disturbs me – what’s happening in our country. Both behind closed doors and overtly.

I’m aware that sometimes I can’t get all the knots out, no matter how hard I try. I can’t prevent the pain someone is experiencing.

Sometimes the best I can offer is to simply walk alongside them in their anxiety. Their fear. Their suffering.

And not have any answers. Not be able to explain why a country known throughout the world for supporting and defending human rights would treat others inhumanely.

It doesn’t seem like enough. What I do.

But I know that kindness does matter. A caring heart matters. And an educated, intelligent response to abusive authority matters, too.

Your response matters.

Let’s all do the best we can do. It’s the only way positive changes can happen.

Davis Gets It…Again

Annunciation House in downtown El Paso

I had Davis to myself for nearly five days over the Christmas holiday. That has to be a first.

Usually, whenever he’s home, he has friends to catch up with, numerous social engagements to attend, and at least one overnighter at a best friend’s house. But I’m not in Virginia anymore.

Here in El Paso, he had nothing on his social calendar except visiting me.

Despite my glee, I wasn’t stingy with him. I didn’t hoard his attention. I shared him with El Paso.

After all, he was the first of my intimate circle of family and friends to visit, and I was anxious to show him around. To introduce him to life at the border and expose him to the people and places that mean so much to me. I wanted to give him the full effect.

And I hoped he would understand.

On Christmas Eve, his first day, we attended the annual Las Posadas and intimate Christmas Eve Mass and dinner at Annunciation House – a hospitality house for migrants and refugees that has been operating for 40 years in downtown El Paso. Entirely run on donations and volunteers, the building is old, but it’s filled with the precious hearts and stories of those who have passed through its doors.

A woman prays by her bed in her assigned room at Annunciation House

 

This was Davis’s first Las Posadas.  He didn’t seem to mind as we walked the street, knocking on doors, singing in Spanish – a language he doesn’t know. We followed a little girl posing as Mary, a lace shawl draped around her head, accompanied by her raggedy-dressed Joseph – both of them real-life refugees.

When we gathered back at Annunciation House, he didn’t seem to mind the peeling paint and cracked walls. Or that he had to stand during the service because there weren’t enough seats. He toured the house with one of the 20-something year-old volunteers who’ve made a year-long commitment to work and live here, and he asked thoughtful questions. He listened to fellow volunteers share stories about what this place means to them. 

Then we ate a simple Christmas Eve meal of Posole, a traditional Mexican stew made with hominy, while sitting on a hard bench alongside refugees from the Congo, Guatemala, and Honduras. Davis even scrounged up the courage to practice his French with the African woman. Not knowing either English or Spanish, she had been silent until he engaged her in conversation.

The next morning at breakfast I asked what he thought about our unique Christmas Eve celebration.

Without hesitation, he said, “I can see God is present here.”

As he spoke of the volunteers’ commitment to the people, of all the “good” and the generosity he’d witnessed, my heart filled.

He’d seen what I’d wanted him to see. After only one day!

During the rest of his trip, in quiet moments, Davis asked questions about his dad. He wanted to remember the quirky aspects of David’s personality. Hear more about his father’s childhood and the early days of our marriage.

I didn’t mind at all. In fact, I became acutely aware of David’s presence in our conversations. I felt immense warmth and gratitude.

I never wanted Davis to suffer this loss at such a young age, in the middle of the most important stage of his relationship with his father.  Yet I know he is wiser because of this experience. His life is richer, his insights deeper, his compassion more genuine.

It’s what enabled him to stand in this place at the border with me and see what I see. With an awareness and understanding that comes from the heart.

Gregory Boyle, the Jesuit priest who’s worked with gang members in LA for 30 years and wrote the best seller Tattoos on the Heart, spoke about this in a recent interview with Krista Tippett. He says that “standing in the lowly place with the easily despised and the readily left out,” he finds more joy, kinship, mutuality. He’s discovered that “the measure of our compassion lies not in our service of those on the margins, but in our willingness to see ourselves in kinship.”

Sometimes that kinship comes in the guise of wounds.

As one of Fr. Boyle’s homies, who’d been abused and beaten throughout his childhood, explained, “How can I help the wounded if I don’t welcome my own wounds?”

So, we have to welcome our wounds. These hurting places within us. And I think if we are not afraid to acknowledge them, and know that we are loved unconditionally in them, we will be better able to stand in that “lowly place” offering kinship to those whom society considers dismissible, disposable.

And we will see with different eyes. The eyes that saw what Davis saw in El Paso.