March 28, 2025 • 21 mins
Understanding Asylum Seekers: Interview with Rev. Christina Rathbone About Her New Book
In this episode of The Simply Christian Life, Bishop Michael Hunn of the Diocese of the Rio Grande introduces an interview with Reverend Christina Rathbone, the first border chaplain of the Diocese. Christina discusses her book 'The Asylum Seekers' and shares profound insights from her ministry at the US-Mexico border. They explore the realities faced by asylum seekers, the importance of small, real acts of love, and the philosophy of ministry that prioritizes relationships over systems. The episode also includes an emotional reading from Christina's book, encapsulating the human stories and the divine presence in the lives of those seeking refuge.
00:00 Welcome and Introduction
00:46 Interview with Reverend Christina Rathbone
03:00 Christina's Journey to the Border
07:51 The Philosophy of Ministry
11:58 Excerpt from 'The Asylum Seekers'
20:38 Conclusion and Final Thoughts
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:07):
Hello and welcome to the Simply Christian Life.
My name is Michael Hunn, and I'm the bishop of the Diocese of the Rio Grande, which encompasses the entire state of New Mexico and the far west part of Texas.
Including 40% of the US Mexico border.
There's been a lot in the news media and online lately about asylum seekers in the United States and those who are currently being deported, having been legally present in the United States.
(00:33):
Under the last administration, quite frankly, there's been a lot of misinformation about who asylum seekers are.
Implying that everyone who migrates to the United States.
Is doing something illegal or criminal? In this episode, I wanna share with you an interview with the Reverend Christina Rathbone.
Christina Rathbone was the first border chaplain of the Diocese of the Rio Grande, and she's written a book called The Asylum Seekers, which talks about a particular moment in time when families were being detained as they sought to legally claim asylum in the United States of America.
(01:10):
In this moment, it seems that the policy of the United States government is to detain families again.
So it might be helpful for you to know more about who the people are who have legally claimed asylum in the United States, who have often fled for their lives.
The book is called The Asylum Seekers by the Reverend Christina Rathbone, and what follows is an interview with her.
(01:35):
I wanna thank.
Tina Rathbone for her ministry brief, though it was in the Diocese of the Rio Grande.
And I want to thank the Reverend Canon Lee Curtis for conducting this interview.
Alright, also, I am with, uh, the Reverend Christina Rathbone with Tina, um, who I have had the pleasure of knowing since 2019 and kind of one of the.
(02:05):
Great coincidences of, of my ministry, not just here in the DRG, but ever.
Um, and so Tina, um.
Why don't you, you tell folks a bit of the story about how you got here and then, um, you know, we can talk about a, a bit about where that went, um, but beyond the specifics of what we did, what I really want to, to give, um, the clergy here and the DRG is a bit of your philosophy of ministry, um, which has been, um, huge for me personally.
(02:31):
Um.
And, and not many folks in, in the diocese of the Rio Grande have had the privilege of, you know, sitting down with you and mulling over things.
And you being like, no, Lee, that's too big.
No, Lee, that's not gonna work.
No, Lee, you need to, you need to dial it back, like keep the first thing first.
Um, and so I want to, um, knowing how big that's been in my ministry, um, wanted to give, give you a chance to share that with, uh, the clergy, the DRG.
(02:58):
Um.
And so that's kinda where we are.
So how did you come here? How'd you get to know us? What have you been up to? Yeah.
It's great to see you Lee.
Um, and yeah, what a pleasure to be back in contact with you and all the priests, um, of the diocese of the Rio Grande two, which is, I, I count you guys as my other diocese, so I, I don't know if that's, you know, too, um, just outrageous of me, but that's how I think of you all, so.
(03:22):
Mm-hmm.
Um, please some blessings.
Yeah, it was a kind of a, a gift of God, I think.
Um, you and I meeting each other and my coming even to El Paso, um, I had left Boston where, uh, the Diocese of Massachusetts is my home diocese and I'd worked for many, many years with homeless folks here in Boston, creating with them a ministry out of our cathedral, um, here and when it was time to leave there, that was 2019.
(03:49):
Um.
I'm half Cuban, half English.
My family had all come to this country with nothing, and were given an opportunity and a chance to make a new life for themselves here.
So I sort of felt compelled in part because of my own family story to go to the border and see what it is I could do both as a priest of the Episcopal church and also as a citizen of this country.
(04:11):
Um, you know, passport carrying citizen, what, what, what responsibilities did that entail and what opportunities did it give me to be of some, some small assistance to others? I originally thought that I would settle in Tijuana and do some ministry there by the border, but when I came for a brief visit to El Paso Juarez, um, things just started taking off.
(04:32):
I met with you.
Um.
You were all so welcoming and generous, um, and interested and keen to get involved and ready.
Um, and so sort of against my initial desire and because the path seemed so clear and to do otherwise would've been just very obviously disobedient to the great power of God.
(04:54):
I ended up staying here and together we created, uh, the Bridge Chaplaincy, which has been such a blessing to so many.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah, no, I think that's a really important point to make.
Um, so, so Tina is, is the Proto Bridge chaplain.
Um, so Anna, Anna Reza has, um, made an amazing impact in the diocese.
And, and you were the one, um, who really kind of, I.
(05:18):
The impetus for that, um, and, and prototyped the position.
And so hugely thankful, um, for the legacy that's still continuing, uh, RG Oh yeah.
And I'm so thankful for Anna, um, for the process that found her and for her incredible witness.
Yeah.
Mm, no, she's, she's remarkable.
Um.
And, and we can go into that.
(05:39):
If, if I say too much, she'll get, she'll get upset with me.
Um, but we are, we are collective members of the HONOREES fan club here in the DRG founding members.
Right? Founding members, only members.
You know the distinction? No, certainly not the only members.
Um, so as I, as I said in the beginning, I, um.
(06:00):
I think the, and going back to the kind of developing of the Bridge Chaplaincy position, um, and the way that we've thought about these things, uh, I remember, I remember it was, it was just before the pandemic hit and we were kind of talking through what would this be? It was after the shift, um, from the work directly on the bridge to starting to integrate with the shelters.
(06:25):
Um.
The, with the, uh, diocese of Northern Mexico.
Um, and, and I remember having these conversations that were just hugely ill illustrative or, or illuminating for me because my impulse at that point was programatize everything.
Right? Um, 'cause that's what diocesan employees do.
(06:47):
We programatize everything.
And, and I remember again that just like.
This, this kind of refrain that you gave back to me of, of small and real and um, and avoiding trying to systematize things that are really inherently dependent on relationships.
(07:08):
Yeah.
Um, rather than systems.
And, and I have gone to at like, kind of throughout the pandemic, I've gone back to that, um, after the pandemic.
You know, as we started settling into the, the shelter that we had been operating out of St.
Christopher's, that was still, we had these constant kind of pushes of, can you expand your capacity to 50, can you expand your capacity to a Hunnndred? Um, and by that time it had kind of integrated so far into me, they'd been like, no, we're good at 25.
(07:38):
We can do 25.
Um.
But that's a real, that's a real push.
And I know it's not, you know, the, the ministry that we've done here on the borders, an is an example of that.
But I know you've embodied that in different ways.
Um, so I just, what I really was hoping for this is, is, especially at this time where we're facing so many things that seems so big, so much bigger than we are.
(08:01):
Yeah.
How would you describe your idea, your, your philosophy of kind of your philosophy of ministry? Talking about small, real things.
What is it? How do you think about it? And, and then we can go from there.
Yeah.
Thank you, Lee.
What an incredible opportunity.
I think it's all based as, all good things are in Jesus.
(08:21):
Mm-hmm.
Uh, the word became flesh and dwelt among us.
The word became flesh.
It's so taking all that infinity of the word and having it be reduced into the extreme finitude of becoming flesh, right as finite as I am here.
Someone who's born, who will live and who will die.
(08:45):
Then come to life again in a new way over and over again throughout our lives.
So I think for me, that is what is so profound about Christianity, that astonishing statement about the nature of God's love for us all and of God's self-giving that reduced God's self to the size of a human being and the truth of a human being.
(09:08):
And that, for me, shifts the scale of my desire, um, because it means that every human being.
That I'm given to meet sometimes to help, sometimes to be helped by is.
A container of the divine and therefore contains everything within them.
And as you said, that is the ground of all the work that I do.
(09:30):
It is always relational between me and my role as a priest, of course, and all that that represents the whole community of saints, the community of the church, and the person in front of me and everything that they represent and their community that they carry with them with.
And through that relationship.
(09:51):
Between two people.
We find everything.
We find the kingdom of heaven.
I really do believe that even, and maybe especially in the deepest, darkest, most broken places, so.
If we're working on the scale of the individual, it means that a tiny thing is actually huge in the way we normally think of it.
(10:13):
It's not huge in terms of great, bright, shiny, flashing light successes, but it's huge in terms of the transmission of God's love and the transformation that occurs through that transmission.
So yes, altering our sites from the.
Two enormous horizon to the absolute finitude of a real live person in front of me with real live needs and real live gifts.
(10:39):
That's where I find my salvation and that's where I find God.
Mm-hmm.
And those two things are inevitably linked.
And so in that, and I, I think that's, that kind of speaks to a lot of the, um, a lot of the struggle that I think, uh, many clergy experience I know I've experienced in, in these kind of, um.
(11:01):
What we have labeled as success mm-hmm.
Is a valuing of the kind of, of the horizon of the bright and the flashy.
Um, instead of this kind of, um, even understanding of a vesti degree of a relationship with a vestry as a relationship is a network of individual relationships and those kind of community pieces that you bring in.
(11:23):
And so, so I guess the.
I know.
Well, this is also another reason for the conversation that I should bring in now.
Uh, you've written a book, um, about your time, um, in, in El Paso and Juarez.
And, um, I had the, the pleasure of of being able to read it.
And, um, I think I told you it's the first book I've, I've put down in one sitting in years.
(11:48):
Um, and, and there's some time some pieces in there where you describe this exact.
Phenomenon.
I was wondering if you, if you have a piece there that you wouldn't mind sharing with us.
Yes.
So, uh, this excerpt comes about halfway through the book and it's, um, taken from when the community of asylum seekers was still living, squashed into one block, pressed up against the port of entry in downtown Juarez, about 500 people just living in makeshift tents.
(12:15):
And they had organized an incredible system to approach, um.
The top of the bridge, which was the dividing line between Mexico and the United States.
And to ask for asylum requests, which were turned down and turned down, and turned down and turned down.
As you very well know Lou Lee, 'cause you spent a lot of time up there.
Mm-hmm.
Um, accompanying folks asking for that.
(12:36):
Um, so this little reading takes place, um, during a dip when no one had been allowed to ask for asylum for an extremely long time.
It had been so long since anyone had gotten through eight full days of trying and failing.
Trying and failing.
Trying and failing.
So a prayer came easily as we approached the bridge again for God's mercy to fill the hearts of the border Patrol for God's courage to fill the three families who were trying and for God's grace to course through everyone who would not get through today, bringing them what they needed in ways they could actually feel.
(13:14):
Afterward I crouched down to speak more intimately with Luis and the other two kids in the group.
I needed to express something to them to imbue them with some urgent thing.
And it turned out to be this, how extraordinary they were and how lucky my country was that they were hoping to move there.
And most of all that, however hard the next few days may be, they had all they needed already right there in their hearts.
(13:44):
The intensity with which the kids listened to all this was sobering to the point of silencing, stunned a bit by it and wanting also to arm them again for the reality that awaited.
I lumbered back up to my feet and gently cuffed Luis's jaunty sideways cap the way I always did.
But he just kept looking at me and looking at me until he turned to follow his family.
(14:06):
Single file up through the turnstiles and onto the bridge.
We were all openly weeping by then, and at least partly because we all needed space to subdue both our hope and our fear.
We quickly dispersed, hoping for a few minutes of solitude.
I set off for the black and white coffee shop on Juarez A, where I'd become a regular, but another little boy.
(14:28):
Samwell far smaller than Luis and without the pizazz stopped me as I passed.
He'd been trying to speak to me earlier and I told him then that he needed to wait.
So here he was again, now silent in front of me with his even littler sister and his only just taller mom.
I stopped crouched down again to be at eye level with him and waited for a time.
(14:53):
The three of them just stood there in a straight line.
Little boy, tiny girl, slightly taller mom.
Then Samuel well began to tell me what he'd been trying to tell me all afternoon that his mother was afraid that she had heard that the kids would be separated from her in detention and that they would be inside for months and months and it would be freezing and they'd have nothing to keep themselves warm and not enough to eat, and if either of the children, he or his sister.
(15:20):
He said looking down at his sister for a moment.
Started even to cry for any reason, or maybe even to squabble, that the guards would come in and beat them and then take them away.
Was this true? He asked this boy who looked maybe seven and who was speaking already, so lucidly and fluently on behalf of his mother, who was too afraid to speak even to me.
(15:45):
This was what his mother had heard.
He repeated this was what people had told her, that they would be separated even if they made just one mistake.
I can't describe the intense effect.
This tiny boy speaking like a man on behalf of his terrified mother had on me.
I.
He stood so straight and he spoke so quietly and also so clearly because it was important what he was saying.
(16:11):
He knew and he might not get another chance, and he didn't want to forget anything.
Is it true that me and my sister will be sent to live with strangers? He said, do you have family over there? I asked.
Yes.
Then you will all probably go and live with them together.
But they live in Orlando, Florida.
(16:32):
He anguished as if it were the real name of hell.
I tried to let him know that every kid in the world wanted to go to Orlando, Florida, because that was where Disney World was.
But I don't think he'd ever heard of Disney.
Mickey Mouse lives there.
I said, stupidly turning to his little sister and Donald Duck.
(16:53):
Does Little Pony live there too? I love Little Pony.
His sister said, yes, little Pony too.
I said, and still the boys stood there straight and as tall as he could make himself asking his questions, voicing the fears of his family.
I.
I told him then that I was a priest and was therefore not allowed to lie.
(17:15):
Not ever.
And that I had never heard of children being separated from their mother because they cried or squabbled, or of them being beaten, but it was not enough.
It was as if Samwell were waiting for something and then all of a sudden I knew what it was.
I took off the bracelet I'd been wearing every day.
(17:37):
The one Judy back in Boston had given me that read, though she be but small, she be fierce, and I wrapped it around his wrist, pressing the metal ends together.
So they touched around his tiny arm, telling him as I did, so what it said, I added that the adults might take it away from him in detention, but that they would have to give it back when he left to go to Orlando, Florida and that it didn't matter anyway, whether he had it or not.
(18:03):
Because it was true what it said.
He was fierce and he already had everything he needed in his heart.
I pointed to his heart then, and then to his sister's heart, and to his mother's heart, and told them that God lived in there, God, and that no one could ever take God away, ever.
(18:27):
The intensity between us then must have been palpable because a silent and creeping group of wide-eyed little kids started to gather around us.
So I pointed to each of their hearts too, one by one and very quietly told each one of them the same.
God is in here.
God is in here.
(18:48):
God is in here.
God is in here.
Small real things.
Small real things.
This is what I kept trying to remember and to trust.
Not big impressive things, but small real things are the way to love with through and for the other small, not because we can't be bothered, but because we are small ourselves.
(19:20):
And because every time we honor this smallness without shutting down, every time we acknowledge our lack of sufficiency and remain willing even so, to both meet and be met by the other, well, whatever follows will both come from and lead to the realm of abundance.
Some of us call God and real transformation will happen only on an infinitesimal scale.
(19:46):
This is how small real things make a small real difference.
And this is important too because small real things are necessarily incarnate.
They cannot be faked or sold or even advertised.
They can only be sought in the moment and then welcomed.
(20:06):
They require nothing flashy, nothing expensive.
Only a mute and muscularly passive stance full of willingness and re reliability and vulnerability.
It isn't that small.
Real things don't sometimes become large real things because they do.
It isn't the smallness, that's the point.
(20:28):
But the intention, it's as if the act of desiring and then seeking something small, liberates us to receive without measure.
As if by not aiming for bigness or for success, we somehow become freed from the regular marketplace world in which something is always given in exchange for something else and enter instead a realm where giving and receiving become the same thing.
(20:57):
Here are a couple of sentences by Sandra Cisneros, which cheered me up one dark night in El Paso because they say more or less the same thing, only more simply I.
I don't know anything she writes, but I know this whatever is done with love in the name of others without self gain, whatever is done with the heart on behalf of someone or something, what? Whatever work we make with complete humility will always come out beautifully and something more valuable than fame or money will come This.
(21:35):
I know.
Hello and welcome to the Simply Christian Life.
My name is Michael Hunn, and I'm the bishop of the Diocese of the Rio Grande, which encompasses the entire state of New Mexico and the far west part of Texas.
Including 40% of the US Mexico border.
There's been a lot in the news media and online lately about asylum seekers in the United States and those who are currently being deported, having been legally present in the United States.
(00:33):
Under the last administration, quite frankly, there's been a lot of misinformation about who asylum seekers are.
Implying that everyone who migrates to the United States.
Is doing something illegal or criminal? In this episode, I wanna share with you an interview with the Reverend Christina Rathbone.
Christina Rathbone was the first border chaplain of the Diocese of the Rio Grande, and she's written a book called The Asylum Seekers, which talks about a particular moment in time when families were being detained as they sought to legally claim asylum in the United States of America.
(01:10):
In this moment, it seems that the policy of the United States government is to detain families again.
So it might be helpful for you to know more about who the people are who have legally claimed asylum in the United States, who have often fled for their lives.
The book is called The Asylum Seekers by the Reverend Christina Rathbone, and what follows is an interview with her.
(01:35):
I wanna thank.
Tina Rathbone for her ministry brief, though it was in the Diocese of the Rio Grande.
And I want to thank the Reverend Canon Lee Curtis for conducting this interview.
Alright, also, I am with, uh, the Reverend Christina Rathbone with Tina, um, who I have had the pleasure of knowing since 2019 and kind of one of the.
(02:05):
Great coincidences of, of my ministry, not just here in the DRG, but ever.
Um, and so Tina, um.
Why don't you, you tell folks a bit of the story about how you got here and then, um, you know, we can talk about a, a bit about where that went, um, but beyond the specifics of what we did, what I really want to, to give, um, the clergy here and the DRG is a bit of your philosophy of ministry, um, which has been, um, huge for me personally.
(02:31):
Um.
And, and not many folks in, in the diocese of the Rio Grande have had the privilege of, you know, sitting down with you and mulling over things.
And you being like, no, Lee, that's too big.
No, Lee, that's not gonna work.
No, Lee, you need to, you need to dial it back, like keep the first thing first.
Um, and so I want to, um, knowing how big that's been in my ministry, um, wanted to give, give you a chance to share that with, uh, the clergy, the DRG.
(02:58):
Um.
And so that's kinda where we are.
So how did you come here? How'd you get to know us? What have you been up to? Yeah.
It's great to see you Lee.
Um, and yeah, what a pleasure to be back in contact with you and all the priests, um, of the diocese of the Rio Grande two, which is, I, I count you guys as my other diocese, so I, I don't know if that's, you know, too, um, just outrageous of me, but that's how I think of you all, so.
(03:22):
Mm-hmm.
Um, please some blessings.
Yeah, it was a kind of a, a gift of God, I think.
Um, you and I meeting each other and my coming even to El Paso, um, I had left Boston where, uh, the Diocese of Massachusetts is my home diocese and I'd worked for many, many years with homeless folks here in Boston, creating with them a ministry out of our cathedral, um, here and when it was time to leave there, that was 2019.
(03:49):
Um.
I'm half Cuban, half English.
My family had all come to this country with nothing, and were given an opportunity and a chance to make a new life for themselves here.
So I sort of felt compelled in part because of my own family story to go to the border and see what it is I could do both as a priest of the Episcopal church and also as a citizen of this country.
(04:11):
Um, you know, passport carrying citizen, what, what, what responsibilities did that entail and what opportunities did it give me to be of some, some small assistance to others? I originally thought that I would settle in Tijuana and do some ministry there by the border, but when I came for a brief visit to El Paso Juarez, um, things just started taking off.
(04:32):
I met with you.
Um.
You were all so welcoming and generous, um, and interested and keen to get involved and ready.
Um, and so sort of against my initial desire and because the path seemed so clear and to do otherwise would've been just very obviously disobedient to the great power of God.
(04:54):
I ended up staying here and together we created, uh, the Bridge Chaplaincy, which has been such a blessing to so many.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah, no, I think that's a really important point to make.
Um, so, so Tina is, is the Proto Bridge chaplain.
Um, so Anna, Anna Reza has, um, made an amazing impact in the diocese.
And, and you were the one, um, who really kind of, I.
(05:18):
The impetus for that, um, and, and prototyped the position.
And so hugely thankful, um, for the legacy that's still continuing, uh, RG Oh yeah.
And I'm so thankful for Anna, um, for the process that found her and for her incredible witness.
Yeah.
Mm, no, she's, she's remarkable.
Um.
And, and we can go into that.
(05:39):
If, if I say too much, she'll get, she'll get upset with me.
Um, but we are, we are collective members of the HONOREES fan club here in the DRG founding members.
Right? Founding members, only members.
You know the distinction? No, certainly not the only members.
Um, so as I, as I said in the beginning, I, um.
(06:00):
I think the, and going back to the kind of developing of the Bridge Chaplaincy position, um, and the way that we've thought about these things, uh, I remember, I remember it was, it was just before the pandemic hit and we were kind of talking through what would this be? It was after the shift, um, from the work directly on the bridge to starting to integrate with the shelters.
(06:25):
Um.
The, with the, uh, diocese of Northern Mexico.
Um, and, and I remember having these conversations that were just hugely ill illustrative or, or illuminating for me because my impulse at that point was programatize everything.
Right? Um, 'cause that's what diocesan employees do.
(06:47):
We programatize everything.
And, and I remember again that just like.
This, this kind of refrain that you gave back to me of, of small and real and um, and avoiding trying to systematize things that are really inherently dependent on relationships.
(07:08):
Yeah.
Um, rather than systems.
And, and I have gone to at like, kind of throughout the pandemic, I've gone back to that, um, after the pandemic.
You know, as we started settling into the, the shelter that we had been operating out of St.
Christopher's, that was still, we had these constant kind of pushes of, can you expand your capacity to 50, can you expand your capacity to a Hunnndred? Um, and by that time it had kind of integrated so far into me, they'd been like, no, we're good at 25.
(07:38):
We can do 25.
Um.
But that's a real, that's a real push.
And I know it's not, you know, the, the ministry that we've done here on the borders, an is an example of that.
But I know you've embodied that in different ways.
Um, so I just, what I really was hoping for this is, is, especially at this time where we're facing so many things that seems so big, so much bigger than we are.
(08:01):
Yeah.
How would you describe your idea, your, your philosophy of kind of your philosophy of ministry? Talking about small, real things.
What is it? How do you think about it? And, and then we can go from there.
Yeah.
Thank you, Lee.
What an incredible opportunity.
I think it's all based as, all good things are in Jesus.
(08:21):
Mm-hmm.
Uh, the word became flesh and dwelt among us.
The word became flesh.
It's so taking all that infinity of the word and having it be reduced into the extreme finitude of becoming flesh, right as finite as I am here.
Someone who's born, who will live and who will die.
(08:45):
Then come to life again in a new way over and over again throughout our lives.
So I think for me, that is what is so profound about Christianity, that astonishing statement about the nature of God's love for us all and of God's self-giving that reduced God's self to the size of a human being and the truth of a human being.
(09:08):
And that, for me, shifts the scale of my desire, um, because it means that every human being.
That I'm given to meet sometimes to help, sometimes to be helped by is.
A container of the divine and therefore contains everything within them.
And as you said, that is the ground of all the work that I do.
(09:30):
It is always relational between me and my role as a priest, of course, and all that that represents the whole community of saints, the community of the church, and the person in front of me and everything that they represent and their community that they carry with them with.
And through that relationship.
(09:51):
Between two people.
We find everything.
We find the kingdom of heaven.
I really do believe that even, and maybe especially in the deepest, darkest, most broken places, so.
If we're working on the scale of the individual, it means that a tiny thing is actually huge in the way we normally think of it.
(10:13):
It's not huge in terms of great, bright, shiny, flashing light successes, but it's huge in terms of the transmission of God's love and the transformation that occurs through that transmission.
So yes, altering our sites from the.
Two enormous horizon to the absolute finitude of a real live person in front of me with real live needs and real live gifts.
(10:39):
That's where I find my salvation and that's where I find God.
Mm-hmm.
And those two things are inevitably linked.
And so in that, and I, I think that's, that kind of speaks to a lot of the, um, a lot of the struggle that I think, uh, many clergy experience I know I've experienced in, in these kind of, um.
(11:01):
What we have labeled as success mm-hmm.
Is a valuing of the kind of, of the horizon of the bright and the flashy.
Um, instead of this kind of, um, even understanding of a vesti degree of a relationship with a vestry as a relationship is a network of individual relationships and those kind of community pieces that you bring in.
(11:23):
And so, so I guess the.
I know.
Well, this is also another reason for the conversation that I should bring in now.
Uh, you've written a book, um, about your time, um, in, in El Paso and Juarez.
And, um, I had the, the pleasure of of being able to read it.
And, um, I think I told you it's the first book I've, I've put down in one sitting in years.
(11:48):
Um, and, and there's some time some pieces in there where you describe this exact.
Phenomenon.
I was wondering if you, if you have a piece there that you wouldn't mind sharing with us.
Yes.
So, uh, this excerpt comes about halfway through the book and it's, um, taken from when the community of asylum seekers was still living, squashed into one block, pressed up against the port of entry in downtown Juarez, about 500 people just living in makeshift tents.
(12:15):
And they had organized an incredible system to approach, um.
The top of the bridge, which was the dividing line between Mexico and the United States.
And to ask for asylum requests, which were turned down and turned down, and turned down and turned down.
As you very well know Lou Lee, 'cause you spent a lot of time up there.
Mm-hmm.
Um, accompanying folks asking for that.
(12:36):
Um, so this little reading takes place, um, during a dip when no one had been allowed to ask for asylum for an extremely long time.
It had been so long since anyone had gotten through eight full days of trying and failing.
Trying and failing.
Trying and failing.
So a prayer came easily as we approached the bridge again for God's mercy to fill the hearts of the border Patrol for God's courage to fill the three families who were trying and for God's grace to course through everyone who would not get through today, bringing them what they needed in ways they could actually feel.
(13:14):
Afterward I crouched down to speak more intimately with Luis and the other two kids in the group.
I needed to express something to them to imbue them with some urgent thing.
And it turned out to be this, how extraordinary they were and how lucky my country was that they were hoping to move there.
And most of all that, however hard the next few days may be, they had all they needed already right there in their hearts.
(13:44):
The intensity with which the kids listened to all this was sobering to the point of silencing, stunned a bit by it and wanting also to arm them again for the reality that awaited.
I lumbered back up to my feet and gently cuffed Luis's jaunty sideways cap the way I always did.
But he just kept looking at me and looking at me until he turned to follow his family.
(14:06):
Single file up through the turnstiles and onto the bridge.
We were all openly weeping by then, and at least partly because we all needed space to subdue both our hope and our fear.
We quickly dispersed, hoping for a few minutes of solitude.
I set off for the black and white coffee shop on Juarez A, where I'd become a regular, but another little boy.
(14:28):
Samwell far smaller than Luis and without the pizazz stopped me as I passed.
He'd been trying to speak to me earlier and I told him then that he needed to wait.
So here he was again, now silent in front of me with his even littler sister and his only just taller mom.
I stopped crouched down again to be at eye level with him and waited for a time.
(14:53):
The three of them just stood there in a straight line.
Little boy, tiny girl, slightly taller mom.
Then Samuel well began to tell me what he'd been trying to tell me all afternoon that his mother was afraid that she had heard that the kids would be separated from her in detention and that they would be inside for months and months and it would be freezing and they'd have nothing to keep themselves warm and not enough to eat, and if either of the children, he or his sister.
(15:20):
He said looking down at his sister for a moment.
Started even to cry for any reason, or maybe even to squabble, that the guards would come in and beat them and then take them away.
Was this true? He asked this boy who looked maybe seven and who was speaking already, so lucidly and fluently on behalf of his mother, who was too afraid to speak even to me.
(15:45):
This was what his mother had heard.
He repeated this was what people had told her, that they would be separated even if they made just one mistake.
I can't describe the intense effect.
This tiny boy speaking like a man on behalf of his terrified mother had on me.
I.
He stood so straight and he spoke so quietly and also so clearly because it was important what he was saying.
(16:11):
He knew and he might not get another chance, and he didn't want to forget anything.
Is it true that me and my sister will be sent to live with strangers? He said, do you have family over there? I asked.
Yes.
Then you will all probably go and live with them together.
But they live in Orlando, Florida.
(16:32):
He anguished as if it were the real name of hell.
I tried to let him know that every kid in the world wanted to go to Orlando, Florida, because that was where Disney World was.
But I don't think he'd ever heard of Disney.
Mickey Mouse lives there.
I said, stupidly turning to his little sister and Donald Duck.
(16:53):
Does Little Pony live there too? I love Little Pony.
His sister said, yes, little Pony too.
I said, and still the boys stood there straight and as tall as he could make himself asking his questions, voicing the fears of his family.
I.
I told him then that I was a priest and was therefore not allowed to lie.
(17:15):
Not ever.
And that I had never heard of children being separated from their mother because they cried or squabbled, or of them being beaten, but it was not enough.
It was as if Samwell were waiting for something and then all of a sudden I knew what it was.
I took off the bracelet I'd been wearing every day.
(17:37):
The one Judy back in Boston had given me that read, though she be but small, she be fierce, and I wrapped it around his wrist, pressing the metal ends together.
So they touched around his tiny arm, telling him as I did, so what it said, I added that the adults might take it away from him in detention, but that they would have to give it back when he left to go to Orlando, Florida and that it didn't matter anyway, whether he had it or not.
(18:03):
Because it was true what it said.
He was fierce and he already had everything he needed in his heart.
I pointed to his heart then, and then to his sister's heart, and to his mother's heart, and told them that God lived in there, God, and that no one could ever take God away, ever.
(18:27):
The intensity between us then must have been palpable because a silent and creeping group of wide-eyed little kids started to gather around us.
So I pointed to each of their hearts too, one by one and very quietly told each one of them the same.
God is in here.
God is in here.
(18:48):
God is in here.
God is in here.
Small real things.
Small real things.
This is what I kept trying to remember and to trust.
Not big impressive things, but small real things are the way to love with through and for the other small, not because we can't be bothered, but because we are small ourselves.
(19:20):
And because every time we honor this smallness without shutting down, every time we acknowledge our lack of sufficiency and remain willing even so, to both meet and be met by the other, well, whatever follows will both come from and lead to the realm of abundance.
Some of us call God and real transformation will happen only on an infinitesimal scale.
(19:46):
This is how small real things make a small real difference.
And this is important too because small real things are necessarily incarnate.
They cannot be faked or sold or even advertised.
They can only be sought in the moment and then welcomed.
(20:06):
They require nothing flashy, nothing expensive.
Only a mute and muscularly passive stance full of willingness and re reliability and vulnerability.
It isn't that small.
Real things don't sometimes become large real things because they do.
It isn't the smallness, that's the point.
(20:28):
But the intention, it's as if the act of desiring and then seeking something small, liberates us to receive without measure.
As if by not aiming for bigness or for success, we somehow become freed from the regular marketplace world in which something is always given in exchange for something else and enter instead a realm where giving and receiving become the same thing.
(20:57):
Here are a couple of sentences by Sandra Cisneros, which cheered me up one dark night in El Paso because they say more or less the same thing, only more simply I.
I don't know anything she writes, but I know this whatever is done with love in the name of others without self gain, whatever is done with the heart on behalf of someone or something, what? Whatever work we make with complete humility will always come out beautifully and something more valuable than fame or money will come This.
(21:35):
I know.
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