With Tom Albinson
I woke up to a WhatsApp text this morning. It was from a Somali refugee. She wanted to know if my family was okay. She knows the Covid-19 virus is loose in America. She said she is praying for us.
I also spoke with a Turkana pastor in Kakuma this morning. He too wanted me to know that he was concerned and praying for us.
Those who have suffered are often the best care givers. They know uncertainty and loss.
How beautiful to start my day with their kind words of encouragement.
Above: a life-saving soap distribution center
Refugee camps have been identified as among the most vulnerable places to a Covid-19 outbreak.
I reached out to our refugee partner agency (URHC) in Kakuma refugee camp (Kenya) to see if we can do anything to help deter such an outbreak. We identified that one of the most urgent and needed things in the camp was soap.
Most of us living in countries of influence and power take soap for granted. It plays an often taken for granted role in our lives – keeping us healthy.
But our forcibly displaced friends live in harsh circumstances without access to stuff as simple and essential as soap.
As we talked together, we realized that the 162 refugee churches with whom we partner could all be transformed into local soap distribution centers! All they need is a 50 liter tank, a tap, liquid soap and water.
We did the math. It would take just under $40 to set up one church with everything – including 1 month’s supply of soap. Thereafter it would cost $7 per church to resupply them with another month’s worth of soap. It sounded doable.
After working out the plan and budget, I spoke with a friend and mentioned my excitement to have found a way to help the churches in Kakuma serve and protect their communities. That friend got excited too – and within a couple of days made a donation to cover the setup and 4 months’ worth of soap for all 162 churches!
It took my breath away. God is clearly determined to provide this protection for the vulnerable people in Kakuma!
So IAFR wired the first round of funds earlier this week. The refugee churches are preparing to set up their soap distribution systems.
I’m hoping and praying that the soap begins to flow before the weekend in Kakuma!
I start the journey back to our friends in Kakuma refugee camp today. I’ll finally get there on Wednesday after meeting with our NGO partner offices in Nairobi on Tuesday.
I’ll post updates from Kenya to the IAFR Kakuma blog. I’ll be traveling with Dr. George Kalantzis, Professor of Theology at Wheaton College and Senior Fellow of Theological Development with IAFR. Dr. Margaret Diddams, Provost of Wheaton College, and her husband Stan will also serve with us kn this visit. We plan to continue offering theological training for refugee pastors as well as consult with them concerning curriculum development for their School of Mission. There is much more to this trip – so be sure to check out the blog!
Traveling at this early juncture of the covid-19 virus pandemic has a lot of unknowns. I welcome your prayers for a fruitful trip and an uneventful return to Minnesota that does not include getting quarantined anywhere along the way.
This is a Facebook conversation I had today with a man who is running for his life and stuck in the limbo of an international airport for 25 days and counting. How he found IAFR on Facebook I may never know. I’ve censored references to places that might put him in danger. But I think you will still understand the basic situation.
This isn’t theoretical. He’s a real human being in fear with his back against the wall. Perhaps you can hear the trace of relief in his final words. It matters to feel seen and heard by someone who cares. Perhaps it matters most when there is no way out.
I’m thankful I can let him know that he and his suffering are not unknown today. And just maybe, God will answer our prayers for him and lead him to a safe place where he can clean up and rest his weary mind, body and soul.
I chatted (above) with an Iranian leader with whom we partner in Greece. Winter is setting in. Refugees in the camp are suffering from cold and lack of food. The team is doing what they can to help. A church in the Netherlands just shipped 7 tons of rice to the team. Last fall they shipped several tons of beans to the team.
Another IAFR teammate received a request for help in Mali, where there is a massive number of people internally displaced due to escalating violence. The needs are overwhelming. We have no presence there and no ability to help.
We do what we can, but it isn’t enough. This weighs heavily on us all.
Father in heaven – Father here with us, have mercy on these displaced friends. Hear their cries.
It was “open mic Sunday” at our church today. So I braced myself for the worst before heading inside.
Pastor Jenna invited people to share a way that God showed up in their lives this past year. A beautiful series of stories surfaced as brave souls raised their hands.
A sister in our church shared how hard it has been to re-enter life in the US after several years of ministry in South Africa. She then said God showed up this year when we met during our annual church retreat.
She recounted telling Donna and I about her struggle. Apparently we responded by saying that “it can be tough when everyone here is sure that it is great to be back“. That was it – the words she needed to hear at that time. She felt seen and understood.
That was a significant God moment for her this year. And neither Donna or I had a clue just how much that simple encounter meant to her until today.
I have to confess, it feels good to be used of God in someone’s life.
I wonder how often God uses you and me like that – without our ever knowing? I hope and pray it is often.
My heart is heavy. I received tragic news this week from a pastor/friend in Kakuma, Kenya. A soccer game in the refugee camp went wrong. Ethnic fighting broke out leaving six refugees dead.
Kakuma is around 60 miles from the border of Kenya and South Sudan. Years of ethnic violence plagues South Sudan. It is no surprise that such outbursts would happen in the camp that is host to tribes that are at war with each other just over the border.
Hopelessness doesn’t help. Many of our friends in Kakuma have been there for decades with no hope of ever leaving. Yet as refugee camps are temporary by definition, neither can they stay forever. The resulting emotional stress is impossible for people like you and I to comprehend – unless you’ve experienced it firsthand yourself.
Add to the stress of having no place in the world, insufficient food rations, restrictions on movement, rationed water, hostile climate, overcrowded schools, etc. and it is a wonder that more such violence doesn’t occur.
May God use the refugee church in Kakuma to help bring reconciliation and restore peace and safety to the camp. Amen.
Translation: “I need help with a couple of things. First, I need counseling – our present situation is even affecting our kids as they are cooped up indoors for long periods of time with nothing to do.”
I got this message yesterday from a friend/pastor who was a refugee in Uganda until this summer when he and his family were forced to uproot again and flee to Kenya. That happened in the last few months.
They are not in a camp. They are among the millions of urban refugees in the world (60% of the worlds refugees are in urban centers).
They are relatively safe for the time being. But the trauma of another sudden displacement, the stress of daily life and the uncertainty of the future are weighing heavily on him and his family.
So he messaged me via WhatsApp. I’m getting in touch with some skilled trauma care people in Kenya to see if they might be able offer him some support. It’s really tricky because trust is low when one has been traumatized and uprooted and everyone is a stranger.
Please pray with me for him. Just call him Pastor P.
World Evangelical Alliance asked me to draft a statement for the Global Forum on Migration and Development, facilitated by Churches Witnessing With Migrants (CWWM) in Quito Ecuador later this month. My original draft is below. Click here to download the final draft signed by the WEA Secretary General.
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WEA Draft Statement for the Global Forum on Migration and Development of Churches Witnessing With Migration
Quito, Ecuador | 2 November 2019
by Thomas Albinson
We live at a time in which uprooted people are often denied their dignity along with many human rights. They are increasingly portrayed by media and politicians as a threat to national and personal security rather than as vulnerable people in need of safety. In many places they are even denied freedom of movement. This has been the case for so long now that many consider it to be normal.
No one contests the fact that solutions to forced displacement are failing the vast majority of refugees as they are not able to return to their countries of origin or integrate into their countries of refuge or given opportunity to resettle to a third country.
As a Somali woman asylum seeker recently put it, “Place has been stolen from me.” And when a human has no place, they are left to inhabit spaces in which they have little to no influence over their own well- being. Their lives are defined by restrictions and must be lived on the terms of others upon whom they depend for their daily bread, water and shelter.
A Somali man in a refugee camp said, “I have to remind myself on a daily basis that I am human because everything around me says otherwise.”
These are some of the unacceptable realities that the CWWM Talking and Doing Points address. And while the Talking and Doing Points are not uniquely Christian, they are certainly consistent with Christian faith and provide helpful common ground with others serving refugees, asylum seekers and internally displaced people.
Although many do not realize it, local communities of faith are strategically equipped to help people survive and recover from forced displacement in ways that compliment the critical work of humanitarian response agencies. While NGOs do remarkable work that saves lives, they are not well equipped to strengthen hope and re-humanize the people they serve. Such work plays to the strengths of local churches, whether they are embedded in refugee populations or in the surrounding host community.
A growing number of churches are recognizing their unique ability to offer at least five critical contributions that play an important role in helping people survive and recover from forced displacement in ways that affirm dignity and strengthen hope.
First, when churches are at their best, they are welcoming and supportive communities that affirm the dignity of others, especially of those who are marginalized and vulnerable. And while this includes extending hospitality and offering practical help, to be truly life-giving we must also receive hospitality and help from refugees.
Second, churches affirm and share the life-giving worldview that God is good and that he loves us so much that he put on flesh and walked among us – a reality that profoundly reveals the love of God and affirms the dignity of humans – including those who are vulnerable and marginalized. For Christ did not only dwell among us, he did so as a disadvantaged and oppressed minority in an occupied country. Soon after his birth, he was forced to flee to another country with his family. God became a refugee. This suffering and loss did not make him a lesser God or human. This is good news for all of us and especially for those who have been stripped of everything, including place.
Third, churches have potential to serve as healing communities that offer safe space to listen to our displaced friends unpack their stories of suffering, loss and trauma and to bring their lament before God in prayer.
Fourth, Churches are embedded within their local communities, filled with people of diverse capacities that can help refugees make helpful connections and learn skills needed to navigate their new context.
And fifth, churches are communities that offer displaced people opportunities to make a meaningful contribution to society – communities that recognize the displaced to be more than people in need. They are embraced as people who can make a valuable contribution and benefit to their faith community as well as to the rest of society.
As local churches live into these five inherent strengths, not only will we fulfill many of the Talking and Doing points, we will also increase the capacity of our countries to receive, welcome and integrate refugees into society.
Lest we think that such a vision is beyond what a local church can embrace, I want to point out that these five contributions were identified by observing the ways in which refugee churches keep hope alive in the midst of protracted displacement. They have shown us the way forward. Our part is to help local churches within the scope of our influence embrace this vision.
Perhaps this will help us answer the pressing question posed by Howard Thurman in his book, Jesus and the Disinherited.
“The masses of men live with their backs constantly against the wall. They are the poor, the disinherited, the dispossessed. What does our religion say to them?” (p. 13)
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In case you’re wondering why I haven’t posted here recently, it’s because I’m in Kakuma refugee camp in remote northwestern Kenya. I am posting to the IAFR Kakuma blog. I invite you to check it out.