The Second Station of the Cross: Jesus Takes Up His Cross

[The following is from a series first posted during Lent in 2015.]

< The First Station of the Cross                                                                        The Third Station of the Cross >

Jesus willingly accepts and patiently bears his cross

© AFP Immigrant workers harvest grapes in California's Napa Valley

"We do rely on a foreign workforce. We really have an issue in terms of attracting domestic workers. They typically don't want to work in agriculture. It's out in the elements, it can be a hard job" http://www.wine-searcher.com/m/2013/03/california-harvests-delayed-by-shortage-of-workers

Many of us live in comfort in the Empire, taking our bounty for granted. It is a bounty that is largely dependent upon the work of immigrant laborers who are poorly paid, lacking in many services such as housing and healthcare, living in substandard conditions. We, in turn, denigrate the illegal immigrants upon whom we rely for the food and wine on our tables. Undocumented immigrants willingly take up the burden while Empire enjoys the bounty.

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Just Like Jonah

Not Just a Fish Story

The Book of Jonah was written during a time in Israel’s history when they were focusing on some kind of racial/national/religious purity to the point that they wanted to get rid of all foreign influence. Yes, the Israelites were returning from Babylonian captivity to their homeland. They wanted to make their nation great again, and some of their leaders (Ezra and Nehemiah, to name names) thought that they needed to cleanse themselves from all foreigners. They were even willing to separate families, telling those who had taken foreign wives to send them back to their own respective lands.

There were some, however, who said "Wait a minute, not so fast. This does not sound like the God we worship, the God we know to be compassionate and merciful." They had a more universal vision of their faith and how they should live, so there began a resistance movement to counter the hardliners.

In order to address the xenophobic error that threatened to distort the faith  even while attempting to preserve it, the story of Jonah arose to illustrate to the people that the Israelites were not the only ones who could hear and respond to the word of God. Indeed, the story reflects God's compassion for all people and gives us reason to welcome the foreigner in our midst*.

Confronting the Other

In the story, the Lord told Jonah to go and preach to the people of Nineveh. They were foreigners and heathens, after all, in Jonah's mind. His message was that they needed to repent, or God would bring down judgment. Jonah had been reluctant to even meet with these ungodly heathens, but he eventually delivered the message (after some detours, including a ride in the belly of a big fish). Once he had his say, Jonah headed out of town to find a nice vantage point to view God’s mighty destruction upon the people.

Much to Jonah’s dismay, the people of Nineveh actually repented and turned their hearts toward God. The biblical story recounts that Jonah was angry with God for the way it all turned out.  “Isn’t this what I said, Lord, when I was still at home? That is what I tried to forestall by fleeing to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity.” (Jonah 4: 2, NIV)

Thomas Carlisle wrote a beautiful book, You! Jonah! He recasts the story in a series of poems which can be read in a single sitting. I highly recommend the book. Here is one of the poems from Carlisle’s work:

The generosity of God
Displeased Jonah exceedingly
And he slashed with angry prayer
At the graciousness of the Almighty.
“I told You so,” he screamed.
“I knew what You would do,
You dirty Forgiver.
You bless Your enemies
And show kindness to those
Who despitefully use You.
I would rather die
Than live in a world
With a God like You.
And don’t try to forgive me either.”

Confronting Our Own Xenophobia

In America today, we are seeing a rise in xenophobic fear and recrimination. We are hearing cries to build walls and pass legislation to keep the foreigners out. People of faith seem just as loathe to show kindness and love to a foreigner as Jonah was. We are seeing a huge swath of Christian believers who apparently would rather not live in a world where the words of Jesus must be taken into consideration.

As a Southerner who grew up Southern Baptist, I find it quite ironic that we are hearing a higher ethic from The New York Times and greater compassion from Hollywood than we are hearing from our pulpits on Sunday. We, like Jonah, could learn from those “heathens” on the East and West Coasts, if we but had ears to hear and eyes to see.

We find ourselves in a world where many professing Christians confronted with Black Lives Matter or Hispanic refugees at the border do not want to hear any word about the love of God or the compassion of Christ. Instead, they want to “Keep them Out,” “Send them back,” or “Push them Down.” 

Deep down we surely know, as did Jonah in the biblical story, that God intends peace and compassion, not strife and hate.

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* The book of Ruth was written during this same time period and also illustrated the value of the foreigner by reminding the people that even their great King David had foreign ancestry in his bloodline.

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Image at the top: "Jonah and the Whale,"  ca. 1400 , Iran (At The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City)

Medium: Ink, opaque watercolor, gold, and silver on paper 

                 A folio from a Jami al-Tavarikh (Compendium of Chronicles)

Note from The MET page regarding the painting:

The story of Jonah and the Whale, mentioned in the Qur'an (37:139), was popular in the Muslim world and frequently illustrated in manuscripts of world history. This large-scale painting, however, never formed part of a manuscript. Rather, it may have been used during oral recitation or storytelling. Scholars have also suggested that with its strong palette, monumental figures, and spare composition, this work may reflect a now-lost wall painting tradition. Here, we see Jonah after his release from the belly of the fish. Above him, a gourd vine grows—sent by God to protect him from the elements—and, gliding across the top of the painting, a spirited angel with colorful spreading wings offers Jonah a garment.

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Broken Glass, Shattered Dreams

[Author's Note: The following poem was written yesterday morning in response to the news of the proposed ICE raids to take place today. The President subsequently announced a two-week delay in those raids. Thankfully, there are groups protesting (see below) yet our country remains on a course that can only be described as evil and inhumane in its treatment of immigrants and asylum seekers along our southern border.] #WeHaveRights

“ICE set to begin immigration raids in 10 cities on Sunday”

(CNN News Headline)

Broken Glass, Shattered Dreams

Kristallnacht, “the night of broken glass,”

When paramilitary forces  enforced a pogrom against the Jews

Confirming the moral blight upon the regime

Of a civilized nation.

No one spoke out.

The white Christian majority

Dared not question the authorities.

Whether in fear

Or in tacit approval,

Unspeakable atrocities

Were unleashed.

Today

In the land of the free

Paramilitary forces are set in place

To enforce a pogrom against immigrants of color.

We wanted those Hispanic immigrants to tend out yards,

Clean out hotels,

Pick our crops,

And to do those jobs that are beneath our lot.

Yet how many will speak out?

Who will affirm “freedom and justice for all?”

Keeping silent is easier –

Less trouble on the part of the comfortable majority.

We already tipped our hand

By allowing concentration camps

Where children are taken from their parents

To face fear

Abuse,

And death.

But we tipped our hand before

With the Indian Removal Act

And the Dred Scott Decision.

We speak noble words

While plotting evil deeds.

Whether in fear

Or in tacit approval,

Unspeakable atrocities 

Were unleashed.

Our progress comes

By stepping over broken glass

And trampling upon shattered dreams.

We could be better than this.

                                                             ~ CK

Photo by Grace Carson)

“Denver immigrant groups blast Sunday ICE raids as ‘terror’ tactic”

(Headline from The Colorado Independent)

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Emigres

As our nation continues to debate and discuss border walls and immigrants we find ourselves fearing the terrorist, encumbering the asylum seeker, and shunning the refugee. Tragically, we separate children from parents in our response to those caught in dire circumstances.

Today's post is a poem from my Masterworks Series. It offers insight from the point-of-view of a refugee family.

Emigres

Our Lord, allow us to welcome the stranger and treat them kindly. Allow us to see that the stranger can benefit us. Allow us to see that the stranger can benefit those from where they came.  Ameen.

                            

                                             ~ Sarah Joseph, OBE*

   

It seems we are always looking back to Egypt.

We suffer our kings;

Tentatively we give them admiration

While doing our best to stay out of their way.

Our rulers give us hope

That God will bless our land,

Yet more often they are the reason

We hope for better days.

Leaving Bethlehem by night

With my wife and son,

We cast ourselves upon

The mercy of the open road.

Fleeing one tyrant

For memories of another,

We take refuge in the land

That was abundant in wealth and oppression

For our forebears.

Rootless and homeless

We have only family for support

And the strength of our hands

For a day’s wage.

Living as refugees,

Moving from overlord to overlord,

We will make our way.

Longing for home and

Grieving for a land

Once filled with life and song

Now turned deadly.

Trees offer their fruits

As we stop to rest,

Reminding us that the earth is gracious

Even when the land is stolen and divided by kings.

Sojourning in a strange land

We will hold on to the goodness of the earth

Waiting for old kings to die;

Waiting for the time of singing.

In the meantime

We will join with the downtrodden

And dwell with the outcast

Seeking refuge together.

Perhaps we will find a place

In the shadows of the empire

To sing our songs of hope.

                                                           ~ CK

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* From Sarah Joseph's BBC Radio Prayer for the Day, 23 July 2015

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Image: "The Rest on the Flight into Egypt" at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Artist: Gerard David (Netherlandish, 1460-1523)
Medium: Oil on panel
Date: c.1510


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Looking at 9/11 Memorials on the Day After

Each year since 2002, we have spent time remembering the tragedy at New York City’s Twin Towers that occurred September 11, 2001. On the first anniversary, I wrote a poem to commemorate that event that left its mark upon our national psyche. Garrison Keillor, in yesterday's The Writer's Almanac shared a beautiful and thoughtful poem by Charlotte Parsons titled, "9/11." 

Now, 16 years later, I wonder if we are indeed honoring those lives lost that day. I wonder if we are honoring our American ideals, In a tweet yesterday, President Barack Obama said that “No act of terror will ever change who we are.” When I look around at the state of our nation today, I can't help wondering if that is really true. Have we changed since that day when the towers fell?

We continue to launch campaigns of hate, and we fear the foreigner so much that we as a nation are threatening war on many fronts while our president seeks to dismantle hope for some of the brightest who happen to be Hispanic children of undocumented immigrants. Has terror caused us to forget who we are?

I must hasten to add that not everyone in our country is operating from fear and hatred. How we treat our immigrant neighbors, how we respond to the Islamic community, and what values we present to the world are currently being debated in the public square. While prejudice seems to be on the ascendency at the moment, we have not lost our hope for justice to prevail and for the common good to be our standard.

One of the best 9/11 commemorations that I have read is by Gary Furr, pastor of Vestavia Hills Baptist Church and blogger at The Flat Pickin’ Pilgrim’s Progress. You can read his essay here. I highly recommend it for its broad and compassionate look at what the anniversary of 9/11 means to us.

As we think on our history, our legacy, and our travails, may we always, somehow, look to the better angels of our nature, and not grow weary in our well doing.

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Photo: Two women stop to read the names of the victims lost at Ground Zero (FEMA photo by Lauren Hobart, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)

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Bearing Witness to the Times: Sanctuary Cities

San Francisco is one of several sanctuary cities    (Photo by Kaddi Sudhi)

"Washington threatens funding cuts to California, other 'sanctuary' areas"

(Headline from Reuters)

Sanctuary Cities

Across the country

Cities rise –

Reaching for humanity,

Calling upon our higher nature.

While often seen

As places of danger –

Cruel life on the streets
And hideouts for our greatest evil –

Cities also gather our greatest good,

Presenting skills of workers

Talents of artists

And dreams of seekers.

Today
While a nation constricts,

Guarding its borders

And hoarding its treasure,

Some cities rise in freedom.

Some cities proclaim our best,

Welcoming the stranger

And speaking to the hopes of our ancestors.

Defying bitter politics of fear,

Sanctuary cities offer shelter

And refuge

To all who have heard the call

Of Lady Liberty

In New York Harbor.

While politicians cry

“We are a nation of laws,”

Our conscience cries,

“We are a nation of immigrants.”

It is to the city that we come.

We come to find ourselves,

We come to find America.

                                                           ~ CK

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Photo by Mike Blake (Reuters)

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The Second Station of the Cross: Jesus Takes Up His Cross

[The following is from a series first posted during Lent in 2015.]

< The First Station of the Cross                                                                        The Third Station of the Cross >

Jesus willingly accepts and patiently bears his cross

© AFP Immigrant workers harvest grapes in California's Napa Valley

"We do rely on a foreign workforce. We really have an issue in terms of attracting domestic workers. They typically don't want to work in agriculture. It's out in the elements, it can be a hard job" http://www.wine-searcher.com/m/2013/03/california-harvests-delayed-by-shortage-of-workers

Many of us live in comfort in the Empire, taking our bounty for granted. It is a bounty that is largely dependent upon the work of immigrant laborers who are poorly paid, lacking in many services such as housing and healthcare, living in substandard conditions. We in turn denigrate the illegal immigrants upon whom we rely for the food and wine on our tables. Undocumented immigrants willingly take up the burden while Empire enjoys the bounty.

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Bearing Witness to the times: System Partially Down

“Phoenix immigrant mother deported to Mexico amid protests”

 (Photo by Rob Schumacher / AP)

System Partially Down

In the midst of a busy day

Conflict arose.

We have a system in our workplace

To make things more efficient.

It mostly works

Except when it doesn’t.

Conflict arose

When I needed that space

At the same time my coworker

Needed that space.

He did not like

My taking the space.

I could have waited

But my work was important.

His work was important, too.

Hard feelings that day.

No one’s fault

But a flawed system

Putting us at odds.

And so we live

Within flawed systems –

Sometimes thwarting our plans,

Sometimes placing us at odds

With one another.

I fall back to an old zen story about an empty boat:

A man sitting in his boat was rammed

By another boat.

Anger immediately arose within him.

Turning,

He saw that the boat was empty,

Simply adrift.

With no person, no motive, no agenda to rage against,

The man’s anger completely dissipated.

I try to see our flawed system

As an empty boat

When I’m placed at odds

With colleagues.

It helps me navigate my day.

But I still feel great sorrow that

A flawed system

Separated a young mother from her family,

Deporting her to Mexico.

This is not just a case of an empty boat.

                                                          ~ CK

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From my introductory post:

The best thing that poets can do is to bear witness to the times – articulate what is happening in the moment; speak to the real life experiences of your people.  I am setting myself a goal to write a poem each week that reflects what I see and experience in the life of our nation... if I can write one poem a week there will be some chronicle of our sacred/tested/doubtful union.

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Our Immigration Dilemma

Alabama State Capitol

I just returned from a run to the post office. While I was there, I saw a young Hispanic woman at the customer island counter in the process of packing eight separate boxes. Each box was identical in size, and from what I could see as I walked past she was packing each box with jeans, shirts, and sneakers.  I did not want to intrude with questions about what she was doing, but I assumed that she was in the process of mailing things back home to family members. There are so many stories of immigrants who come to the U.S. in order to send money and needed items back home to support their families. I imagined what this young woman must be feeling, her sense of industry and her ability to make life a little better for her people back home. This has been happening in so many towns in the U.S. for years.

The scene I witnessed also reminded me of the fiasco of an immigration law passed in my home state of Alabama. The State legislature passed the harshest immigration law in the country, which many citizens oppose and are asking for the law to be repealed. Instead, the State House is about it try to pass some amendments to strengthen the law and make it more palatable to the business community. The law has already been seen to be unjust and has been harmful to the state’s economy. It should be abolished rather than amended.

Here are my other thoughts about the young lady I saw at the post office. Assuming she is an immigrant, she works very hard and has contributed much that our community needs (we gladly accept immigrant labor to pick our crops, roof our houses, tend our lawns and clean our buildings). I also know that she does indeed pay taxes – with every items purchases and with every paycheck receives she is paying taxes ( last year in Alabama, immigrants paid $132 million in taxes).  She is also loving under much more stress and fear since the passing of our state’s immigration law. I recall my conversation with an Hispanic pastor named Antonio who compared life under the new law with life under the Samosa regime in Nicaragua. I also recall the article in U.S.  Catholic about the difficulties of the Hispanic community in Opelika, Alabama due to our new law (“Alabama to Latino immigrants: No room at the inn”).

There is no question that the immigration laws need to be changed. Since we are so dependent upon immigrant labor, we need new laws that will make it easier for Latino immigrants to work in the U.S.  That legal reform however, must take place at the federal level. Immigration policy is under federal jurisdiction. The problem is that today so many are reacting out of fear.  The U.S. Congress is afraid to do anything of any consequence for fear of the ballot box and congressmen’s fear of not being able to stay in power. State governments are operating out of fear of losing control and seeing too many brown-skinned people around. There has to be a better way to reform our immigration policies. There has to be a way in which all parties can operate with purpose and industry rather than with fear and prejudice.

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UPDATE: Unfortunately, the Alabama State Senate has voted not to repeal HB56, but instead has voted to change the law without repealing it. Read the press report in The Montgomery Advertiser here. An earlier article has a little more detail here. As the song says, "Not dark yet, but it's gettin' there"

FURTHER UPDATE - May 17, 2012: Here are just a few recent statements about the harmful effects of Alabama’s Immigration law. (For the record, I have found no one crediting this legislation as good or helpful, even when I Google "the good thing about Alabama's immigration law.")

From Jeb Bush:

http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2012/01/27/413038/jeb-bush-alabama-immigration-turned-off/?mobile=nc

From the New York Times:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/16/opinion/alabamas-disgrace.html?_r=1&smid=fb-share

From Fox News Latino:

http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/news/2012/05/13/alabama-immigration-crackdown-prompts-farmers-to-scale-back-production/

ONE MORE UPDATE - June 26, 2012: When my state refused to repeal or even budge on its Immigration law, it became all to clear to me that Alabama will not do what is just and right in this situation unless and until the Federal government intervenes. I should have known this. The same was true with it's Jim Crow laws, civil rights and integration (but one can always hope that his state will do better).

Yesterday's Supreme Court ruling on the Arizona Immigration law it a sure step toward correcting Alabama's law. As reported in The New York Times, immigration is a matter of federal jurisdiction , not individual states:

The justices make it clear that this case is about the power of the federal government to set immigration policy and to pre-empt, to a large degree, state policies that can infringe on that federal power. An expert on immigration law, Micahel A. Olivas, explained: "We can't have 50 different immigration policies, 50 different foreign policies."

The only part of the Arizona Law that the court tentatively upheld was the  allow law enforcement to determine immigration status  of someone detained for other reasons if there is legitimate suspicion. When this part of the law is enacted, it will likely lead to racial profiling which may then be struck down by the court.

So in short, there is some hope yet for justice. Will congress now embark on serious immigration reform?
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Previous posts on Immigration:

Alabama's New Immigration Bill

Alabama's Anti-Immigration Law: The Faithful Take Action

G92 Immigration Conference: Seeking a Just and Ethical Solution to the Immigration Dilemma

More on the Plight of Undocumented Immigrants

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More on the Plight of Undocumented Immigrants

The first time I posted on the issue of Alabama's harsh immigration law (back in June, 2011) I stated:

… if it did not benefit our society to have undocumented immigrants working here, they would not be here. Increasingly over the past 2 or 3 decades, we have willingly paid these immigrant people to mow our lawns, do our housework, clean our hotels, dig our ditches, work on our construction crews, and do any number of dangerous jobs in the meat-packing industry and other types of unskilled labor. We have used them for our advantage (or I should say, our society has). Now we are getting a little uneasy and anxious, so we are using drastic legal tactics. It is as though we are shocked and outraged that all of these aliens whom we have employed at low wages (and without reporting said payments) are somehow in our midst.

There are scriptures that advocate that we respect the alien in our midst; that we not mistreat or take advantage of them. Instead, we first took advantage of them, and now we aim to mistreat them, and our governor who likes to make a big deal about his faith just smiles and signs the bill. Leviticus admonished the Hebrew people to “remember that you were once aliens.” All of us white Americans in the U.S. should likewise remember that we were once immigrants.

Last week I posted an account of actions by an Episcopal congregation to advocate for the immigrants in our midst. For a view from the Catholic community, please read the article on Commonweal Magazine’s web page, “Easy Targets: the Plight of Immigrant Women,” by Kristin Heyer:

Roughly 4.5 million American children have at least one undocumented parent residing in the United States, and in the first six months of 2011, 46,000 parents of these kids were deported. Many immigrant families are like Lupe’s: some members are documented, some not; they are firmly embedded in communities; they contribute to American culture, including paying taxes. For many, crossing the border to seek a living wage, and living with the threat of deportation once here, means prolonged separation from their families. Yet that kind of immigrant experience fails to register at presidential debates.

You can read the entire article here.

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