what i’m into {april showers edition}

It feels like it’s been raining constantly in San Diego. April showers and all that, I kept thinking. But in reality, this year is one of the dryest in recent record, says public radio.

why yes, i am wearing Target knock-off-Uggs on the beach.

So maybe I just expect it to be sunny Every! Single! Day! in San Diego and am surprised when it’s not.

But it does feel like the rain is falling, hard or gentle. It feels like things are beginning to grow.

living

I expected Lent and Easter to be crazy busy, since I work at a church and all. I was pleasantly surprised when, for me in children’s ministry land, it wasn’t.

Well.

With a kids’ talent Sunday in worship on Pentecost and then a Sunday School Sunday in worship two weeks later, I’m eating my words. April is all about preparation, it seems like. List-making, coordinating, figuring out how to showcase a third grader’s skateboard tricks in church, getting summer teachers together, helping plan VBS…I think my number is up.

It DID rain when I played tourist with our Chinese friend Sunny and toured the fancy-schmancy Hotel Del. It’s rained two out of three times we’ve taken her sightseeing. Coincidence?

Slowly, slowly, I am learning to take Sabbath. It’s harder than you’d think, with two jobs, both of them with working weekends. Thursday has been my Sabbath day, my sleep in day, my beach day, my reading day. It’s odd, to be resting while everyone else is working. Sometimes taking a Sabbath by myself on the day that I choose seems like the most laughably American thing to do. But it is a start, a little bit of rain falling on dry ground, a little promise of new life that I’m growing into.

i was sick {part six}

Agua Prieta, Mexico

He had taken the train.

Photos c/o CPT Borderlands Delegation, 2007

His name has faded in my memory. I remember his name as Jesus, like so many of the others. But maybe it wasn’t.

He had taken the train. Like many of the others that people call “Mexican,” he was from Guatemala. Like the others, he had grown corn, until the bottom of the market fell out, until it cost more to grow than he could make selling.

Like the others, he needed money to live. Money to send home.

Like the others, he couldn’t afford the bus ticket north. So he took the train.

i needed clothes {part five}

Exposure, they call it.

Photo c/o CPT Borderlands Delegation, 2007

It seems like a diagnosis from a hundred years ago. A word on an autopsy from the ancient world, like tuberculosis or leprosy.

They take only what they can carry on their backs, the Mexican shelter workers tell us. A backpack with a sweater, some electrolyte drinks, water. Then, when the coyote tells them they’re close to the border, they drop it all and run. They don’t want to be weighed down.

quiet for boston {a pause}

Sometimes the best thing we can say is nothing.

I have no words for a day like today, even words I’ve already written. So I offer you this: a pause. Quiet. A prayer.

Eternal God, in whose perfect kingdom no sword is drawn but the sword of righteousness, no strength known but the strength of love: So mightily spread abroad your Spirit, that all peoples may be gathered under the banner of the Prince of Peace, as children of one Father; to whom be dominion and glory, now and for ever. Amen. -Collect for Peace, The Book of Common Prayer

I’m in the midst of a seven-day series on encountering Jesus on the U.S.-Mexico border. But sometimes we just need to be quiet. I’ll be back tomorrow to continue.

i was a stranger {part four}

Altar, Mexico

The plaza in Altar seems like a scene from a film.

All photos c/o CPT Borderlands Delegation 2007

A beautiful Mexican church rises up beside a concrete plaza filled with migrants on the last step of their journey before they cross. The atmosphere seems to combine the edgy feeling of a border town with the excitement and commercialism of an amusement park.

Vendors sell tacos, backpacks, walking shoes, bandanas, hats, electrolyte drink. Long-distance buses from Chiapas and Oaxaca arrive on a side street, and their passengers, mostly men but with a surprising amount of women, unload their belongings and stand to stretch their legs after the nearly twenty-four hour bus trip.

Black crows fly through the air and land on the roof of the church, in startling contrast to the blue sky.

i was thirsty {part three}

Outside Sasabe, Arizona

We read the Bible in the desert whenever we can.

One of the pastors in our group volunteers to lead the last meditation, which we time to line up with our visit to a Humane Borders water tank in the desert. She speaks about the Samaritan woman at the well and her conversation with Jesus.

We’ve crossed over the border again, back into the United States, and are in the region where migrants most frequently travel: the west desert around Tucson.

The water station is simple and unassuming. In other locations, these stations have been torn apart and vandalized by angry residents who resent the migrant traffic that comes through the area. But this one is intact: a simple tank with a spigot of clean water that people can fill their bottles with before traveling on.

i was hungry {part two}

“For I was hungry, and you gave me something to eat.” -Matthew 25:35

Photo c/o CPT Borderlands Delegation 2007

Benjamin Hill, Mexico

“I watched a man the other day at the feeding program,” said Father Quiniones as our group sits in a restaurant in Benjamin Hill, Sonora.  “How many tortillas do you think he ate?”

We had only met Father Quiniones a few minutes before, but we could already tell that he was a storyteller.  We had already learned from Rick, our leader, that Father Quiniones had two great passions apart from the church: loving the stranger and telling a good yarn.   “This many,” he said.  He held up one palm, then turned it over for each multiple of five.  Five, ten, fifteen, twenty.  And then an outstretched pointer finger: twenty-one.

“Twenty-one tortillas!” he said.

jesus the migrant {a series}

Photos c/o CPT Borderlands Delegation, 2007

It’s about time.

After years, a comprehensive immigration reform bill is set to hit Congress, and it’s rumored that something may actually happen. People have been waiting a long time. For many of the attendees of today’s immigration reform rally in Washington and other rallies nationwide, it’s been too long. Too long.

I started thinking about immigration in 2007, when I actually met some immigrants.

With the support of my church, I traveled to the U.S.-Mexico border with Christian Peacemaker Teams, a group trying to “get in the way” of violence worldwide. We saw the border, and we also saw what was on the other side: decreased job opportunities, high prices for , and thousands of people trying to make ends meet, even if it means a 70-mile walk across the desert to El Norte.

This week, to kick off What I Saw Wednesday, I’ll be posting daily about what I saw on the border. I have no easy answers, not even any political solutions, just stories about Jesus the migrant.

God was there, I was there, and this is what happened. This is what I saw.

daily bread

“Give us this day our daily bread,” we teach the children to pray.

We go through the prayer, line by line, sorting out words like hallowed and trespasses. And then we make it to the honorary verse of dinner tables everywhere.

“We’re asking for the things we need for today,” we tell the kids. I can see the kids’ thoughts behind their eyes: laptops, iPods, to do well on the test. My mind wanders, too, away from bread. Give us this day the money for the rent, the money for the student loans, the money for the car repairs.

The things we need for today, yes. But first of all, we are asking for food, for bread. We are asking for the things that will nourish us and keep our bodies strong.

a weekend prayer

This is the day that so many call “Low Sunday.” People are worn out after the extravaganza of Holy Week and Easter Sunday.
I get the feeling.

It’s still Easter, yes. But the alleluias are quieter, subtler. And that’s okay.