Tuesday, May 22, 2012
Monday, May 21, 2012
Lewis & Clark College: Reflections on Infinite Complexity and Inevitability
This past week I started classes in my M.A. in Professional
Mental Health Counseling at Lewis & Clark College here in Portland. This is
the story of my journey.
Almost two years ago I started the process of getting into grad school for counseling. There were many possible programs, many custom tailored to fit different schedules, budgets, and lifestyles. Yet I was looking for only three things: worldview, location, and intellectual rigor. I wanted a school that had a worldview that would both complement and challenge my own—more on that later. I wanted a school that was somewhere I would actually want to live. I’d lived in the Southwest a long time and was potentially looking for a change. Finally, I wanted a school that would have very high academic standards both for my efficacy in my chosen field and to help prepare me for my eventual further schooling in law/jurisprudence, philosophy, ethics, whatever. As I said before, there were a lot of schools, but in the end there was only one that actually fit the bill: Lewis & Clark College.
If you know me the worldview piece was already severely limiting. Most schools’ counseling programs are overly practical and don’t want to rock the boat. They’d better rock my boat. Also if you know me, one of my mottos in life is “location, location, location”. I wasn’t going to live anywhere in the Midwest… or the South, and definitely not in Texas. Nor most of the East Coast and I quickly discovered the right side of the country is not big on rigorous counseling programs. I wanted to find one in Boston, but out of their many colleges/universities I only found one even possible program, which I eventually decided against. There were some choices in the Southwest but they were all Christian schools and I was still leaning more towards secular education. That left the Pacific Northwest (ie Portland as I’ve never been impressed with Seattle), which had a number of good programs. But after incredible amounts of study I realized that it was Lewis & Clark College or essentially nothing for me. I guess I secretly don’t believe in margin or I have that much faith in God and/or my own abilities.
Almost two years ago I started the process of getting into grad school for counseling. There were many possible programs, many custom tailored to fit different schedules, budgets, and lifestyles. Yet I was looking for only three things: worldview, location, and intellectual rigor. I wanted a school that had a worldview that would both complement and challenge my own—more on that later. I wanted a school that was somewhere I would actually want to live. I’d lived in the Southwest a long time and was potentially looking for a change. Finally, I wanted a school that would have very high academic standards both for my efficacy in my chosen field and to help prepare me for my eventual further schooling in law/jurisprudence, philosophy, ethics, whatever. As I said before, there were a lot of schools, but in the end there was only one that actually fit the bill: Lewis & Clark College.
If you know me the worldview piece was already severely limiting. Most schools’ counseling programs are overly practical and don’t want to rock the boat. They’d better rock my boat. Also if you know me, one of my mottos in life is “location, location, location”. I wasn’t going to live anywhere in the Midwest… or the South, and definitely not in Texas. Nor most of the East Coast and I quickly discovered the right side of the country is not big on rigorous counseling programs. I wanted to find one in Boston, but out of their many colleges/universities I only found one even possible program, which I eventually decided against. There were some choices in the Southwest but they were all Christian schools and I was still leaning more towards secular education. That left the Pacific Northwest (ie Portland as I’ve never been impressed with Seattle), which had a number of good programs. But after incredible amounts of study I realized that it was Lewis & Clark College or essentially nothing for me. I guess I secretly don’t believe in margin or I have that much faith in God and/or my own abilities.
What really put L&C as the only real runner in the race
was the fact that it is CACREP accredited, which means that it’s an approved
program by the American Counseling Association and this bodes well for my
future professional life. There are very few CACREP-accredited programs and
even fewer that also share the worldview and location pieces. Furthermore,
people had sometimes referred to L&C as “the Harvard of the West Coast”,
which was compelling to me since I do plan on going to the Harvard of the East
Coast at some point in my life… So anyways I had chosen, now I just needed to
get in. So in January of 2011, after much wrestling with the injustice of 500-word
entrance exams (Grant Newman saving my life on that count), I put my application
in the mail—no small feat in my opinion. My two recommendation letter-writers,
Celestia Tracy (herself an L&C alum and experience counselor/author) and
Dr. Bill Simmons (then director of the MASJHR program at ASU) sent their letters
and the rest is history. Really long story short, I was accepted into the
program.
But my life somewhat fell apart in 2011 and I could not go to Portland that fall; I asked for a deferment, made a defense of that decision, and it was granted. I would now start in the Summer of 2012. Now I just had to get my life in order, have one final “mission trip”, and prepare to leave the dryness for the rain. The preparation to leave my friends, family, and community in Phoenix could not have begun too early. I was leaving everything behind.
My friends finally made peace with me leaving, the discussions were had, the wisdom of stay or go were analyzed critically, prayed over, and accepted. Africa was prepared for and finally conducted and then I was home for 5 days and then finally in a van headed North. The photos are up. It was a rush. I wouldn’t do it any other way.
Now I’m here in Portland, which I’m probably going to just keep calling “the land of myth and beards”. It’s an extraordinary city that does make me a little sad that 90% of cities in the US don’t even have half the interestingness of this town. I could hate it after 7 months of gray, but even on this rainy, moody May afternoon it is endearing at worst. I should be studying and reading copious amounts of material about research methods and counseling theory, but I want to do this first, so that’s what I’m doing.
“How is school”, you ask? Grad School has been challenging, but I love it. I know I’m in the right place.
The first thing you must know about Lewis & Clark College is that it is beautiful. Not “kinda pretty”, but breathtaking and grand. It sits high on a bluff over the Willamette River in between an extremely wealthy community known as Lake Oswego and a densely forested state park. The architecture of some of the older buildings is reminiscent of archetypal old (and large) English cottages, while the new buildings are tastefully refined contemporary—all of which are LEED certified for energy efficiency, of course. The whole campus is a garden with flowers, towering junipers and firs, lush ferns, and babbling creeks. Trails run throughout the campus’ forests and nature walks. There are countless beautiful and secluded spots to study and rest. Bridges cross a little ravine tucked on the East side of campus. The trees tower over you and you can hear the stream running below. It is something of poetry, to be honest. Even the beautiful library runs along the massive rose garden—replete with flower bushes, moss-covered stone gazebos, and a view oriented at the summit of Mt. Hood. Last year the L&C campus won “2nd most beautiful campus” in the United States and I am not surprised in the least. It’s a simply splendid place to be.
Yet even this is not the reason that I chose Lewis & Clark, although it surely didn’t hurt. The beauty was compelling, being in Portland was perfect, and the school’s intellectual heritage was encouraging, but what I was most excited about was this one thing (in two parts):
Their Critical Perspective and their commitment to Social Justice.
I wanted a school that admitted they had an agenda, refusing the intellectual and moral dishonesty of modernist notions of “objectivity”. Lewis & Clark trains counselors so that those individuals might make society more just and help humans heal. They are not vague in their endeavor, but explicit. This is more uncommon than you may think. Most counseling programs are not concerned with the societal implications of moving into another person’s brokenness. Lewis & Clark is. Granted, this is of course because of fundamentally humanistic beliefs, not Judeo-Christian beliefs, but that too was what I wanted. I’m a believer in Christ through and through, yet I realize that I’m a resident alien in this World. I had already decided some time back that I did not want to go to a Christian school. This was for a number of reasons, but mostly because I wanted nothing to be sacred. We live in a post-modern world in which nothing is sacred. If all I knew was a Christian perspective and used ideas and word that may be “true” but meant nothing in a deconstructed world I would never be able to reach in and love the person whose psyche is unable to conceptualize a loving God or love a person who cannot believe in Jesus out of intellectual conviction (and/or sin). This decision to eschew Christian education was ultimately one about what I wanted to do with my life—and what I thought God wanted to do with my life. It was almost theological in nature. Thankfully, these past couple years my whole theology of what it means to believe in a resurrected King had coalesced and produced vision for my place in an unbelieving world. Stanley Hauerwas, Shane Claiborne, Ron Sider, and Kevin Gage all played a part in that. Thanks guys!
So now I find myself in Research Methods class deconstructing (my favorite!) philosophical paradigms. This will likely not be popular with most Christians, but as with any liberal education grounded in critical theory, we approach everything from the post-modern perspective. It’s much more complex than that, of course, but essentially that is what it is.
But my life somewhat fell apart in 2011 and I could not go to Portland that fall; I asked for a deferment, made a defense of that decision, and it was granted. I would now start in the Summer of 2012. Now I just had to get my life in order, have one final “mission trip”, and prepare to leave the dryness for the rain. The preparation to leave my friends, family, and community in Phoenix could not have begun too early. I was leaving everything behind.
My friends finally made peace with me leaving, the discussions were had, the wisdom of stay or go were analyzed critically, prayed over, and accepted. Africa was prepared for and finally conducted and then I was home for 5 days and then finally in a van headed North. The photos are up. It was a rush. I wouldn’t do it any other way.
Now I’m here in Portland, which I’m probably going to just keep calling “the land of myth and beards”. It’s an extraordinary city that does make me a little sad that 90% of cities in the US don’t even have half the interestingness of this town. I could hate it after 7 months of gray, but even on this rainy, moody May afternoon it is endearing at worst. I should be studying and reading copious amounts of material about research methods and counseling theory, but I want to do this first, so that’s what I’m doing.
“How is school”, you ask? Grad School has been challenging, but I love it. I know I’m in the right place.
The first thing you must know about Lewis & Clark College is that it is beautiful. Not “kinda pretty”, but breathtaking and grand. It sits high on a bluff over the Willamette River in between an extremely wealthy community known as Lake Oswego and a densely forested state park. The architecture of some of the older buildings is reminiscent of archetypal old (and large) English cottages, while the new buildings are tastefully refined contemporary—all of which are LEED certified for energy efficiency, of course. The whole campus is a garden with flowers, towering junipers and firs, lush ferns, and babbling creeks. Trails run throughout the campus’ forests and nature walks. There are countless beautiful and secluded spots to study and rest. Bridges cross a little ravine tucked on the East side of campus. The trees tower over you and you can hear the stream running below. It is something of poetry, to be honest. Even the beautiful library runs along the massive rose garden—replete with flower bushes, moss-covered stone gazebos, and a view oriented at the summit of Mt. Hood. Last year the L&C campus won “2nd most beautiful campus” in the United States and I am not surprised in the least. It’s a simply splendid place to be.
Yet even this is not the reason that I chose Lewis & Clark, although it surely didn’t hurt. The beauty was compelling, being in Portland was perfect, and the school’s intellectual heritage was encouraging, but what I was most excited about was this one thing (in two parts):
Their Critical Perspective and their commitment to Social Justice.
I wanted a school that admitted they had an agenda, refusing the intellectual and moral dishonesty of modernist notions of “objectivity”. Lewis & Clark trains counselors so that those individuals might make society more just and help humans heal. They are not vague in their endeavor, but explicit. This is more uncommon than you may think. Most counseling programs are not concerned with the societal implications of moving into another person’s brokenness. Lewis & Clark is. Granted, this is of course because of fundamentally humanistic beliefs, not Judeo-Christian beliefs, but that too was what I wanted. I’m a believer in Christ through and through, yet I realize that I’m a resident alien in this World. I had already decided some time back that I did not want to go to a Christian school. This was for a number of reasons, but mostly because I wanted nothing to be sacred. We live in a post-modern world in which nothing is sacred. If all I knew was a Christian perspective and used ideas and word that may be “true” but meant nothing in a deconstructed world I would never be able to reach in and love the person whose psyche is unable to conceptualize a loving God or love a person who cannot believe in Jesus out of intellectual conviction (and/or sin). This decision to eschew Christian education was ultimately one about what I wanted to do with my life—and what I thought God wanted to do with my life. It was almost theological in nature. Thankfully, these past couple years my whole theology of what it means to believe in a resurrected King had coalesced and produced vision for my place in an unbelieving world. Stanley Hauerwas, Shane Claiborne, Ron Sider, and Kevin Gage all played a part in that. Thanks guys!
So now I find myself in Research Methods class deconstructing (my favorite!) philosophical paradigms. This will likely not be popular with most Christians, but as with any liberal education grounded in critical theory, we approach everything from the post-modern perspective. It’s much more complex than that, of course, but essentially that is what it is.
This, for me, is a breath of fresh air.
I was going to get into why this is a great thing for me,
but I will need to develop my thoughts in time because Christianity has had an
idolatrous love affair with modernist thought for so long that to critique it
raises the ire of the Christian establishment. I think modernism, while
pointing towards some “truths” is fundamentally a distraction that keeps the
church watered down and worshipping science, the State, the legal systems—and
trying to “prove God”—instead of worshipping a King and Kingdom whose, for
example, concepts of Justice don’t fit inside Western legal systems. This
Kingdom isn’t premodern, modern, or
postmodern. I am just convinced that postmodern thought is the (un)belief
structure that is most conducive to the growth and expansion of The Church.
But, I’ll get into that in a later post. For now I’ll avoid that minefield and
simply say that I’m very thankful that every belief in my classroom will be
equally picked apart and that I won’t have to listen to foolish, intolerable
notions of “common sense”.
My cohort is a relatively diverse group of around 18 people
that I’ll be doing the next three years with alongside. This irreverent
deconstruction and critique is already challenging my whole cohort; it’s
beautiful. None of us get to walk into the room and pretend that anyone else on
the planet believes the exact same things we do; none of us get to believe that
our beliefs are objective or unbiased. It makes you really, truly understand
what you believe and why you believe it. In being so close to the ultimate lie
that is relativism the truth of my faith seems all the more stronger and more
beautiful. That paradoxical statement no longer is an enigma to me. What we
believe, brothers and sisters, faces no special or new challenge under the
intellectual violence of deconstructionism. And I’m excited to go through this
process with my cohort of gay and straight men and women, Native Americans and
upper class white folks, yuppies and hippies, former Marines and current
activists, ecopsychology adherents and those who believe ecopsychology is
crazy. The program is meant to be diverse and to challenge every person who is
in class. There is no dominant belief in the classroom (past postmodernism of
course, but that’s a conversation for another day, and even that gets
critiqued). Everything is up for exploration and discussion, my Christianity as
much as the sexuality of every member in the class. It’s honest for a change. We are to know one another intimately, the
good, the bad and the ugly. I’m excited for that! I’m the only Christian in my
cohort too from what I can tell. In my Intro to Counseling class we are to find
a place that we need to go that would contain the people we most dislike or
would be uncomfortable around (I’m thinking KKK meeting?). For many of the
people in my class that has already been stated as being “conservative churches”.
Maybe it’s because they don’t want their sin called out or maybe it is because
they’ve truly been hurt by Christians who failed to love them in profound ways.
I don’t know. I do know it is not my job to judge, but it is my job to move
into relationship with the folks in my class and be a light set upon a hill. I
know what I believe and it is not in danger of being fundamentally altered. I
would hope to take even the most jaded to a church where they can see what
Jesus is all about. Ultimately they have to make decisions for themselves, that
much I know. But I know that as our lives become interwoven I will have to
truly learn to give grace and remember who it is that I serve because it is
going to be tough. I’m excited though.
The program director who did my entrance interview—who is
also my advisor—I just found out is a lesbian woman married to her female
partner. When she did my entrance interview we talked extensively about my
beliefs concerning homosexuality and she made sure I could defend my worldview
but never asked me to change it. She wanted to know whether I could still
operate in a world that simply didn’t share my convictions. I reminded her that
none of us are objective, neutral observers and we come into every situation
with biases, beliefs, subjective interpretations, and different previous
experiences; I told her that I still believed what I believed concerning my
faith and sin nature, etc, but I told her I would actually love to counsel
people whose sexual orientation is “homosexual”. It’s obvious she and I have
fundamentally different perspectives on something as crucially important as
human sexuality is, but still she chose to have my perspective in the cohort. I
don’t “owe” her anything, but if I put myself in her shoes as a “conservative”
(theologically speaking) Christian I am an inherent threat to the other
homosexuals in my program who have universally been hurt by the modern
Christian AFA/700-Club hate machine. So I am thankful to be given the
opportunity to show that Christianity is not fundamentally about pointing out
the “sin” of others (although that definitely plays into it), but instead to be
the salt and light in a dark world.
It’s going to be a great, challenging year. I’ll learn about
Social Justice and serving the oppressed in somewhat of a different way amongst
people that make my intellectual ability seem quite average if not slightly
below the bar. I’ll be stretched and I’ll get to know these 3 guys and 14-ish
girl in new and exciting ways.
I appreciate your prayers as I learn to love my cohort and try to excel in my studies. Licensure feels like forever away, but before I know it I’ll be a therapist in this state or perhaps another. This will open up many new and exciting opportunities for future ministry both here and abroad.
I appreciate your prayers as I learn to love my cohort and try to excel in my studies. Licensure feels like forever away, but before I know it I’ll be a therapist in this state or perhaps another. This will open up many new and exciting opportunities for future ministry both here and abroad.
Phoenix to Portland: "The Past is Prologue"
Warning: This won’t be short; the war on brevity continues unabated.
I’m sitting at Rain OR Shine (OR = Oregon, get it?) my neighborhood coffee shop drinking a resplendent chai that is, of course, locally sourced and organic. It’s a beautiful, if cool, day and it feels good to finally sit down, ignore the ridiculous amounts of reading I have to do and just write about what I want to write about.
The two-year journey is over. I’m in Portland. This land has existed almost in mythology for me as I’ve prepared to leave the American Southwest for a state I’ve, incredibly, never been to in a region I hadn’t been to since I was 16 (and didn’t like when I was there). The mythology was informed by everything from pop-culture and friends to weather charts. I have moved a lot in the last decade of my life—Florida to Arizona to Cali to Arizona—and I wouldn’t have it any other way. Doing so has forged a new concept of identity for me. I no longer view myself purely in terms of the individual, which Western culture is wont to do, but in terms of my community and those I surround myself with. Who am I apart from them? Sure, the moral relationship of soul to creator remains one of God and man, but I believe I am because we are. So moving my “self” from Phoenix to another place rends me physically from the other part of me: my family, friends, and the body of Christ as it is localized in central Arizona. So I could not move as if it had no bearing on anyone else. These others are important to me. And yet I knew that the season of dryness was to become a season of rain elsewhere. As Aaron Weiss has taught me, they will flow in one river… So now I have left the land of dryness for the land of rain, leaving behind a community forged in the fire of service, laughter, brokenness, adventure, and struggle. I have physically left Legitistan, my home in downtown Phoenix, for a place I don’t know and do not yet understand. This is a serious breach of Legitistan/Epicstan rules: We aren’t allowed to leave. I’m lucky to be alive :)
And yet my two brothers who have been the world to me for so long took the time to load all my junk—a considerable amount I might add—into a rented Kia Sedona for one last hurrah. Leaving without them, just getting on a plane or something would be criminal. A roadtrip was in order. It would be a journey of hitherto untouched distances and proportions for even a well-travelled and adventurous clan such as Legitistan. So May 8th 2012, after a whirlwind 5 or so days back in Phoenix post-Uganda (all the while recovering from a terrible bacterial infection), Kevin, Brant, and I hit the road. Three best friends embarking on the most time-honored of traditions for American single men: the roadtrip. Not just any roadtrip, either, but what would become 2,200 miles from Phoenix, Arizona, up California and Oregon’s unspeakably beautiful Highway 1 to this mythological place known as “Portland”. Amazingly, everything I wanted to bring managed to fit perfectly into the Sedona—mostly due to the logistical genius of Tobie Milford, one of his many talents. We set off with “Drawing Black Lines” blaring through the speakers and set our first day sights to the glittery ghetto known as Hollywood, California. Having lived in SoCal for a few years, it no longer retains much of a draw past great memories of Julien-K shows at the The Viper Room. Once escaping the vicious claws of I-10 Phoenix traffic I watched my beloved land of growth and pain fade in the rearview mirror.
California beckoned. We raced across the desert with the pleasingly rapid pace of traffic all, as motorcyclists are wont to do, thinking of how we’d individually negotiate the amish roadblocks and large trucks if we were on our sportbikes and not in a reddish minivan, the car of our never-hoped-for futures. Lord have mercy. The music was eclectic and phenomenal and we chased the Western sun to our final destination. After eclipsing Quartzite I saw a sign for a Cinnabon store/stand at the Pilot Truckstop just before the California/Blythe border. I flew the van to the exit and told me excited compatriots, “if I am leaving this state for a long time, what better way to leave than loaded with empty carbs and a smile on my face.” We indulged and our metabolisms thought nothing of it. We got back on the 10 and crossed the Colorado river into the greatest state in the union, the Republic of California. We were headed to Brant’s friend’s house just outside of Hollywood in Studio City. Kenny and Meli are in the film industry and have a nice little apartment near Universal Studios. In a few hours we were there, having crossed the Sonoran desert and the even more imposing Inland Empire of San Bernadino county. We parked our van against an ivy covered wall and headed inside. I was not to stay long, however, for while I was very tired a friend of mine in Phoenix had deemed to give me a final going away present that I was to experience. “When is the next time you’ll be in California?” he had asked. “Tomorrow evening, actually” I had said. “Good! I have a really great girl I want you to meet.” “Sounds good”, I said. So, at about 10 PM in Studio City, I jumped back on the freeway to drive to Pasedena for what would become the best blind date I’ve ever been on. Thankfully I’ve never had a bad blind date in my life, but I always know that the potential exists…. Nevertheless, this particular date was fun and, in retrospect, a heck of a way to start life away from Arizona! I arrived back at Kenny & Meli’s at some ungodly hour knowing that we were to hit the road at sunup. God, I love roadtrips.
And so set the tone for the rest of our journey of friendship and adventure through God’s country, the West Coast of the United States. We drove out of Hollywood on the 101 through the Malibu Hills, down through Ventura and Oxnard and whenever we could be on Highway 1 (ie. when it wasn’t merged with the 101 Freeway) we would take that route even though we knew it would take much more time. It was amazing. We ate at a roadside diner in Oxnard, explored Westmont College in Santa Barbara where Thomas and I used to hang out and continued up the coast stopping in a farming community to get fresh strawberries and honey from a roadside vendor. Both were sublime. Soon we were past San Luis Obispo, with Kevin and I having headaches in tow. The actual coast beckoned and once past Morro Bay we were there, snaking along a precipice that beckoned like a siren with its beauty and terror. If one were to ever jump to their deaths, this is the place to do it. Those 3 seconds before annihilation would be of some of the most epic scenery imaginable. Kevin and Brant filled me in on good music I’d missed while in Africa. Gotye and Fun kept the miles and conversation going. We kept a good pace yet stayed enthralled with all that we were taking in. We swept by gas stations with $6 gallons of petrol and were unable to stop at the land of grandeur known as Big Sur. We were getting hungry and my headache was pressing. Although we stopped to see the Elephant Seals bark and fornicate, Carmel beckoned. We pulled into Carmel and by memory I guided Kevin and Brant to Clint Eastwood’s restaurant called, “Hog’s Breath”. It’s not the best food, nor that expensive, but the ambiance is quite amazing, especially when Brant was in a wife-beater and my beard was looking particularly unkempt. It’s a quaint town but a little too yuppie for the likes of vagabonds like ourselves (“gypsies like us should be stamped in solidarity!”). Plus Los Gatos, in the Bay area was just a few hundred miles over the horizon. Once we got to the drug-coma land of Santa Cruz we jumped on what might be the coolest freeway in America, Highway 17 into Los Gatos. We raced the Sedona next to riced Del Sols and ubiquitous 5-series. We found Jen Foster’s house as if it were nothing and yet rest after such a journey was not in our fortune for as soon as we got there Jen had us jump in her car and we raced to Villa Montalvo Arboretum County Park to do some hiking through beautiful NorCal mountain forests. Despite my residual weakness and Kevin’s asthma we made it just in time for a beautiful view of the bay and Cali’s hard-to-beat sunset. We saw the Apple building directly north in Cupertino. We then hiked down and wearily sought to find the greatest food on earth: Sushi. In retrospect large amounts of exhaustion and sushi probably don’t mix as I didn’t sleep all that well that night despite my relative inability to keep my eyes open.
Day 3 guaranteed to be perhaps the greatest of them all: San Francisco to Redwood National Forest. We stopped for coffee just north of Santa Cruz and put on mewithoutYou’s new and phenomenal album, “Ten Stories”. We eased through farming communities set against some of the most beautiful coastline in the world. It was beautiful and married with Aaron’s soaring, introspective vocals/lyrics had an ethereal, lofty quality to it. My heart was calm as I set my sights towards Portland and my future. Of course, San Francisco, one of my favorite cities in the U.S., was our next destination and we soon found ourselves in the somehow-misplaced East Coast style city idyllically placed in a bay midway up the California coast. The row houses, BART, and forest parks caught our eye and yet we jetted forward to get to the Golden Gate Bridge, the icon of SF. I’ve been across it a few times but it never gets old although I think Rusty can attest that despite its charms, being in its shadow sleeping on the streets of San Francisco it does nothing to warm you up!
We soon found the exit to leave the 101 freeway and regain our footing on Highway one. But first we made a small pitstop in the Muir Woods, where the southernmost Redwoods live. We decided against entering because we knew that night we’d be in the actual Redwood forest, so we headed back out again. In case you’re wondering which stretch of Highway 1 is most epic, either south of SF or north, I can say without reservation that it is north; in fact the Southern Oregon coast is probably even better than the Northern California stretch. Either way, our coastal journey had truly begun once we snaked up the coast north of San Francisco. I don’t think I can capture the awe-inspiring and incredibly varied scenery we passed. I hope none of you have a myopic view of what California looks like for it is by far the most vastly diverse state in the United States and the northern coast is an amazing mix of quaint rural communities and splendid scenery. We stopped for some fresh seafood and then found ourselves easing into the Redwood forests. In case you’re wondering, this forest is the most beautiful that I’ve ever seen, even better than Sequoia National Park near Yosemite. Every mile was a photographer’s dream and we drove in silence just searching for adjectives that would communicate to the fellow traveler what we subjectively observed. None came. The inevitable question that follows news of a redwood excursion into the redwoods is, “did you drive through a tree?” and the inevitable answer if you know anything about Legitistan is, “heck yes!” A 275-foot beast called Chandelier to be exact. The KIA barely fit, but it fit all the same. We had some folks from Idaho help us with the obligatory photo-op and then we were on our way hoping to find an equally large tree to sleep under that night in the National Park a hundred+ miles to the north. I can tell you that one of my favorite drives I’ve ever been on is the stretch from Garberville to Eureka, California. The sun tried to penetrate the thick canopy of lush conifers and gloriously failed, fragmenting light on our thin strip of asphalt heaven that had us dreaming of warm touring motorcycles and 6-month vacations. After an unfortunate stop at a McDonalds in I-don’t-know-where we finally found a place to sleep under the stars. It was night. We opened up the back of the Sedona and I pulled out my down comforters and our sleeping bags and put ‘em straight on the ground. I slept like a baby in the cool Pacific air next to a lush pasture that would in time fill with the Elk that inhabit the dense forest.
We loaded up that Day 4 morning and headed south to hike through the Redwood Forest. Which we did, but the subsequent, umm, “navigational error” cost us some 100 miles of epic journey and massive headache. I am glad we got to experience the Hoopa Native Reservation and Eureka… again, but we were definitely a little behind once we finally made it past where we’d begun and headed past Paul and his, ummm, massive Blue Ox to Crescent City—where we had, I might add, wonderful deep-fried fish ‘n chips of the Salmon variety. The forest had been amazing, but Oregon beckoned. State 41 (I have nine more to go!) was a short jaunt away and we found Brookings, Oregon—the first town we came to—pleasantly warm with what the locals called the “Chetco Effect”, that is warm air from inland Oregon runs down the Chetco river and warms the small fishing town. We went on. The Oregon Coast was better than we could have imagined. It was about a beautiful day as can be imagined and the whole coast of Oregon continued to enthrall us mile by mile. The coast became brutally cold to this Arizona resident but soon we had to turn inland to head to Portland (up Highway 18 if you’re tracking this by map) where it turned considerably warmer. The anticipation in my heart and head was building. The land of myth and beards was approaching. We entered the city from the south and suddenly my new home was there before us in all its beauty—It was love at first sight. The buildings tucked against the coniferous forests and small hills; the river lined by cool buildings and fashionable bars; the OHSU tram running from the river’s shore to the mountain. It was amazing and yet we headed up I-84 to make it to my new home in the Mt. Tabor neighborhood of Portland. We were hungry, however, and stopped at a fun Irish pub on 60th Ave for a quick beer and bite. It was a fitting place to enter into the Portland culture and already the quirky tattooed girls and flannel-wearing bearded men came into view. “I’m going to love this place”, I told myself.
And it’s true. I do love this place. For soon we were home and sleeping on Kelsey’s floor. Kelsey is a friend I know from my time spent in Malawi. She was a fellow intern and we’ve been friends ever since. She and her brother have a small home in Mt. Tabor and now that’s where I live too. Kevin, Brant, and I got the best introduction to Portland that we could: We went to Voodoo donuts (I had the maple bacon donut of course), Stumptown Coffee, and Multnomah Falls. We rode both the MAX lightrail and Portland Streetcar. We even saw Mt. Saint Helens and Mt. Hood as we drove around. The weather has been perfect too! It has just begun….
My first day here I got up before everyone else and went to the top of Mt. Tabor and just saw amidst the towering trees and beautiful views and I prayed thanking God for the beautiful weather and for the strength to make it this far. Shackles that had been on my heart for years seemed to just melt away. Place matters and yet we can’t run from our problems, still I knew it was time for me to be here. I didn’t know then and I don’t know now what the future holds. I haven’t even been here a week, but I’m excited for the future here and am confident that this is where I am to be.
There is more, about Portland, Lewis & Clark College, everything—but it is forthcoming….
Saturday, May 5, 2012
Africa Journal #14: The Dryness and the Rain
I am home.
A few days ago I boarded
an Emirates A330 to Dubai, UAE feeling tired, weak, and fearing the events that
would surely come and ask more of me than I was able to give. At Dubai’s Gate
215 I finally took the time to do something I had long needed to do. It was
something that had been years in the making and finally, in that foreign land,
needed faced. The great caverns of Dubai International Airport at 1 AM provided
the necessary anonymity to weep and pray bitterly, tired and oh so alone. It
was there that my belief in happy endings passed away. The irony was not lost
that even in a place so far from home personal memories still exist. At 2:30 AM
I boarded an Emirates 777 bound for overflight of Tehran, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan,
Siberia, the north pole, Vancouver BC, and Oregon’s Three Sisters trying to
leave the past in the Middle East. It took 16 hours and I was (un)welcomed back
into my country by the overzealous folks of the Department of Homeland
Security. A man never feels more unwelcome than in his own country, I suppose.
The warm dry air of Phoenix greeted me and what had become monochromatic began to fill in with hues of color upon the recesses of my mind: the smell of automobiles on hot tarmac, the feel of efficiency and quality, the sound of familiar language. Kevin, Lisa, and Grace picked up a disheveled, vanquished man from the Terminal 4 north curb and took him to America’s Taco for carne asada therapy. I held Grace’s precious hand the entire time, having realized in my time away just how wonderful it is to love a child and to feel so thankful for the opportunity that Zak & Lisa’s beautiful creation has afforded me. In the familiar din of Phoenix’s best carne asada joint I began to warm up and remember. Brant showed up and all the sudden I hadn’t been gone for two and a half months; it’d been only yesterday that I’d left the desert for equatorial Africa on a journey to serve. But who can remember that now? We laughed and talked and moved easily through the rhythms of familiarity and love. Shortly I was home napping trying to escape the terrible lag that crept up behind me. I failed. Waking up from that small nap my first day back felt like dying and it wasn’t until the following morning that my body finally said, “ok, you can start to heal now.” Waking up I remembered the experiences just a few days before…
The warm dry air of Phoenix greeted me and what had become monochromatic began to fill in with hues of color upon the recesses of my mind: the smell of automobiles on hot tarmac, the feel of efficiency and quality, the sound of familiar language. Kevin, Lisa, and Grace picked up a disheveled, vanquished man from the Terminal 4 north curb and took him to America’s Taco for carne asada therapy. I held Grace’s precious hand the entire time, having realized in my time away just how wonderful it is to love a child and to feel so thankful for the opportunity that Zak & Lisa’s beautiful creation has afforded me. In the familiar din of Phoenix’s best carne asada joint I began to warm up and remember. Brant showed up and all the sudden I hadn’t been gone for two and a half months; it’d been only yesterday that I’d left the desert for equatorial Africa on a journey to serve. But who can remember that now? We laughed and talked and moved easily through the rhythms of familiarity and love. Shortly I was home napping trying to escape the terrible lag that crept up behind me. I failed. Waking up from that small nap my first day back felt like dying and it wasn’t until the following morning that my body finally said, “ok, you can start to heal now.” Waking up I remembered the experiences just a few days before…
My last few days in
Uganda were not what I had planned. I never returned to the village to say
goodbye to the boys and aunties that had taken such good care of me for two
months. I felt robbed of that necessary experience, but alas sickness does not
ask what we think or what we want. So under what can loosely be described as
“doctor’s orders”, I stayed in Kampala trying to stay above the water. Gina and
I watched Season 7 of The Closer and she fed me some tasty Indian food, Abby
& David and I went to a posh Italian restaurant in Kololo, and the
Farrell’s and I enjoyed some breakfast at Café Javas. Yet most of my time was
spent laying down and thinking. Africa had been nothing of what I had planned.
I do not regret going and I do really believe that it all happened as it should. After all, it probably isn’t possible for things to happen as they should not. Only God knows, but I know that in Africa I didn’t merely slow down, I stopped. There were days in which I sat only in the company of God. This sounds more spiritual than it is for in this time I faced some of the darkest times and darkest beliefs. I did not share them with anyone for the efficacy of sharing burdens is limited at the nether regions of the subjective agonies of life. I wish I could say I felt His presence, but more often I felt His absence. I taunted God, asking of Him things that cannot be asked. I shut down, became cold and feared a future that was made of things such as this. To be honest, I don’t know if I wanted to hear from Him. The anger and hurt had reached new depths, and the sickness provided the space for honesty about that. In that place I only wanted to be alone with the visceral immediacy of pain. In my hopeless state there were many who attended to my needs reminding me that my attempts to truly feel alone were only partially successful. Thankfully, God wasn’t allowing me to write the script of our story. It was because of people like Gina, Shawn & Sarah, and Abby & David that I made it through. When the day finally came to leave Uganda, Shawn and his new adopted son Jethro made sure I made it safely to Entebbe Airport; I was not, am not alone.
I suppose a final report on Africa is in order. This is common practice for “missionaries” and those that are “sent”. Yet ministry does not lend itself to quantification. I don’t know the impact my passion or skills brought to the table. I know that I enjoyed counseling the boys when I could and that it was helpful for them. I know that I loved doing MTS with the male leaders, even if we were unable to finish. I know that I felt within my strengths when I did trainings, even if those were few. I know that it is always an honor to spend time with my Ugandan friends, the boys in the home, and the boys on the street. I know that the Americans at the Kampala guesthouse were my lifelines in many ways and I hope that I blessed them in some capacity as they have blessed me. I am further reminded and comforted by what I know the church is and can be. I will probably never learn to like churches in Africa with their prosperity gospel and too-often heresies, but I will always love The Church in Africa for the faith, devotion, and community. God, how I have so much to learn from them. Furthermore, it is encouraging and life-giving to be reminded that God’s Church is something that knows no boundaries, respects no culture, and is promised to be victorious both now and in the end. I know that I have cast my lot in the way of a broken, crucified King and that there is no other way to the truth. I could have learned that again in a place that wasn’t Africa, but probably not as well. I needed the late night talks with Peter, the enormous pain of hearing the stories of young boys who have experienced hell, the experience of Abby & David’s great passion, the laughter in the churches, and the stark reality of Rwanda’s genocide memorials to truly learn in a way that may sink into the fleshy part of my soul.
I do not regret going and I do really believe that it all happened as it should. After all, it probably isn’t possible for things to happen as they should not. Only God knows, but I know that in Africa I didn’t merely slow down, I stopped. There were days in which I sat only in the company of God. This sounds more spiritual than it is for in this time I faced some of the darkest times and darkest beliefs. I did not share them with anyone for the efficacy of sharing burdens is limited at the nether regions of the subjective agonies of life. I wish I could say I felt His presence, but more often I felt His absence. I taunted God, asking of Him things that cannot be asked. I shut down, became cold and feared a future that was made of things such as this. To be honest, I don’t know if I wanted to hear from Him. The anger and hurt had reached new depths, and the sickness provided the space for honesty about that. In that place I only wanted to be alone with the visceral immediacy of pain. In my hopeless state there were many who attended to my needs reminding me that my attempts to truly feel alone were only partially successful. Thankfully, God wasn’t allowing me to write the script of our story. It was because of people like Gina, Shawn & Sarah, and Abby & David that I made it through. When the day finally came to leave Uganda, Shawn and his new adopted son Jethro made sure I made it safely to Entebbe Airport; I was not, am not alone.
I suppose a final report on Africa is in order. This is common practice for “missionaries” and those that are “sent”. Yet ministry does not lend itself to quantification. I don’t know the impact my passion or skills brought to the table. I know that I enjoyed counseling the boys when I could and that it was helpful for them. I know that I loved doing MTS with the male leaders, even if we were unable to finish. I know that I felt within my strengths when I did trainings, even if those were few. I know that it is always an honor to spend time with my Ugandan friends, the boys in the home, and the boys on the street. I know that the Americans at the Kampala guesthouse were my lifelines in many ways and I hope that I blessed them in some capacity as they have blessed me. I am further reminded and comforted by what I know the church is and can be. I will probably never learn to like churches in Africa with their prosperity gospel and too-often heresies, but I will always love The Church in Africa for the faith, devotion, and community. God, how I have so much to learn from them. Furthermore, it is encouraging and life-giving to be reminded that God’s Church is something that knows no boundaries, respects no culture, and is promised to be victorious both now and in the end. I know that I have cast my lot in the way of a broken, crucified King and that there is no other way to the truth. I could have learned that again in a place that wasn’t Africa, but probably not as well. I needed the late night talks with Peter, the enormous pain of hearing the stories of young boys who have experienced hell, the experience of Abby & David’s great passion, the laughter in the churches, and the stark reality of Rwanda’s genocide memorials to truly learn in a way that may sink into the fleshy part of my soul.
So now I am home and
charged with remembering and taking this knowledge forward, even as my
definition of home must again change. If home is where the heart is I may never
know where home is, but I know that my physical address will in one week be
quite different from what it is now. PHX to PDX. Leaving Arizona elicits
emotions that are too complex for this space, this letter. If Season 1 was
growing up in the Midwest and Season 2 was the five years in the Marine Corps,
than my five years here was the 3rd Season of my life. It was not at
all what I’d expected. I thought I would grow in to the man that I needed to
be, but I do not believe that is the case. I thought I would know more about
life, but I believe I know less. Sometimes we care called to the desert to
discover the brokenness that always existed; sometime we don’t recover. And yet
the time has come to move forward, stake a new claim. I leave behind a
community family I could have never dreamed existed. I leave behind a new niece
that I adore. I leave behind a desert I know intimately and respect deeply. I
leave behind the catalysts for fractured memories of failures, victories, joys,
and pain. I embrace an unknown future.
Last Tuesday I left Uganda. This Tuesday I leave Phoenix. Brant, Kevin and I will load up my junk in a rented minivan (whatever can’t fit stays) and head to Santa Barbara and up the Pacific Coast Highway to Astoria, Oregon and then on to Portland where on Monday I begin my first grad school classes. I’m not even remotely prepared, but as always, I’ll shoot from the hip and hope for the best. The opportunity before me is one that few people get and I plan on capitalizing on the blessing. I am cautiously hopeful all the while steeling myself for an extended season of loss. I have never known less about what the future holds and that can be somewhat disconcerting at 28. But most of my plans and dreams for my life have already collapsed so I’m hoping God can take what is effectively a tear-stained blank slate and write something new and beautiful on it. Whether I like it or not I’m quickly running out of things to rely on besides Him. So that is my prayer for Season 4, from dryness to rain, that He would write a new story for me and that I would lose control of that which I hold on to with all my life… that which has only produced death. It is time to integrate my pain, loss, and knowledge into my story. I surrender, God! I was called out to the desert and was faithful to go. Now I am called to the land of rain and I want to be faithful, so I ask You to do something new and create in me something beautiful! That is my prayer. Amen.
Last Tuesday I left Uganda. This Tuesday I leave Phoenix. Brant, Kevin and I will load up my junk in a rented minivan (whatever can’t fit stays) and head to Santa Barbara and up the Pacific Coast Highway to Astoria, Oregon and then on to Portland where on Monday I begin my first grad school classes. I’m not even remotely prepared, but as always, I’ll shoot from the hip and hope for the best. The opportunity before me is one that few people get and I plan on capitalizing on the blessing. I am cautiously hopeful all the while steeling myself for an extended season of loss. I have never known less about what the future holds and that can be somewhat disconcerting at 28. But most of my plans and dreams for my life have already collapsed so I’m hoping God can take what is effectively a tear-stained blank slate and write something new and beautiful on it. Whether I like it or not I’m quickly running out of things to rely on besides Him. So that is my prayer for Season 4, from dryness to rain, that He would write a new story for me and that I would lose control of that which I hold on to with all my life… that which has only produced death. It is time to integrate my pain, loss, and knowledge into my story. I surrender, God! I was called out to the desert and was faithful to go. Now I am called to the land of rain and I want to be faithful, so I ask You to do something new and create in me something beautiful! That is my prayer. Amen.
“I’m gonna take that grain and I’m gonna crush it
all together in the flour of a bread as small and simple and sincere as when
the dryness and the rain finally drink from one another the gentle up of mutual
surrender tears.” –Aaron Weiss.
Thanks for reading these
posts, rants, and brainstorms. I hope they have blessed you in some way. I know
it has blessed me to be heard. Moreover, thank you to those who prayed for me
both over this time in Africa or at any time in my life, you are greatly
appreciated. Thank you as well for those who supported me financially. I hope
you do not view your hard-earned dollars as being spent on something that
ultimately was a waste.
This is my final Africa
Journal update in real time although I do have a number of unfinished blog
entries about a number of topics I wrote about while in Uganda that I’ll
probably share both here and on my blog (www.glocaldan.blogspot.com) at a later
time. To my Phoenician friends and family, thank you and goodbye. I love you
more than you know.
Dan
Africa Journal #13: Sickness & Genocide
Hey Friends,
I’ve wanted to update you
for some time. However, circumstances have prevented me from doing almost
anything more than just lay in bed. For the past six weeks, if I’ve counted
right, I’ve been sick. There have been some good stretches lasting a few days
or so, but the sheer weakness has been ever present for the majority of this
journey. No more working in the fields. No more working out with Uncle Peter.
No more outings to see friends in distant villages. Instead a lot of bed rest,
headaches, and refusing of food. I’ve probably lost 10 pounds, which for me is
almost unprecedented. I’ve been to the hospital a few times, but there was
never any conclusion on what I had. Initially it was thought that I had “a
virus” and that I’d get over it. That proved to not be true. A few weeks ago I
became again violently sick and was in bed for a few days. I finally got better
and decided I was strong enough to make it to Rwanda—a trip I’d had planned
since before I came and had postponed because of sickness. So, I went to Rwanda
and was mildly sick the entire time. By the time I made it back to Uganda I was
feeling pretty poorly but still decided to head back out to the village where I
lived. This could have been an almost fatal mistake. Thankfully, Gina Orr, a
middle-aged missionary here who works with API saw me and told me that I had to
go to the hospital the next day and that I could not stay in Kalule one more
night—she would simply now allow it. So that night I packed my things and
headed to Kampala. I didn’t know if I would make it. I almost passed out on the
boda boda to our house in Mengo, Kampala. I’m so glad Gina made me come,
however, for the next morning I went to use the restroom and woke up on the
bathroom floor sometime later. I was blacking out and hallucinating. I was able
to stand and I was able to call out to Gina and then I passed out again in the
kitchen. Everyone mobilized and at that early hour of 5:45 I was in Abby &
David’s new van headed to the International Hospital in Myenga.
Americans, if you’re not sitting down, you should probably sit down before the next sentence, as it will invariably shock you. When I went into the ER I was taken to a bed immediately. There was zero wait. I walked from the car to a bed and was seen immediately. Incredible! I will skip the gory details, but soon enough they had an IV in me and were pumping fluids into my depleted system. I talked to a couple of doctors there and they asked about my symptoms and I told them about the stomach pain, headaches, nausea, vomiting, lack of appetite, come and go fever, muscle soreness, and the “intestinal problems.” They took blood and did some tests. They found out I have a really bad bacteria infection that before escaped detection and that I have really bad allergies, which is exacerbating the problems. I can’t even tell you how nice it is to finally know what is wrong. The doxy and amoxy I have been taking have had no effect on this formidable enemy. They got the right/strong antibiotics flowing into me and went from there. In about six hours I was discharged at a total cost of like $56. I won’t even try and consider how much that care would have been in the U.S. That was yesterday and since then it has not been all roses and I’ve been in a lot of pain, but I think I am finally on the mend. This evening I ate my first full meal in about a week.
Americans, if you’re not sitting down, you should probably sit down before the next sentence, as it will invariably shock you. When I went into the ER I was taken to a bed immediately. There was zero wait. I walked from the car to a bed and was seen immediately. Incredible! I will skip the gory details, but soon enough they had an IV in me and were pumping fluids into my depleted system. I talked to a couple of doctors there and they asked about my symptoms and I told them about the stomach pain, headaches, nausea, vomiting, lack of appetite, come and go fever, muscle soreness, and the “intestinal problems.” They took blood and did some tests. They found out I have a really bad bacteria infection that before escaped detection and that I have really bad allergies, which is exacerbating the problems. I can’t even tell you how nice it is to finally know what is wrong. The doxy and amoxy I have been taking have had no effect on this formidable enemy. They got the right/strong antibiotics flowing into me and went from there. In about six hours I was discharged at a total cost of like $56. I won’t even try and consider how much that care would have been in the U.S. That was yesterday and since then it has not been all roses and I’ve been in a lot of pain, but I think I am finally on the mend. This evening I ate my first full meal in about a week.
Being sick provides a lot
of time to sit and think. This is a dangerous business for me. I can get lost
in the obsessions of my mind for some time and sometimes emotionally I cannot
really handle that. To be honest this sickness has really affected me
emotionally too. I spend most of my time alone and when with other people they
are taking care of me because I’m pretty useless to people. I did two trainings
on sexual abuse last week and that was the last “ministry” I’ve really been
able to do. I’m usually not too concerned about “performance” but when on a
“mission trip” I feel a desire to be of use and instead I have been lying about
in bed. God sometimes has truly felt like my only companion. I know the spiritual
thing to say is that He is always with me, but it doesn’t always feel like
that. A lot of the time I have felt truly alone and that’s not because I am,
but because I feel that I am. And yet sometimes God, in both subtle and
apparent ways, reminds me that he is redeeming the many missteps I have taken
in this life. In this season of profound powerlessness this has been something
I have wrestled with a lot. I thought I came to Africa to serve and to be of
use, but instead I have mostly been served and wrestled with God. Get me alone
long enough and that is what seems to be the inevitable end. God had a
different plan for this trip than I did. I can handle that. But in the silences
of my time here it is the different plans he has for my life that I struggle
with. I am tired of crying and being so emotionally vulnerable and emotionally
weak here. It is a fitting state given that I am sick, but a part of me wants
to pretend strength once again as if I knew even the first thing about how to
live my life; I don’t.
This sick, self-aware man
is the same man who went to Rwanda to see, if I’m honest, the genocide
memorials. I have always longed to go. I’ve read almost every book on Rwanda
that there is. I’ve taken classes on genocide and studied them to the nth degree.
The holocaust is fascinating, but nothing is gripping like the story of a
country that in 1994 was able to convince one group of people to kill their
neighbors, friends, and family with farm implements. In 100 days between
800,000 and a million people were murdered. It’s hard to get good numbers when
the scale is such that those who would speak for the dead are also dead. Many
of you have probably seen Hotel Rwanda or maybe Sometimes in April. Maybe some
of your have read Left to Tell which
is an incredible story of redemption after the genocide. All are good and
helpful, but I have to see with my own eyes. I wanted to see the blood stains
and smashed skulls. I’m no sadist, but I want to never forget what man is
capable of. Nothing seems more real than standing over a pile of bones of a
child smashed against a wall. [If you know little about this recent historical
event I encourage you to briefly read the wiki page on the genocide or perhaps
pick up a book like Gourtevich’s We Wish
To Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families.]
So, in my sickness and emotional turmoil Uncle Alex (who I work with at API) and I headed to beautiful Kigali, Rwanda to bear witness, both to the 18th anniversary of the genocide and to the continual redemption of Rwanda, arguably Africa’s best current success story. I could say a lot of the trip, but it would take far too long. But I will tell a story. While we were there we went to the Kigali Genocide Memorial, a place where over 250,000 men, women, children, fathers, mothers, sons, daughters, wives, husbands, students, friends, whatever, were buried. The only thing the buried had in common was that they were part of the conjured “tribe” Tutsi that the Belgians had thought up in the early 20th century. It was a far more socio-economic status than a racial designation, but nevertheless it spelt death in April of 1994. The mass graves cannot be summed up so I will not try. I cannot wrap my mind around 250,000 individual, brutal murders although it became easier when we were inside looking at skulls that had collapsed around the physical power of a machete to the side of the head. But where I fell apart, where I prayed aloud to never, ever forget what I have seen was the exhibit dedicated to children. It was as subtle as could be, but the tall photos of young Rwandan boys and girls smiling were almost themselves too much. The placards underneath the endearing photos were what caused you to fall apart:
So, in my sickness and emotional turmoil Uncle Alex (who I work with at API) and I headed to beautiful Kigali, Rwanda to bear witness, both to the 18th anniversary of the genocide and to the continual redemption of Rwanda, arguably Africa’s best current success story. I could say a lot of the trip, but it would take far too long. But I will tell a story. While we were there we went to the Kigali Genocide Memorial, a place where over 250,000 men, women, children, fathers, mothers, sons, daughters, wives, husbands, students, friends, whatever, were buried. The only thing the buried had in common was that they were part of the conjured “tribe” Tutsi that the Belgians had thought up in the early 20th century. It was a far more socio-economic status than a racial designation, but nevertheless it spelt death in April of 1994. The mass graves cannot be summed up so I will not try. I cannot wrap my mind around 250,000 individual, brutal murders although it became easier when we were inside looking at skulls that had collapsed around the physical power of a machete to the side of the head. But where I fell apart, where I prayed aloud to never, ever forget what I have seen was the exhibit dedicated to children. It was as subtle as could be, but the tall photos of young Rwandan boys and girls smiling were almost themselves too much. The placards underneath the endearing photos were what caused you to fall apart:
NAME: Ariana Nyabagora;
AGE: 24 months;
FAVORITE WORD: “Jaja”
(grandma);
FAVORITE FOOD: Rice;
HOMELIFE: Daddy’s girl;
CAUSE OF DEATH: Stabbed
in the head with a knife.
There were dozens of
these and the deaths were gruesome: beheaded, grenade in the shower, buried
alive, stabbed in mother’s arms, etc. I wept bitterly, writing furiously in my
journal to keep the emotions safe. Then I saw a photo that caused my heart to
do a somersault. In 1993 when this black and white photo was taken someone used
way too much flash and this one young girl looked like a white baby in the
photo, but not just any white baby, but resembling my very own niece, Grace. I
wanted to run, to scream, to not think of it, but I had to stop and hold that
pain in and know it intimately. I had to cry and face what evil really means in
this world. I had to face that lie that says sin is benign, unimportant. The
young girl’s name was Felicia and she was almost one and a half when she was
thrown against a wall in a church by a genocidiare.
Even a passing resemblance to Grace rocked my world not because a white baby is
more valuable than a black baby, but because it wasn’t any white baby, but my
sister’s own child whom I love. And we deceive ourselves when we think
ourselves too sophisticated for such anarchy and evil. I agree it is highly
unlikely that the racist, anti-life voices in our society will every have
sufficient power to convince every brown-haired person to kill every
blonde-haired person, for example, but just as radio RTLM in Kigali convinced
the Hutu that Tutsi were “cockroaches” sufficiently dehumanizing them for
extermination, we have voices in our own society who use their prejudices to
dehumanize and hate. It is but for the Grace of God that those hateful words
land on ears sufficiently taught to be nuanced in interpretation. The sin,
however, is the same. “Never Again” was said after Rwanda’s genocide in which
every Western power (save for the French who, expectedly, helped the genocidiares) watched it happen—as one
of the Rwandan Colonels orchestrating the genocide told an American during that
dark time, “we have no oil, no bridges, no strategic interests for your
country”, rightfully noting the US would do nothing. And yet “Never Again” was an
empty statement for a few years later Milosevic send his Serb forces to
exterminate the Muslim minority in the Balkans. Some years later after that
Omar Bashir’s Sudan sent attack aircraft and the Janjaweed rebels to
exterminate the people of Darfur. The list is extensive and it should be
instructive but I don’t want to help others reach policy conclusions. I want to
never forget what my eyes have seen and what it means… for me, for the church,
for life. And speaking of the church, the average pastor (catholic,
evangelical, whatever) in Rwanda in 1994 did not protect his flock. In fact,
number of them led the killers to their church to get rid of the “Tutsi
Cockroaches” amidst their congregations. The Muslims, on the other hand, almost
universally protected people in their mosques. We can make all the excuses we
want, but in Rwanda circa April-June 1994, Allah looked a lot more gracious
than G-d. May we learn to be the first to die to save a life.
I could never capture
Rwanda in a word. I will not attempt, but I hope someday you go and see what
amazing things God is doing out of the ashes of atrocity.
I leave Africa is a few short days. I do not yet know what the lasting impact of this season will be on me, but I believe it will have been instrumental in some way in my life. I’ve seen God do amazing things and I’ve seen God keep me sufficiently humble and reliant on Him. I’m truly thankful for your prayers and support that got me to this place. You’re a blessing to me and I want you to know that. Some of you I owe emails too and I hope to get those to you when I can. I hope to write one more time once my thoughts and life are in order. Expect some new blog entries soon at my blog: www.glocaldan.blogspot.com
God Bless,
I leave Africa is a few short days. I do not yet know what the lasting impact of this season will be on me, but I believe it will have been instrumental in some way in my life. I’ve seen God do amazing things and I’ve seen God keep me sufficiently humble and reliant on Him. I’m truly thankful for your prayers and support that got me to this place. You’re a blessing to me and I want you to know that. Some of you I owe emails too and I hope to get those to you when I can. I hope to write one more time once my thoughts and life are in order. Expect some new blog entries soon at my blog: www.glocaldan.blogspot.com
God Bless,
Dan
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