Remembering Refugees

The large church building held more than one thousand people, squeezed together on narrow wooden benches. There were five large choirs, and each sang enthusiastically, with impressive cohesion and choreography. There were also several pastors, as this congregation formed when several smaller congregations merged when they found themselves transplanted into the Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) Camp. We remember that first visit well – it was electrifying and moving to have so many people packed into the church building and also to know that despite their joyful worship, each of them had experienced significant trauma and upheaval. After the service, the church leaders led the way, weaving through the maze of white tents, to the home of pastor James. We sat together with some of the elders and pastors, listening and trying to understand a piece of their life. Deacons brought in large platters with heaping bowls of wal-wal, fish soup, lentils and kisra. We were amazed and humbled – this was the first congregation in Juba to feed us a meal after Sunday worship, and we knew that this hospitality was a sacrificial gift.

Pastor James shared that he is often called to help counsel people who are experiencing trauma or abuse in the camp. With so many people crowded into small spaces without good sanitation facilities or land for them to cultivate, over the course of years health, relationships, and work ethic begin to decline. The church is an important source of hope, connection, and strength, and perhaps this is one reason that the worship and prayers feel especially powerful in the camp. Many of the current residents fled to this camp near Juba in 2016 during a horrific period of attacks on the Nuer people. The situation in the city has improved, and many people leave the camp during the day for work or school, but do not yet feel safe enough to live outside the camp. The trauma and fear that they have experienced is significant, and we know that several conditions will have to be met for most of the people to be able to return to normal lives outside the camp. The years that this drags on, however, means that children are growing up inside the camp, and some of our colleagues have lamented that this means they are not learning the skills such as farming, building houses, or caring for cattle that they would be learning in their villages – which of course adds another set of challenges for the country in navigating a new way forward.

World Refugee Day is June 20. We encourage you to remember with us the incredible challenge of refugees around the world. South Sudan is a country with the largest refugee crisis in Africa, with more than 1.5 million people displaced from their homes within South Sudan and more than 2 million living temporarily in camps in neighboring countries. Most of these refugees have been in camps or displaced for nearly five years. Last year nearly 200,000 voluntarily returned home as prospects for peace in their regions improved. However, attempts to implement a new unity government in 2020 have been mired in controversy and led to further instability. In May and June of this year, inter-tribal violence broke out in several places over cattle raiding and revenge killing. The Presbyterian Church of South Sudan is organizing a group of trained mediators to assist in resolving the conflicts. This year also brings the added threat of the Coronavirus – some initial random tests have confirmed the presence of Covid-19 in the IDP camps near Juba, so we pray that the spread is contained.

The Presbyterian Church (USA) has several resources to use in worship or to learn more about the situation of refugees around the world. Specifically, here is a PDF that has two prayers for refugees and a lament for South Sudan written by one of Bob’s students. We look to God, who says repeatedly that he looks out for those who are oppressed and suffering, and that he cares for their welfare. We pray that God will continue to sustain them, that in His mercy they will feel safe to return home, and that the praises and prayers from Nuer United Presbyterian Church will continue to bless God and the community around them and remind them of the hope that they have in our God who came and suffered with us and for us.

He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing. And you are to love those who are foreigners, for you yourselves were foreigners in Egypt.  Dueteronomy 10:18-19

A New Language

The Sunday evening rally was organized by the local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and a local organization called “Not in My Town,” an organization committed to anti-bigotry and anti-bullying.  Within twenty four hours, the planners were able to organize this rally for justice and one thousand concerned citizens showed up at the promenade outside the Law and Justice Center in downtown Bloomington, Illinois. 

When we arrived a few minutes before 5pm, people were standing and sitting and many were holding signs and placards with messages such as “White Silence is Violence” and “We Remember George Floyd” and “Black Lives Matter.”  Even upon arrival, one could viscerally feel the emotion, the pathos, the pain.  We felt compelled to come and show solidarity and concern, but being at any type of rally felt strange and new for us.  We were at the back of the crowd, where it was often difficult to hear the speaker.  A person would speak for a short time and then chants would cascade across the promenade, the crowd shouting “No justice, no peace” or “I can’t breathe” or “Say his name…George Floyd” or “Black Lives Matter.”  For me to say “I can’t breathe” out loud with the group helped me to enter into the moment and the pain.  To be honest, it was mildly difficult for me to voice those words.  While I struggled to utter and internalize the unutterable words of a man killed within the last week, I felt like I needed to verbalize and internalize these words.  I needed to enter into the pain of George Floyd and the others gathered to promote justice on this Pentecost Sunday. 

Rally for Justice in Bloomington, Illinois
Photo Credit:  Ryan Denham, WGLT

The following day Kristi and I participated with over one hundred staff of the Presbyterian Mission Agency to process and lament together.  Laurie Krauss, the director of Presbyterian Disaster Assistance (PDA), co-facilitated our shared time.  She framed our time by sharing how when the tongues of fire came down at Pentecost, people responded in one of two ways to the new languages they heard spoken.  Some were open to what God was doing while others dismissed the disciples as being drunk on wine.  Laurie suggested that the protests and riots happening in our country could be seen as a new language.  We can be open to the protests and the pain and ask, “Even though I don't understand what is going on, what message does God have for me and for us at this time?  Or, we choose to disengage from the messengers because we don’t understand or agree with the method. 

Kristi and I feel like we have been on a journey of learning the language of pain and protest from the African American community for several years now, though we often feel like new kids on the block.  With a group of fellow mission co-workers, we are currently reading a book called White Fragility:  Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism, by Robin DiAngelo  (link here).  We are also listening to black and brown voices share their pain and their hope for a better world.  One recent poignant interview was with Dr. Dwight Radcliff of Fuller Theological Seminary (podcast link here).  We are on a journey, trying to learn a new language, the language of pain and protest.  We will keep listening, keep reading, keep asking questions and keep showing up until we see a new heaven and a new earth rise up like a phoenix out of the broken ashes of our world, a world where division and poverty and racism hold sway.  We will keep holding court with Jesus in prayer and we will continue entering spaces which are not comfortable, forcing us to listen to “voices long silenced” and to narratives not our own.    

Friend, where are you on this journey?  What steps are you taking to understand the language of pain and protest?  We invite you to join us on this journey, a journey we believe to be transformative and healing.