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A sword to pierce my soul

March 22, 2023

An asylum seeker looking out over Lake Superior

Last week I met with my friend Tamrat, a scholar, faith leader, and asylum seeker currently living at Jonathan House. We complained together about the cold spell here in Minnesota and made a bit of small talk, but his eyes looked tired. I asked how he was doing and because he comes from a deeply communal culture, how his family back home was managing.

Among my displaced friends, questions like this don't always receive a full answer. How am I doing? How is my family? Where to start? Does this person really want to hear my heartbreak? What will it cost me to bring those feelings to the surface?

The wait and uncertainty are torture.

That day, however, Tamrat chose to share a bit of his experience with me. His family is managing, he said, as well as anyone can in a war-torn and economically distressed country. But his wife was sick with something mysterious, one more stressor that he couldn’t do anything to alleviate.

And his asylum case? Still no answer. It has been many months since Tamrat completed the final stage of his long legal process, and now he checks the mail every day, waiting for the news that will either open the door to long-term safety or send him back into harm's way. The government agencies can’t tell him when the answer will come - it may be tomorrow or still months away. The wait and the uncertainty are torture, he tells me.

It would have been better if I died there.

Tamrat expressed a kind of despair I’ve heard before from my asylum-seeking friends:

“Sometimes I think it would have been better if I had died there. At least I would have been with my family.”

I try to imagine it, and I can't.

Tamrat has young kids; so do I. I try to imagine what it would be like to be apart from them for years, for my children to be in harm's way, for there to be nothing I can do to protect them. I don’t even like to be away from them for a few days. I try to imagine it and I can’t.

Sharing the heartbreak makes a difference.

I tell Tamrat that I’m sorry that he is going through this. “I wish there was more than I could do.”

He replies: “All of you at Jonathan House share in my heartbreak. That really means something to me.”

I can allow the sword to pierce my soul.

I think again of Simeon’s prophecy to Mary: “and a sword will pierce your own soul, too” (Luke 2:35). God spoke these words to me when I was first called into this ministry. To love those who suffer, God said, is to open yourself to suffering also. I pray that God would grow my capacity to share heartbreak, and that I would learn to do so in healthy and holy ways.

I am learning. I can’t solve Tamrat’s suffering; I can’t even understand it. But I can witness it. I can lift it to the God who sees, hears, and cares for both of us. I can allow the sword to pierce my soul.

CLICK HERE to learn more about Jonathan House and how you can help!

- by Bethany Ringdal (Jonathan House)

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