94 days

I am tired. Its the time of year when I seem to get tired. I am so ready for the clouds to part and the sun to shine through. 

Mother Theresa says, do not think that love, in order to be genuine, has to be extraordinary. What we need is to love without getting tired.

I'm not quite sure how thats supposed to happen. 

Somehow when you/I/one first start a project, its so exciting. Meeting new people, learning a new system, trying and even failing. Slowly, it becomes easier, less overwhelming, until one day it is completely and entirely ordinary. People are people, who you know, and who know you. There aren't really surprises, because even if a new circumstance comes up, you already know how each person is going to respond, and who you need to call to sort it out. Some people complain about everything. Some people freak out like the world is ending (and always need some small crisis to be solved)... maybe so they can feel like they're making progress in the midst of the incredibly infuriating long wait. 

I live with people who are waiting to be heard. They are waiting for a hearing, so that they can learn if the government of Canada is willing to accept their story, and willing to let them stay in Canada. A family could wait two years for a hearing, then wait three months for a letter, (and if they're not accepted, wait a few weeks for the next last-chance application to try to stay). And if all that fails? They go back. They're deported. 

If it works however, these fragile (sometimes annoying) people can trust the world again. They can slowly become more fully human, more fully present. They can live, fully. not waiting any longer. 

I haven't figured out a good response yet, when someone asks me if they are going to be accepted or not. I tell them I don't know. Even though I have heard their story over coffee or jack daniels. Even though I have seen how their children can't sleep at night without nightmares. Even though I have watched them conquer so much in their time here. Even though I believe that every inch of their humanity is valid and wholly worthy of protection. I don't know if Canada is their new home, or if they'll be sent back.

I am tired of not knowing. I am tired of bearing stories and expecting them to not be accepted. The political climate of Canada is so conservative these days, and the refugee board that hears the cases is more and more highly politicized.

I work with a lot of Roma(ni) these days, gypsies (zigan/cegan) in common derogatory terms. I can't believe the shit that these kids have gone through in their schools. I can't believe the shit their parents went through, or their grandparents. (Did you know that the Roma were killed off alongside the Jews in the Holocaust? sometimes just gunned down in killing fields, as to not waste the resources expended by transporting them to gas chambers?). There's limited evidence that people bring with them of systemic discrimination. police brutality and roaming masked mobs. people marching and chanting "death to the criminals: the jews the gypsies and the homosexuals."

And yet, today I was reading al-Jazeera, and I saw an appealing picture. It was a face, vaguely Asian, but I didn't read the headline next to it. I clicked through to find a beautiful slideshow of Hmong faces in Vietnam. I listened to the first seven minutes of the accompanying documentary about the difficulties around infant mortality and cross-cultural understanding between the Hmong and Vietnamese. The Hmong are compassionately portrayed as misled pagans with disfunctional traditions. And yet, when I think of Hmong, I think of the incredible strength, vitality, flexibility and beauty of the diaspora community in Fresno and every US city I've spent much time in. And then I remember how silly it can be to box people in, by culture, by poverty, by any form of statistical expectation. I have agency. The people with whom I live have agency. The world is dynamic, just like the relationships I have here, just like the IRB. I can go ahead and live my life, the world just might continue. I can help in real ways, I can love in real ways, but in the end, I am just a small tiny piece of each child's whole life. Each adult who I talk with, or help with something, has agency over her/his life and family. I have a role to play, but it is not to decide.

We cannot do everything, and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that. This enables us to do something, and do it very well. It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way.... We may never see the end results, but that is the difference between the master builder and the worker. We are workers, not master builders, ministers, not messiahs. We are prophets of a future not our own    ~ prayer attributed to Oscar Romero. 

Example of Feeling Protestant

I've told a few people (including our Jesuit chaplain Jack, whoops) that being at Romero House has made me realize how Protestant I am... and furthermore how much I appreciate my Presbyterian (and *gasp of all gasps* evangelical) roots. For the litany of reasons, I would need another post, but the following event happened a few days ago, and it was the perfect example of how sometimes I get so confused because I don't get the signals, or don't understand whats going on, or what I'm supposed to do, because I'm SO not Catholic. It also demonstrates how I think that the ceremonies and traditions are more fluid than a strict liturgical calendar would let them be. (In fairness, I really appreciate a lot of things that I've learned about Catholic traditions and worldview and commitment to social justice, yet another unwritten post...)

On the Thursday before Good Friday, all the interns gathered for a special "Maundy Thursday" supper. We were apparently recreating the last supper, with unleavened naan and red wine... and chicken and red beets. Before we ate, however, we gathered in the intern common room for a washing of feet. Before the actual washing of feet, our director read a rather long reflection on this painting by Sieger Koder (but I didn't have my glasses, so I couldn't actually focus on the painting at all... )
Then she removed one shoe and sock, and our founder quietly poured water over her one foot and then wiped it off with a towel. Our director then washed/splashed one foot of the guy sitting next to her, who then splashed and wiped the foot of a girl who then solemnly splashed and wiped my foot. I continued the pattern, and on it went. (may i point out at no point in time were there any verbal instructions on what we were supposed to do)

Afterwards, I asked the intern next to me (who grew up Catholic, but no longer affiliates herself with that) "...so... is the one foot thing being considerate because I have a cast on one of my feet? or is it a catholic thing? or like for efficiency or something?"
she thought for a bit. "umm I don't know... i think the only other time I had my feet washed, it was only one foot too. it must be a Catholic thing, but I would ask MJ to be sure"

So over dinner, we ask our Indian intern about what its like in Kerala. He explains that the priest washes the feet of twelve selected members of the parish and then kisses them, and other traditions to which the Catholic members of our group nod and smile.

Coming from the most "evangelical" or perhaps being the most vocally noncatholic background,  our director asked me, "have you ever had your feet washed before". and I said "yeah, definitely, at like camps, or service retreats, but never in connection with the last supper", which I don't think was the expected answer.

and that right there kind of summarizes why I like coming from a tradition that is not so strictly traditionalist. We don't read the same thing on the same day every three years. We don't have (as many) specific rituals attached to specific days. We do things that feel right, that have a biblical base, when it makes sense for the context. My favorite memory of foot washing happened at a camp. After a long day of hiking towards the end of a week at camp, each cabin found a private location and the leader (me) started washing one of the girls feet. The other girls stood around her and gave positive examples of the girl who was being washed having been a servant leader throughout the week. The girl with two clean feet then washed the feet of the next girl. To me, that more wholly represents what John 13 says what Jesus wanted his disciples to do than a ritual where water is symbolically poured and no ones foot is actually cleaned.

sidenote- i feel the same way about communion/eucharist: bread and wine were what was on the table, what was common when eating, not some sacred substance [although there are special foods for passover, i know. but we all do communion/eucharist monthly or weekly anyways, so we're already breaking from the direct text.... ] It didn't have to be led or blessed by some ordained person. i think what jesus was saying was, when you eat together in community, think of me. i am there too....
Hence, i've had communion with a limited number of skittles shared gracefully, and also with tortillas and cranberry juice. neither time was anyone ordained saying any fancy words. but i'll attest and those kids did too, that the holy spirit was there in the middle of that. even with the closest priest miles away.

PS: After dinner, I asked our director about the one-foot thing, and she laughed and told me that it was simply out of consideration of me only having one foot available. which is sweet. but then i asked another intern, and he said that he's seen both.
so i still don't get it....

Voice of the Day: T.S. Eliot

04-19-2011

“In order to arrive at what you do not know 

You must go by a way which is the way of ignorance.

In order to possess what you do not possess

You must go by the way of dispossession. 

In order to arrive at what you are not

You must go through the way in which you are not.

And what you do not know is the only thing you know

And what you own is what you do not own

And where you are is where you are not.”

- T.S. Eliot, from his poem “East Coker”

Verse of the Day: Love in Truth and Action

02-11-2011

"Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action."

- 1 John 3:18

Voice of the Day: Enuma Okoro

02-03-2011

“And the work of God is rarely dull, but it’s not always necessarily what we think. Transformation is hard stuff. Seeking to bring about the kingdom of God — caring for the poor, feeding the hungry, visiting prisoners, caring for the sick, renouncing demons in God’s name — you don’t do that in a 15-minute lunch break.”

- Enuma Okoro

questions that break me (when i get older, i will be stronger)

A new family has moved in. The youngest is nine, and she speaks five languages. They have just come from two years in a Nordic country, and are beginning from nothing once again. They are Roma(ni) from Eastern Europe. They are sweet, funny, and full of laughter alongside of concerns.

Today after starting the school registration process, we sat around their kitchen table and drank strong coffee. After two years of English classes in a foreign European country, the daughters (9 and 11) are conversant, and very interested in who my girl best friend and my boy best friends are. We talk about movies, actors, popular music, and greetings in different languages.

Then after a while, one of the girls began a conversation that I have heard too many times before. "Christina. you are very white."

"yes. yes I am. My skin is very light, especially in winter." She lifts my arm to hold it next to hers.

"You are more white than me" (she is maybe two shades darker than me)

"You are way more white than me" -says her younger sister E (who is caramel-colored with dark hair and eyes, and truly adorable/beautiful)

"Yes, my skin is lighter than yours. but in summer, I will try very hard to get darker skin. I wish that I had skin like yours, E".

"no." -E

"Yeah! its true. Every summer, my friends who are light like me, we lay outside for hours and hours and hours, and we try SO hard to have dark skin. We think it is very beautiful"

"No. it is not beautiful to be black like me". -E

...

and then my heart breaks a little bit.

...

later, we're discussing K'Naan (the waving flag song dude, who was a Somali refugee as a child, and grew up in Toronto).

"is he your boyfriend?" -A

"no. but I wish he was! I've never met him before" -me

"but, do you know his mother?" -E

"no, I've never met his mother" -me

"You should tell him he is your boyfriend" -E

"yeah! I should call him in the phone and tell him, hey! no more girlfriends for you! only me! okay K'naan?" -me, and we all laugh

"...but Christina... he is African?" -A

"yeah, he comes from Somalia, which is in Africa"

"So he is black then?" (A has a seriously concerned look on her face)

"Yeah. he is."

"but he is black..." -A

"Yeah. thats okay with me"

"Is he black like me?" (asks E, a caramel-colored beautiful girl)

"no, he is much darker than you"

"is he black like my dad?" (a slightly darker caramel-colored man)

"no, he is darker than your dad. He's from Africa, so his skin color is like Joy's (their West African neighbor downstairs)"

"You would have a boyfriend who is black like Joy????"

...

My roommate who grew up abroad, went to high school in Chicago, and university in Canada told me in September that Canadians don't really believe in racism... At a museum recently, an intern told me that kids don't think about race. That its only adults that care about race. I told them that one of our kids insulted another by saying "you are too dark like emmanuel (a boy from Nigeria)".

...

Thoughts on talking to kids about the differences between people, and not judging or hating?? loving the skin they are in? not wanting to be white like me? not seeing blackness as something repellent? thoughts on not denying the reality of race and racism in the world but giving them tools and paradigms to avoid soaking it all in?

...

The girls also asked me who I hate. and if they would get hit when they went to school.