The good bye party was painfully joyful, drawn out, and chaotic. From six until ten I found myself receiving dancing advice from ten year olds who couldn’t hold it back while they watched me dance, listening to a song that a group of guests had rehearsed about friendship, crying in my room, and standing in the center of a fifty-person group hug that swayed back and forth over the sala floor. I left Annunciation House at six am the next day with my three sisters and my three trash bags packed in Jet, my toyota. We traveled east on 10, heading towards the rising sun.
The sun came up in front of us and went down behind us. We were in big old Texas for all of it. I was surprised that no heavy emotions or separation anxiety came over me. I was just driving, and not thinking about much else. Transitions always seem to be less dramatic than I envision.
At three in the morning, excluding gas fills, we hadn’t stopped driving. A caffeine high sister decided that we would pull off and find a Tennessee state park, sleep for a few hours, and then continue. As we entered the heavily coniferous state park, and drove past signs for “rustic cabins,” we had delusions that we could find them, peacefully enter, and borrow the beds for a night. Instead we pulled off a dirt road and tried to sleep. One sister accidentally opened a window a crack and the clamor of her chattering teeth became background music to the rest of us. The other two tried balancing their heads against each other as they tried to find comfort among the steering wheel, center console, and all the other impediments of the front seats. After two hours of futile fake sleep, I hopped in the drivers wheel, and took us to Nashville. Weary eyed, we entered a starbucks, brushed our teeths, deoderized, face-washed, and rested a bit until we made the final push to Ashville, North Carolina.
We arrived in Ashville at four thirty which put an end to our epic thirty four hour (look at “four” and “hour” next to eachother...it must be easy learning to pronounce english words) drive. Next day’s destination was Reston, Virginia where we spent the night, and then continued to New Hampshire the following snowy morning. It snowed all day, and at some point Jet decided to test my skill. The windshield wiper fluid pump ceased to work, which left me periodically rolling down the window, and reaching around to pour fluid on the windshield, as I steered with my other hand. This seemed to do the trick. Jet didn’t succeed in killing me.
Before I knew it, I was back home. After five months on the border I was back to my parallel universe, feeling funny about how easy it was to jump from one reality to the other. I found myself patiently waiting for something to hit me. Now that it has, I wish I had been more patient.
Annunciation House has left me with some things that I won’t be able to get rid off. A knowledge that the more I have the less others have. A knowledge that my lifestyle has the potential to send others into poverty. A realization that there are things more important than my anal antics. A heavy heart that can’t shake off the tears of humans. A view of the dark world that also exists.
It is a swift farewell to the things little Danny dreamed of and worked towards. Good bye to the ambitions of power, a big house, cars, success, approval, and affirmations. So now, I am back to the world in which those goals ruled my life, but I am left without those goals. I am drunkenly stumbling to splice these parallel worlds together, and really, it is really hard.
Exactly at the same moment everything seems to really matter while nothing seems to matter at all. I am sure I am not the only one who feels this way.
I was always good at limbo growing up. But I can’t get under the bar this time.
I’ll start school in about a week, and I hope and fear equally for distraction.
Monday, January 25, 2010
Saturday, November 28, 2009
odds and ends
Today I am just posting four(4) relatively unrelated things.
1)
Above, a fellow volunteer does some toe nail work on one of the guests in the office. We call this guest welfare. What is she actually working on? Look below for a close up.
Based on the smile, it seems that things are going well for the toe nail.
2) Below is a border inspired piece of writing:
Reality is clobbered by spirit.
Truth is overthrown by emotion.
The mind is held hostage by the heart.
But. Yet. However.
Spirit is the residue on reality.
Emotion is the manifestation of the perception of truth.
The heart obeys the orders of the mind.
A paradox; alive and well.
Green cuticulous clusters. Silence of noise.
A light on the street—light up my world, light up my nighttime childhood room. Protect me from monsters, protect me from those people who look different than I. Protect me from those myths. Protect me from evil.
Javier, dieciocho de Honduras. "Que Malo?" "Si"
Bricks in a row supporting my body with equally spaced lines—to separate or to hold together.
An open trash can. READY. to be filled, to be emptied. Oh futility.
La gente trabajando. otra vez. otra vez. otra vez.
Cars passing. otra vez. otra vez. otra vez.
Sonrisas. otra vez. otra vez. otra vez.
Oppression. otra vez. otra vez.
The dirty floor needing a clean. again and again and again. que mas. que necesitamos hacer.
A man. me. together in the street. no palabras. no connection of the eye. again and again.
Love on a sunday.
hands together just to cross the silent street.
The utterly futile process of life. its magnitude. each moment is every moment. each breath is every breath. each action is all actions.
3) Every weekday morning at 8:15 we have reflection. We rotate among the volunteers who runs each day's reflection. It ranges from yoga, to poetry, to rollerblading, to music listening.
Below, is the product of a writing reflection on what it is like to live at Annunciation House.
Rice, beans, and whatever.
Food without love is almost never.
Giggles, trickles, sighs and highs.
Sometimes in truth, sometimes in lies.
Always fulfilled, but never satisfied.
You couldn't be, unless you were to hide.
Instead we confront, and brace for the pain.
Sometimes wondering if we are sane.
Put me behind bars, force me to sit—
brothers and sisters, we are worth it.
Everyday I wonder, am I up for my roll.
Everyday I wonder, is it taking a toll.
I could go around the world searching for more.
Or I could stay at this house, and let it come to the door.
4)http://annunciationhouse.org/2009/10/annunciation-house-documentary/
If you go to the above link, you will find the Annunciation House video. I just watched it for the first time. I suggest you peep it!
Hasta luego!
1)
Above, a fellow volunteer does some toe nail work on one of the guests in the office. We call this guest welfare. What is she actually working on? Look below for a close up.
Based on the smile, it seems that things are going well for the toe nail.
2) Below is a border inspired piece of writing:
Reality is clobbered by spirit.
Truth is overthrown by emotion.
The mind is held hostage by the heart.
But. Yet. However.
Spirit is the residue on reality.
Emotion is the manifestation of the perception of truth.
The heart obeys the orders of the mind.
A paradox; alive and well.
Green cuticulous clusters. Silence of noise.
A light on the street—light up my world, light up my nighttime childhood room. Protect me from monsters, protect me from those people who look different than I. Protect me from those myths. Protect me from evil.
Javier, dieciocho de Honduras. "Que Malo?" "Si"
Bricks in a row supporting my body with equally spaced lines—to separate or to hold together.
An open trash can. READY. to be filled, to be emptied. Oh futility.
La gente trabajando. otra vez. otra vez. otra vez.
Cars passing. otra vez. otra vez. otra vez.
Sonrisas. otra vez. otra vez. otra vez.
Oppression. otra vez. otra vez.
The dirty floor needing a clean. again and again and again. que mas. que necesitamos hacer.
A man. me. together in the street. no palabras. no connection of the eye. again and again.
Love on a sunday.
hands together just to cross the silent street.
The utterly futile process of life. its magnitude. each moment is every moment. each breath is every breath. each action is all actions.
3) Every weekday morning at 8:15 we have reflection. We rotate among the volunteers who runs each day's reflection. It ranges from yoga, to poetry, to rollerblading, to music listening.
Below, is the product of a writing reflection on what it is like to live at Annunciation House.
Rice, beans, and whatever.
Food without love is almost never.
Giggles, trickles, sighs and highs.
Sometimes in truth, sometimes in lies.
Always fulfilled, but never satisfied.
You couldn't be, unless you were to hide.
Instead we confront, and brace for the pain.
Sometimes wondering if we are sane.
Put me behind bars, force me to sit—
brothers and sisters, we are worth it.
Everyday I wonder, am I up for my roll.
Everyday I wonder, is it taking a toll.
I could go around the world searching for more.
Or I could stay at this house, and let it come to the door.
4)http://annunciationhouse.org/2009/10/annunciation-house-documentary/
If you go to the above link, you will find the Annunciation House video. I just watched it for the first time. I suggest you peep it!
Hasta luego!
Sunday, November 22, 2009
wrapping up, turning in, turning out
I have been thinking that December will be blog free for me. Or at least blog-pressure free.
I was speaking to a women from Boston who has been living and working in Juarez for at least a decade, and I was able to talk out some of my thoughts on connection and isolation, and the balance that should/can/could/may not/may exist between the two.
When you work in a reality so different from your own, or the one that used to be your own, it is very easy to feel isolated. I am not culturally coherent here, but at the same time, as I spend more time here, I become further from acceptance and oneness with the culture of my background. It feels like I become nothing more then a bridge between two fuzzy entities that I try to dually identify with. Which can be hard. But feels important.
There is no way to look at death, rape, poverty, and suffering on the border without at least acknowledging that the US has involvement and has responsibility. The every day work that I do could be considered "band-aid" work, not really changing anything, and more so, a temporary fix to a futile reality. Well, first, I think that the negative connotation of the term "band-aid" is crap. A band-aid is ever so necesarry. We all do use them afterall. In fact, I really admire people who can just do the reactionary (bandaid) work all their lives, because it is so needed, but has little glory, or sense of control involved. It is simply being in the present, and reacting to the realities that swirl through the land like chaos.
Anyway, because the US is involved with the suffering on the border, I feel like my blogging about what is happening here is the only radical (digging to the root) work that I can do. How can I go day in and day out living with people who have been marginalized by systems of my culture, without wondering how I can alter those systems, to take these people out of the conveyer belt to poverty that we mechanised with such care, and carelessness. So, my blog is my answer. It is my personal response, and the only way that I currently know to maybe a change a little, to maybe scrape at the root of the problem.
So, it is holding on and nurturing my connection to my past, that provides me with a hope of changing stuff. It is being the bridge. If I stay here, become isolated, and forget to open my mouth about what is happening, will I be satisfied with the purpose of my being here?
But, the more I connect to my culture and my background, through blogs, letters...the less I am able to be here, and to be fully here in the present.
If I try to connect back, I minimize my ability to remain present here, but if I let myself be fully present here and isolate from my culture, my day's work becomes futile.
It is funny that that sentence above ^ is what I had been getting at this whole time, a ton of writing just to say one obvious sentence.
Well with that in mind, I am back to where I started, December will be blog free, or atleast blog-pressure free. I will let myself isolate a little bit, so that I can absorb all that I have not absorbed before I will drive back home on the 28th of December. Maybe I will post, maybe I won't. I will dedicate my former blog-writing time to sitting with a baby in my arms, or getting greasy gorditas in Juarez, or cleaning our tool room, or staring at the sky in this West-Texas town of El Paso.
But I hope...that the bridge will not be closed. That your thoughts, or my thoughts, on the border won't end.
I also hope...that if you are reading and have a question, that you will ask it (in the comment section). Because most likely it is a question that I have never asked, and one that I would love to explore before I leave.
Here's a piece of writing:
El Paso here we come. Stick my fingers through the fence. Wrap my mind around the arbitrary line that means too much. One inch, weighted down by vast implications. of life and death and racism. of war of greed. A manifestation of fear. One inch, encompassed by the Beech in the woods behind my house. Adios. Cross the border. Green square cap. Green square suit. Black, shiny gun. Black, shiny boots. Death. Power. Wealth. Welcome to 2,000 murders, fueled by us, by there, by the other side, by here, by up and down. Bienvenidos. Calles de Muerto. Gracias Mexico. Adios. Calle de Oro, on our way. Homeward bound.
Here is another:
Super sweeping streaks. A sunset over sand. Millions of tics and tocs, of giggles and groans, of bombs and blasts, of drop, drop, drop. A four leaf clover in the field. The type that absorbed my childhood free time; searching, screaming, kicking, running. For my very own four leaf clover. Silent. Screams of a bird. Power over land. The irony of human dominance punches me blind. the breeching bulge of the swelling contrasts the setting sun on sand. The clover blows in the wind. Gets damaged by the sun. cut by the scythe. resurfaces to stare me in the face. memorizing every bump, shade, and shape of one another. No clover in sight. Not a full entity. Waiting for the orange above to descend upon me. Warmth. Can't forget the clover. Can't remember the clover. How long will the cl(a tree falls)over last with four leaves and all. North. East. West. North.
I was speaking to a women from Boston who has been living and working in Juarez for at least a decade, and I was able to talk out some of my thoughts on connection and isolation, and the balance that should/can/could/may not/may exist between the two.
When you work in a reality so different from your own, or the one that used to be your own, it is very easy to feel isolated. I am not culturally coherent here, but at the same time, as I spend more time here, I become further from acceptance and oneness with the culture of my background. It feels like I become nothing more then a bridge between two fuzzy entities that I try to dually identify with. Which can be hard. But feels important.
There is no way to look at death, rape, poverty, and suffering on the border without at least acknowledging that the US has involvement and has responsibility. The every day work that I do could be considered "band-aid" work, not really changing anything, and more so, a temporary fix to a futile reality. Well, first, I think that the negative connotation of the term "band-aid" is crap. A band-aid is ever so necesarry. We all do use them afterall. In fact, I really admire people who can just do the reactionary (bandaid) work all their lives, because it is so needed, but has little glory, or sense of control involved. It is simply being in the present, and reacting to the realities that swirl through the land like chaos.
Anyway, because the US is involved with the suffering on the border, I feel like my blogging about what is happening here is the only radical (digging to the root) work that I can do. How can I go day in and day out living with people who have been marginalized by systems of my culture, without wondering how I can alter those systems, to take these people out of the conveyer belt to poverty that we mechanised with such care, and carelessness. So, my blog is my answer. It is my personal response, and the only way that I currently know to maybe a change a little, to maybe scrape at the root of the problem.
So, it is holding on and nurturing my connection to my past, that provides me with a hope of changing stuff. It is being the bridge. If I stay here, become isolated, and forget to open my mouth about what is happening, will I be satisfied with the purpose of my being here?
But, the more I connect to my culture and my background, through blogs, letters...the less I am able to be here, and to be fully here in the present.
If I try to connect back, I minimize my ability to remain present here, but if I let myself be fully present here and isolate from my culture, my day's work becomes futile.
It is funny that that sentence above ^ is what I had been getting at this whole time, a ton of writing just to say one obvious sentence.
Well with that in mind, I am back to where I started, December will be blog free, or atleast blog-pressure free. I will let myself isolate a little bit, so that I can absorb all that I have not absorbed before I will drive back home on the 28th of December. Maybe I will post, maybe I won't. I will dedicate my former blog-writing time to sitting with a baby in my arms, or getting greasy gorditas in Juarez, or cleaning our tool room, or staring at the sky in this West-Texas town of El Paso.
But I hope...that the bridge will not be closed. That your thoughts, or my thoughts, on the border won't end.
I also hope...that if you are reading and have a question, that you will ask it (in the comment section). Because most likely it is a question that I have never asked, and one that I would love to explore before I leave.
Here's a piece of writing:
El Paso here we come. Stick my fingers through the fence. Wrap my mind around the arbitrary line that means too much. One inch, weighted down by vast implications. of life and death and racism. of war of greed. A manifestation of fear. One inch, encompassed by the Beech in the woods behind my house. Adios. Cross the border. Green square cap. Green square suit. Black, shiny gun. Black, shiny boots. Death. Power. Wealth. Welcome to 2,000 murders, fueled by us, by there, by the other side, by here, by up and down. Bienvenidos. Calles de Muerto. Gracias Mexico. Adios. Calle de Oro, on our way. Homeward bound.
Here is another:
Super sweeping streaks. A sunset over sand. Millions of tics and tocs, of giggles and groans, of bombs and blasts, of drop, drop, drop. A four leaf clover in the field. The type that absorbed my childhood free time; searching, screaming, kicking, running. For my very own four leaf clover. Silent. Screams of a bird. Power over land. The irony of human dominance punches me blind. the breeching bulge of the swelling contrasts the setting sun on sand. The clover blows in the wind. Gets damaged by the sun. cut by the scythe. resurfaces to stare me in the face. memorizing every bump, shade, and shape of one another. No clover in sight. Not a full entity. Waiting for the orange above to descend upon me. Warmth. Can't forget the clover. Can't remember the clover. How long will the cl(a tree falls)over last with four leaves and all. North. East. West. North.
Friday, November 13, 2009
Relating Religion
In my experience here the most common response to, “Como estas? How are you?” is “Bien, gracias a Dios! Good, thanks to God!”
Commonly, when I say, “Hasta mañana. See you in the morning.” I hear the response, “Si Dios quiere. If God wants.”
God is thanked and acknowledged frequently. Unlike the communities that I have grown up in, God is very much a part of everyday life. As an organization, we hold masses, and say thanks to God before every meal. This culture of religion is so new to me, and I have spent much time contemplating its role, practicality, and relevance to me.
Religion has been woven into the fabric of my El Paso life, and it has come to my attention that whether or not I have faith in a God, religion does exist and it is indeed a major player in the dynamics of society, and therefore, it is my interest to come to terms with it, and define the role it will take in my life.
I remember, the moments on childhood Sundays, dressed in khakis and a collar, sitting on a bench, when I became too bored, too lost in the events, to continue. I would tap a sister to my side and we would sneak out to the magnolia tree behind the church. Swinging, climbing, and running we enjoyed, as we waited until the service was over and the people shuffled out two by two.
Before meals we would sometimes say, “Thank you God for the food we eat, thank you God for the birds that sing, thank you God for everything!”
Those were the relatively subtle manifestations of religion in my childhood.
As I aged, I slowly acquired a knee-jerk reaction to the word God. I certainly felt a distance from religion, and it seemed to me an incredible force that pulled people from reality, and into a world where energy was boundless. Where people could be captivated and directed so quickly and forcefully, either for the good or for the bad. The intensity of captivated energy and passion frightened me. The reaction that one might have when they hear the term “cult” was similar to the reaction that I had when I heard the word God. Words that came to mind were fear, control, power, violence, and even oppression.
Arguably, these words have been a part of religion in history. And it was these parts, and only these parts, that I cared to recognize. Growing up in mainly white and mainly wealthy communities nurtured my ability to see past the simultaneous beauty and relevance of religion.
It was a change of settings that allowed me to see a different side of religion for the first time. I was in Camoapa, a small agricultural town in Nicaragua, when I asked the director of the organization that I was working with about the reasons for its Catholic affiliation. The organization was a center where kids from the community could come for meals, showers, activities, and help with schoolwork. The director explained to me that some of the kids have no parents, no family, and no home. And that God, and the belief that some greater force is looking out for you, is the last option to keep hope in the lives of these children.
This explanation really resonated with me. It illuminated a good purpose for religion that I hadn’t experienced at home. I was able to recognize that at a level, religion can be the sustenance for those who can’t find other sustenance, and the hope for those that cannot find other hope. With this, I felt very appreciative for the religious structures of the world, but simultaneously still felt no desire to take part in those structures.
Despite the realization, my distrust and fear of religion continued as I once again became isolated from its practical purposes. I was unable to put the word God into terms for myself, so that upon hearing it, it could mean something real to me, and not just immediately turn me away from wherever I heard it.
In deciding to come to Annunciation House, I was forced to consider religion. The organization’s religious roots dig deep. Five young people who were seeking to live out the Gospel and serve the poorest of the poor founded the organization. Believe it or not, it was the visiting Mother Teresa who suggested the name Annunciation House to our current director. Biblically, Annunciation was the revelation of Mary that she would conceive Jesus. In all honesty, the connection of that moment to the work of our house, I have yet to fully understand. I have been meaning to ask Teresa.
At home, living in a community of friends and family who in general, have a critical eye on religion, I received many questions regarding religion and the place I would be living. My response generally went something like this, “Well, I think a lot of the religious activities at the house are in place to make it feel more like home to the guests, of which the majority come from Catholic backgrounds. Also, from what I understand it is good religion, about peace and love, and not killing your neighbor.” Now I chuckle as I remember that I was attempting to define ‘good’ religion in my justification for heading south to the border.
As I was waiting in Boston Logan airport (for seven hours) to board my Texas bound plane, I explained to an El Paso native where I was heading and the work that I would be doing. He said to me beneath his clean cowboy hat and gray splattered beard, “you’re doing the Lord’s work.” I smiled, said “Yes,” and gave a stiff nod. To myself I though, “I am doing the work of the people!” This foreboded the role that the notion of God would play in my El Paso life.
Religion came into my world very quickly in many different ways. I experienced masses that the organization held. I noticed God’s name used in colloquial language. I witnessed people’s lives that were dedicating to following God. Two weeks after my arrival, three Somalian guests invited me to church with them. I decided to go. In four hours of service, I saw people get shoved to the floor. I saw screaming, dancing, crying. I saw our guests pull the only money in their possession out of their pockets, and put it into a velvet bag for the church. I was told to scream hallelujah three hundred times while rolling on the floor, running, and dancing. This was just yet another face of religion to which I was exposed.
Experiencing religion on so many scales, with so many different facets, beliefs, and practices makes the word religion seem diluted in its definition. Religion now seems like such an overarching word that ironically almost means nothing; and yet it is what I am writing specifically about.
Religion, in its nature of belief in a relatively intangible force, does create the space for immense amounts of passion, dedication, energy, and faith. It creates the space by opening a fourth dimension where everything is possible and where realities can be created from one’s own faith. The garnering of the products from this fourth dimension—passion, dedication, energy, and faith—can be used to create such goodness, but equally can be used to create such evil. It is religion’s ability to gather force that makes me nervous, because I do not know where that force will go, what it will do.
One question that I have continually wondered since my arrival in El Paso is how would the religiously active change their lifestyles if one day they found out that in fact there was no God? I see people doing such good work. Dedicating their lives to the poorest of the poor. And when asked what keeps them going, they can point to the book, or point to the sky. But it seems so dangerous to me, that someone’s life could be dedicated to the sky, to the book. What would change if God were pulled out of the picture? Would their actions change?
To be honest I think their actions wouldn’t change. I think that, whether acknowledged or not, personal conviction and the strength of the heart is enough for someone to dedicate their life. I notice that credit is often given to God, but not given to the hands and the hearts and the minds of the people on the ground, doing their thing.
Left over from my years of knee-jerk reactions to the word God, I still struggle getting past that reaction, getting past the disconnection that the word God brings to me. Many times I have been reading or listening to something so beautiful and powerful, and then the end of it reveals that it is based on God and the belief in God. In this, I then become isolated from the expressions. Because if it is based on an idea with which I don’t believe, how can it be relevant to me?
Similarly, many of the people involved with Annuncation House say that God is what carries them through the hard parts of the job and that it is God that keeps them dedicated. Hearing that, I wonder, without a belief in God, how can I get through the hard parts? How can I remain personally dedicated?
Finding my ability to do this without a belief in a God brings me back to a ninth grade World Cultures project to design our own religion. Mine was called Induism, derived from the word individual. It was based on the belief in each person’s infinite dignity, love, and goodness. And simply a belief in the inherent goodness of all things. It is the belief and the hope in goodness that is my motivation…the thing that keeps me going.
The big question to me is how to connect the hope in inherent goodness that keeps me going to the hope in God that keeps so many other people going. This is the biggest struggle and the biggest opportunity in my exploration of religion.
A friend asked me if I had attempted to define God on my terms. I began to think that if I could find a way to make the term God practical to my beliefs, then religion would no longer isolate me, but instead include me.
What if the word God could mean to me the inherent goodness of all? If someone were to say, “God bless you!” It would mean to me, “may the inherent goodness of all bless you.” That to me, does not bring up the uneasiness I have with religion, but instead is something relevant and powerful to my world and my beliefs. With this, God, is on practical terms for the life that I feel comfortable living, and can exist without causing isolation. It is finally a personal peace with the existence of religion in this world.
Commonly, when I say, “Hasta mañana. See you in the morning.” I hear the response, “Si Dios quiere. If God wants.”
God is thanked and acknowledged frequently. Unlike the communities that I have grown up in, God is very much a part of everyday life. As an organization, we hold masses, and say thanks to God before every meal. This culture of religion is so new to me, and I have spent much time contemplating its role, practicality, and relevance to me.
Religion has been woven into the fabric of my El Paso life, and it has come to my attention that whether or not I have faith in a God, religion does exist and it is indeed a major player in the dynamics of society, and therefore, it is my interest to come to terms with it, and define the role it will take in my life.
I remember, the moments on childhood Sundays, dressed in khakis and a collar, sitting on a bench, when I became too bored, too lost in the events, to continue. I would tap a sister to my side and we would sneak out to the magnolia tree behind the church. Swinging, climbing, and running we enjoyed, as we waited until the service was over and the people shuffled out two by two.
Before meals we would sometimes say, “Thank you God for the food we eat, thank you God for the birds that sing, thank you God for everything!”
Those were the relatively subtle manifestations of religion in my childhood.
As I aged, I slowly acquired a knee-jerk reaction to the word God. I certainly felt a distance from religion, and it seemed to me an incredible force that pulled people from reality, and into a world where energy was boundless. Where people could be captivated and directed so quickly and forcefully, either for the good or for the bad. The intensity of captivated energy and passion frightened me. The reaction that one might have when they hear the term “cult” was similar to the reaction that I had when I heard the word God. Words that came to mind were fear, control, power, violence, and even oppression.
Arguably, these words have been a part of religion in history. And it was these parts, and only these parts, that I cared to recognize. Growing up in mainly white and mainly wealthy communities nurtured my ability to see past the simultaneous beauty and relevance of religion.
It was a change of settings that allowed me to see a different side of religion for the first time. I was in Camoapa, a small agricultural town in Nicaragua, when I asked the director of the organization that I was working with about the reasons for its Catholic affiliation. The organization was a center where kids from the community could come for meals, showers, activities, and help with schoolwork. The director explained to me that some of the kids have no parents, no family, and no home. And that God, and the belief that some greater force is looking out for you, is the last option to keep hope in the lives of these children.
This explanation really resonated with me. It illuminated a good purpose for religion that I hadn’t experienced at home. I was able to recognize that at a level, religion can be the sustenance for those who can’t find other sustenance, and the hope for those that cannot find other hope. With this, I felt very appreciative for the religious structures of the world, but simultaneously still felt no desire to take part in those structures.
Despite the realization, my distrust and fear of religion continued as I once again became isolated from its practical purposes. I was unable to put the word God into terms for myself, so that upon hearing it, it could mean something real to me, and not just immediately turn me away from wherever I heard it.
In deciding to come to Annunciation House, I was forced to consider religion. The organization’s religious roots dig deep. Five young people who were seeking to live out the Gospel and serve the poorest of the poor founded the organization. Believe it or not, it was the visiting Mother Teresa who suggested the name Annunciation House to our current director. Biblically, Annunciation was the revelation of Mary that she would conceive Jesus. In all honesty, the connection of that moment to the work of our house, I have yet to fully understand. I have been meaning to ask Teresa.
At home, living in a community of friends and family who in general, have a critical eye on religion, I received many questions regarding religion and the place I would be living. My response generally went something like this, “Well, I think a lot of the religious activities at the house are in place to make it feel more like home to the guests, of which the majority come from Catholic backgrounds. Also, from what I understand it is good religion, about peace and love, and not killing your neighbor.” Now I chuckle as I remember that I was attempting to define ‘good’ religion in my justification for heading south to the border.
As I was waiting in Boston Logan airport (for seven hours) to board my Texas bound plane, I explained to an El Paso native where I was heading and the work that I would be doing. He said to me beneath his clean cowboy hat and gray splattered beard, “you’re doing the Lord’s work.” I smiled, said “Yes,” and gave a stiff nod. To myself I though, “I am doing the work of the people!” This foreboded the role that the notion of God would play in my El Paso life.
Religion came into my world very quickly in many different ways. I experienced masses that the organization held. I noticed God’s name used in colloquial language. I witnessed people’s lives that were dedicating to following God. Two weeks after my arrival, three Somalian guests invited me to church with them. I decided to go. In four hours of service, I saw people get shoved to the floor. I saw screaming, dancing, crying. I saw our guests pull the only money in their possession out of their pockets, and put it into a velvet bag for the church. I was told to scream hallelujah three hundred times while rolling on the floor, running, and dancing. This was just yet another face of religion to which I was exposed.
Experiencing religion on so many scales, with so many different facets, beliefs, and practices makes the word religion seem diluted in its definition. Religion now seems like such an overarching word that ironically almost means nothing; and yet it is what I am writing specifically about.
Religion, in its nature of belief in a relatively intangible force, does create the space for immense amounts of passion, dedication, energy, and faith. It creates the space by opening a fourth dimension where everything is possible and where realities can be created from one’s own faith. The garnering of the products from this fourth dimension—passion, dedication, energy, and faith—can be used to create such goodness, but equally can be used to create such evil. It is religion’s ability to gather force that makes me nervous, because I do not know where that force will go, what it will do.
One question that I have continually wondered since my arrival in El Paso is how would the religiously active change their lifestyles if one day they found out that in fact there was no God? I see people doing such good work. Dedicating their lives to the poorest of the poor. And when asked what keeps them going, they can point to the book, or point to the sky. But it seems so dangerous to me, that someone’s life could be dedicated to the sky, to the book. What would change if God were pulled out of the picture? Would their actions change?
To be honest I think their actions wouldn’t change. I think that, whether acknowledged or not, personal conviction and the strength of the heart is enough for someone to dedicate their life. I notice that credit is often given to God, but not given to the hands and the hearts and the minds of the people on the ground, doing their thing.
Left over from my years of knee-jerk reactions to the word God, I still struggle getting past that reaction, getting past the disconnection that the word God brings to me. Many times I have been reading or listening to something so beautiful and powerful, and then the end of it reveals that it is based on God and the belief in God. In this, I then become isolated from the expressions. Because if it is based on an idea with which I don’t believe, how can it be relevant to me?
Similarly, many of the people involved with Annuncation House say that God is what carries them through the hard parts of the job and that it is God that keeps them dedicated. Hearing that, I wonder, without a belief in God, how can I get through the hard parts? How can I remain personally dedicated?
Finding my ability to do this without a belief in a God brings me back to a ninth grade World Cultures project to design our own religion. Mine was called Induism, derived from the word individual. It was based on the belief in each person’s infinite dignity, love, and goodness. And simply a belief in the inherent goodness of all things. It is the belief and the hope in goodness that is my motivation…the thing that keeps me going.
The big question to me is how to connect the hope in inherent goodness that keeps me going to the hope in God that keeps so many other people going. This is the biggest struggle and the biggest opportunity in my exploration of religion.
A friend asked me if I had attempted to define God on my terms. I began to think that if I could find a way to make the term God practical to my beliefs, then religion would no longer isolate me, but instead include me.
What if the word God could mean to me the inherent goodness of all? If someone were to say, “God bless you!” It would mean to me, “may the inherent goodness of all bless you.” That to me, does not bring up the uneasiness I have with religion, but instead is something relevant and powerful to my world and my beliefs. With this, God, is on practical terms for the life that I feel comfortable living, and can exist without causing isolation. It is finally a personal peace with the existence of religion in this world.
Thursday, November 5, 2009
On the Fence
From El Paso, Texas to the Gulf of Mexico, the Rio Grande runs (not-so-grandly) through deserts and mountains, forming the US-Mexico border. In El Paso, the river bends north and becomes the border between Texas and New Mexico instead. At that point, the US border continues to travel west across land all the way to the pacific.
If you want to go up to the fence, and see Mexico directly on the other side, you have to go to New Mexico where there is not a river at the border. Every year at the fence in New Mexico, a border mass is held in honor of the struggling migrant and of the deaths and injustices that have occurred on the border. This year, I took some pictures.
If you want to go up to the fence, and see Mexico directly on the other side, you have to go to New Mexico where there is not a river at the border. Every year at the fence in New Mexico, a border mass is held in honor of the struggling migrant and of the deaths and injustices that have occurred on the border. This year, I took some pictures.
Above, you can see Mexico on the left of the fence, and the US on the right of the fence. You'll notice that on the Mexican side, the people are crammed against the fence, and on the US side, there is a significant gap between the fence and the people. Seeing this gap, one of the attendees called it, "fucking scandalous." Apparently, last year border patrol put a line a few feet away from the fence where people could not cross, except for during one part of the ceremony, the sign of peace, where you can go to the fence and embrace, with squeezed fingers through cracks, the people on the other side. It was told to me that after communion last year, the bishop from Juárez said on to the US side, "We are further apart than we have ever been, you would think we have a disease or something, I hope that next year we can be fully united once again." This year however, it was far more than a mere few feet of separation.
Some people blamed this gap on the Border Patrol that stood in between the fence and the US crowd. Based on the line that their bodies formed, it appeared the we were not allowed to pass to the fence. Curious, I went up and asked if we could pass and stand at the fence. With a little hesitation, he said yes. So I walked up and stood by the fence, feeling uncomfortable and as if I was neglecting some unspoken rule.
Many flags and balloons hung high on the Mexican side. After the ceremony, the sky became filled with white balloons floating up and up and up.
Above, friends—separated by the fence—take the time to catch up. Despite the umbrellas, it was not raining. It is a new phenomenon to me that in November umbrellas are widely used as sun protection.
When people say it was swarming with Border Patrol, they mean it. These agents are standing about ten feet from the fence, making sure that no one jumps over or climbs through a hole.
These kids seem more interested in the ceremony, than trying to hop the fence.
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Dying to Live
Some days the sala is full, others it is empty. This depends on if the guests could find work that day. Sometimes, guests leave the house to rent a place of their own, and sometimes, they leave to go back to their home country. This depends on if the guest could find work. The general mood of the house also fluctuates with the availability of work. On days when work was abundant, people come home in high spirits and ready to go to bed early. It is days when no work was available that people are on edge, and problems arise. Finding work, one day a week, or two days a week, is the make or break for many guests. It determines if their family in Mexico will have food on the table. It determines how long they have to be separate from their families. A day of work means everything.
This week I will try to document the public policy and economic marginalization involved with the displacement of many native Mexicans—necessitating their migration north. I will highlight how the “workers” category at our house exists because of failed public policy.
Although migration north for work has been a phenomenon since the US acquisition of Mexican land in 1848, the recent waves of migration can be traced back to the implementation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) on January 1st, 1994.
This agreement, between Canada, Mexico, and the US, was reached in hopes to strengthen all three economies with more cooperation and a more free market. Essentially, NAFTA lowers tariffs on goods between the three countries, including the complete elimination of tariffs on 21 farm products. This would allow US companies to take advantage of the cheap labor in Mexico, without having to pay as much to get the goods back across the border. Also, without tariffs, it put the economies of all three countries in direct competition with each other, meaning that the Mexican corn farmer, the US corn farmer, and the Canadian corn farmer were all put head to head to see who could make corn the cheapest.
Mexico signed the deal hoping that the increased incentive for foreign investment would help to stabilize their economy. On the morning of January 1st, 2004, when NAFTA went into effect, Mexico woke up to the Zapatista Army of National Liberation declaring war on Mexico and using the date of the implementation of NAFTA as a symbol of the greater than one hundred years of oppression of the indigenous people of Mexico.
This immediate resistance to NAFTA could be traced to two main reasons. First, because the rural population of Mexico realized that the decreased tariffs would put them in competition with the US farmers and the huge US farm subsidies, therefore, putting them out of work. Second, a Ejido land system had existed in which land was constitutionally protected for certain communities to live on and cultivate. This land was the livelihood for many indigenous people. George Bush Sr. had given Salinas, the then-President of Mexico, an ultimatum that if he did not make the ejido land available for sale and for factory use, NAFTA would not be signed by the US. Salinas then amended the Mexican Constitution to allow for the sale of ejidos, leaving the land, and the people of the land, victim to wealthy landowners and government officials.
The declared Zapatista revolution had dramatic effects on an international scale. Hundreds of foreign investors pulled money out of Mexico as fast as they could, fearing the tumultuous state of the country. With money rapidly leaving the country, the value of the peso fell to less than half of its prior value. Concerned with the disastrous state of our southern neighbor, and the effect that could have on us, the US offered Mexico bailout money, but only under the condition that Mexico would cut social, educational, and infrastructural spending.
In the first year of the implementation of NAFTA, Mexico had witnessed the birth of a revolution, the value of the peso cut in half, and their freedom to spend where they wanted infringed by debt and dependence on US bailouts. The early days of NAFTA did not bode well.
Before NAFTA, one half of Mexico’s land was dedicated to corn production, with the help of two and a half million farmers. The implementation of NAFTA changed things. The US gives twice the amount of subsidies to its farmers than Mexico does, and therefore, the US farmers can grow corn for a much lower cost. Also, the US has an agreement that they will buy up any excess corn that the farmers produce. With the extra corn that the US buys, they then sell it in Mexico, flooding the market with cheap corn. These systems make it nearly impossible for Mexican corn farmers to continue, putting millions out of work. By 1996, two years after NAFTA began, 2.3 million Mexicans lost their jobs, the average cost of living rose by 80% while the average salary only rose 30%, and 20,000 small-medium size businesses went out of business. The disastrous effects of NAFTA seem very evident when you look at the numbers.
With a seemingly eternal tremulous economy in Mexico, there is a saying that, “When the US sneezes, Mexico catches Pneumonia.” This has been seen in the recent economic downturn. In the three-month period this year between April and June, the Mexican economy contracted 10.3% while the US economy contracted 1%. Currently 60% of the active working population in Mexico is working in the informal sector, trying to squeeze out a livelihood washing cars, selling papitas and so on. Of every 730,000 people that entered the labor market before 2008, only 80,000 found employment. Hearing these numbers, it is no wonder that since 1994 and the implementation of NAFTA, 500,000 Mexicans migrate to the US annually.
It is a portion of these 500,000 each year that show up at our door, in a state of crisis, looking to earn enough money to keep them and their dependents in Mexico alive. These people are the byproduct of disastrous public policy, and are the real, living example, of what went wrong. It certainly does something to see the numerical effects that NAFTA has on Mexico. But it is when you get looked in the eye and told by someone that he lost his job, his family went hungry, and now he is simply dying to live, that you can really absorb the pain, injustice, and errors of this particular public policy.
This week I will try to document the public policy and economic marginalization involved with the displacement of many native Mexicans—necessitating their migration north. I will highlight how the “workers” category at our house exists because of failed public policy.
Although migration north for work has been a phenomenon since the US acquisition of Mexican land in 1848, the recent waves of migration can be traced back to the implementation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) on January 1st, 1994.
This agreement, between Canada, Mexico, and the US, was reached in hopes to strengthen all three economies with more cooperation and a more free market. Essentially, NAFTA lowers tariffs on goods between the three countries, including the complete elimination of tariffs on 21 farm products. This would allow US companies to take advantage of the cheap labor in Mexico, without having to pay as much to get the goods back across the border. Also, without tariffs, it put the economies of all three countries in direct competition with each other, meaning that the Mexican corn farmer, the US corn farmer, and the Canadian corn farmer were all put head to head to see who could make corn the cheapest.
Mexico signed the deal hoping that the increased incentive for foreign investment would help to stabilize their economy. On the morning of January 1st, 2004, when NAFTA went into effect, Mexico woke up to the Zapatista Army of National Liberation declaring war on Mexico and using the date of the implementation of NAFTA as a symbol of the greater than one hundred years of oppression of the indigenous people of Mexico.
This immediate resistance to NAFTA could be traced to two main reasons. First, because the rural population of Mexico realized that the decreased tariffs would put them in competition with the US farmers and the huge US farm subsidies, therefore, putting them out of work. Second, a Ejido land system had existed in which land was constitutionally protected for certain communities to live on and cultivate. This land was the livelihood for many indigenous people. George Bush Sr. had given Salinas, the then-President of Mexico, an ultimatum that if he did not make the ejido land available for sale and for factory use, NAFTA would not be signed by the US. Salinas then amended the Mexican Constitution to allow for the sale of ejidos, leaving the land, and the people of the land, victim to wealthy landowners and government officials.
The declared Zapatista revolution had dramatic effects on an international scale. Hundreds of foreign investors pulled money out of Mexico as fast as they could, fearing the tumultuous state of the country. With money rapidly leaving the country, the value of the peso fell to less than half of its prior value. Concerned with the disastrous state of our southern neighbor, and the effect that could have on us, the US offered Mexico bailout money, but only under the condition that Mexico would cut social, educational, and infrastructural spending.
In the first year of the implementation of NAFTA, Mexico had witnessed the birth of a revolution, the value of the peso cut in half, and their freedom to spend where they wanted infringed by debt and dependence on US bailouts. The early days of NAFTA did not bode well.
Before NAFTA, one half of Mexico’s land was dedicated to corn production, with the help of two and a half million farmers. The implementation of NAFTA changed things. The US gives twice the amount of subsidies to its farmers than Mexico does, and therefore, the US farmers can grow corn for a much lower cost. Also, the US has an agreement that they will buy up any excess corn that the farmers produce. With the extra corn that the US buys, they then sell it in Mexico, flooding the market with cheap corn. These systems make it nearly impossible for Mexican corn farmers to continue, putting millions out of work. By 1996, two years after NAFTA began, 2.3 million Mexicans lost their jobs, the average cost of living rose by 80% while the average salary only rose 30%, and 20,000 small-medium size businesses went out of business. The disastrous effects of NAFTA seem very evident when you look at the numbers.
With a seemingly eternal tremulous economy in Mexico, there is a saying that, “When the US sneezes, Mexico catches Pneumonia.” This has been seen in the recent economic downturn. In the three-month period this year between April and June, the Mexican economy contracted 10.3% while the US economy contracted 1%. Currently 60% of the active working population in Mexico is working in the informal sector, trying to squeeze out a livelihood washing cars, selling papitas and so on. Of every 730,000 people that entered the labor market before 2008, only 80,000 found employment. Hearing these numbers, it is no wonder that since 1994 and the implementation of NAFTA, 500,000 Mexicans migrate to the US annually.
It is a portion of these 500,000 each year that show up at our door, in a state of crisis, looking to earn enough money to keep them and their dependents in Mexico alive. These people are the byproduct of disastrous public policy, and are the real, living example, of what went wrong. It certainly does something to see the numerical effects that NAFTA has on Mexico. But it is when you get looked in the eye and told by someone that he lost his job, his family went hungry, and now he is simply dying to live, that you can really absorb the pain, injustice, and errors of this particular public policy.
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
ICE Cracks
All of the meals at Annunciation House are eaten with everyone together, around one large table. Niños primero, and then the rest can grab food too. If you look around the table at any given meal, you will see many very unique stories of how each person arrived at that table. There will be kids laughing, crying, and throwing their food. Mamas will be chasing, and trying to eat themselves. There will be lively talk in Spanish, English, Arabic… somehow all making just one large conversation. But if you continue to look, and pay attention to the patterns of the unique stories, you could realize that as different as the stories are, they mostly all fall into just a few categories. These categories are created by gaps in the social structure and errors in public policy. So it turns out that the guests at Annunciation House are to an extent just one byproduct of public policy, and because of that, they provide a unique view of what went wrong and why it didn’t work.
In this sense, Annunciation House is intimately connected with the actions of our government. Receiving no government funds and having no formal government connections, it is an odd relationship to feel so close to governmental policy via the fact that we are doing their dirty work.
This topic was brought up when the board of directors for Texas ACLU met at Annunciation House. Someone asked what our relationship looked like with immigration and the government. We described it as simply anomalous. Here is a less simple explanation…
To generalize, the major categories that we see at our house are: the ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) guests, the workers, the single mothers, the refugees from violence in Juárez, and the social security guests
In the next couple of weeks, I will attempt to go category by category and document how public policy and other factors have left each category of people in crisis.
This week I will document the public policy involved with former ICE detainees who become left with no options.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) could be considered the muscle of immigration law enforcement. ICE manages all of the immigration raids, does investigations, and runs the detention system. If Annunciation House were ever to be raided for providing hospitality, ICE would be the ones to do it. But in fact, our relationship with ICE is unique, because they actually rely on us. Every few days or so, we receive a call from ICE asking us if we can take someone from their detentions. These guests are, for lack of a better term, called ICE guests (despite their warm hearts).
The ICE guests are here essentially because of faults in the detention and processing system. I would identify two groups in this category: Those who are seeking asylum, and those who were picked up by immigration officials without proper documents. ICE’s response to dealing with these people has changed drastically in the last few years. Until 2006, the US government used a system known as catch and release. With that system, when a person was identified by immigration as not having proper papers, they would be picked up, given a court date to appear before a judge, and then released on their own recognizance. According to a 2007 hearing from the congressional subcommittee on Border, Maritime, and Global Counterterrorism, more than 90% of these “illegal aliens”* never showed up to their court date. Because of this, in addition to a desire for deterrence and punishment, the US decided to begin detaining people instead of releasing them, under the Secure Border initiative. The new program is referred to as Catch and Return. The implications of this change are immense. In one year after the change, ICE increased its detention capacity by 7,500 beds. Now, more than 34,000 people are in over 500 US detentions each day, at the cost of $141 dollars per night per person. Despite the increase in beds and funding, ICE’s eyes appear to have been too big for their stomach—they simply cannot achieve the vast task in which they set out to do. ICE has to release detainees against their will for three main reasons. They don’t have enough beds, they can’t afford to detain people with medical needs, and because a Supreme Court ruling, Zadvydas, states that every 90 days the detention of each individual must be reviewed and if it does not appear that the person can be deported to their country, they then must be released.
So typically, people are released to our house for one of those three reasons. The oddity is that even though someone may be released from detention, it doesn’t mean that he/she has legal status. Many of them are still in the middle of immigration processing such as appeals on an asylum case, deportation proceedings, or waiting for work papers.
A few examples to make this clear (names and details have been altered for the sake of confidentiality)...Adam, from Somalia, was released to our house after 13 months in detention. While in detention, he won his asylum case, but then it was appealed. Later, he won the appeals. Now, while he is at our house, he is waiting because his case is being appealed, AGAIN, at the taxpayer’s expense. I find it quite silly that we (The US) are appealing his case twice, even though it was decided originally by the strict guidelines in which we put in place. It is interesting to know that 62% of people that apply for asylum in the US are denied relief. Because technically Adam hasn’t gotten asylum yet, he is left without working papers or identification to travel legally in the US. Therefore, in El Paso, where most shelters require legal status for admittance, he was left with no option but Annunciation House. ICE called us and asked if we would take him in. We said yes.
Javier, from Honduras, worked in a Mexican restaurant in North Carolina. One day, ICE raided the restaurant and picked up him and his friends. He was detained for six days in El Paso, but then released because they were running low on beds. ICE gave him a court date, and released him in hopes that he will show up. Unfortunately, he was released in a city he has never been to with no support network. That is how he ended up with no other option except Annunciation House. ICE called us an asked if we would take him in. We said yes.
Gloria, from El Salvador, was 4 months pregnant when Border Patrol picked her up crossing the border with her husband. They separated her and her husband, detained her for a few days, but then decided that they didn’t want anything to do with the medical needs of a pregnant women. They released her, leaving the medical expenses to the public, and gave her a court date. Most likely, once she has her child, she will be deported. ICE called us and asked us if we would take her in. We said yes.
The act of calling us, and asking for our help, is verification by ICE of our necessity and also of problems with the current system of catch and return. It is ICE admitting, “we need you, because we have cracks that people are falling through.” And this is precisely the reason that they show up at our door asking for help, and not ready to raid.
The ICE guests show up at our house because under the current system people are detained and then displaced upon release with no status to either travel back to where they have a support network, or to get a job for survival. They are left in a limbo, and Annunciation House exists to lift the bar and let them get through without breaking their backs.
This current program isn’t one without economic consequences as well. In FY 2010, our detention program will cost us over $1.7. Take Adam for example, who is in the process of getting asylum and who was in detention for 13 months. That means that the taxpayers spent $54,990 to detain someone who would eventually receive asylum. This strikes me as unfair to everyone involved.
One alternative to the detention system that many people in the immigration reform movement support is the switch to electronic ankle bracelet monitoring, which shows a rate of higher than 90% for getting people to actually show up to their immigration appointments. The cost of this is $12 per day per person, and is arguably more humane detention. However, a guest at our house has one of these ankle bracelets and it is not problem-free. He wears pants no matter what to avoid the embarrassment of people seeing the bracelet and assuming that he is some kind of criminal. Playing soccer, looking for jobs, hanging out with friends, he has to be wearing pants. Also, he has to sit by an electrical outlet for hours each day to charge the ankle bracelet. The dignity provided in this situation is certainly questionable.
The current system is overwhelmingly expensive, sadly inhumane, and clearly incomplete, leaving places like Annunciation House to pick up the slack. In 2006, when the catch and release program was visibly ineffective, major congressional changes occurred and created the system we now have. Today, in 2009, as the catch and return program is visibly inefficient and inhumane; it seems time for major changes once again. A ver.
* Governmental organizations and many media sources use the term “illegal aliens” to refer to those who are undocumented within our borders. Because of this, the term “illegal aliens” has become a common term in public use. However, it seems very clear to me that no person is illegal and no person is an alien, they simply don’t have proper documents—they are undocumented.
In this sense, Annunciation House is intimately connected with the actions of our government. Receiving no government funds and having no formal government connections, it is an odd relationship to feel so close to governmental policy via the fact that we are doing their dirty work.
This topic was brought up when the board of directors for Texas ACLU met at Annunciation House. Someone asked what our relationship looked like with immigration and the government. We described it as simply anomalous. Here is a less simple explanation…
To generalize, the major categories that we see at our house are: the ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) guests, the workers, the single mothers, the refugees from violence in Juárez, and the social security guests
In the next couple of weeks, I will attempt to go category by category and document how public policy and other factors have left each category of people in crisis.
This week I will document the public policy involved with former ICE detainees who become left with no options.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) could be considered the muscle of immigration law enforcement. ICE manages all of the immigration raids, does investigations, and runs the detention system. If Annunciation House were ever to be raided for providing hospitality, ICE would be the ones to do it. But in fact, our relationship with ICE is unique, because they actually rely on us. Every few days or so, we receive a call from ICE asking us if we can take someone from their detentions. These guests are, for lack of a better term, called ICE guests (despite their warm hearts).
The ICE guests are here essentially because of faults in the detention and processing system. I would identify two groups in this category: Those who are seeking asylum, and those who were picked up by immigration officials without proper documents. ICE’s response to dealing with these people has changed drastically in the last few years. Until 2006, the US government used a system known as catch and release. With that system, when a person was identified by immigration as not having proper papers, they would be picked up, given a court date to appear before a judge, and then released on their own recognizance. According to a 2007 hearing from the congressional subcommittee on Border, Maritime, and Global Counterterrorism, more than 90% of these “illegal aliens”* never showed up to their court date. Because of this, in addition to a desire for deterrence and punishment, the US decided to begin detaining people instead of releasing them, under the Secure Border initiative. The new program is referred to as Catch and Return. The implications of this change are immense. In one year after the change, ICE increased its detention capacity by 7,500 beds. Now, more than 34,000 people are in over 500 US detentions each day, at the cost of $141 dollars per night per person. Despite the increase in beds and funding, ICE’s eyes appear to have been too big for their stomach—they simply cannot achieve the vast task in which they set out to do. ICE has to release detainees against their will for three main reasons. They don’t have enough beds, they can’t afford to detain people with medical needs, and because a Supreme Court ruling, Zadvydas, states that every 90 days the detention of each individual must be reviewed and if it does not appear that the person can be deported to their country, they then must be released.
So typically, people are released to our house for one of those three reasons. The oddity is that even though someone may be released from detention, it doesn’t mean that he/she has legal status. Many of them are still in the middle of immigration processing such as appeals on an asylum case, deportation proceedings, or waiting for work papers.
A few examples to make this clear (names and details have been altered for the sake of confidentiality)...Adam, from Somalia, was released to our house after 13 months in detention. While in detention, he won his asylum case, but then it was appealed. Later, he won the appeals. Now, while he is at our house, he is waiting because his case is being appealed, AGAIN, at the taxpayer’s expense. I find it quite silly that we (The US) are appealing his case twice, even though it was decided originally by the strict guidelines in which we put in place. It is interesting to know that 62% of people that apply for asylum in the US are denied relief. Because technically Adam hasn’t gotten asylum yet, he is left without working papers or identification to travel legally in the US. Therefore, in El Paso, where most shelters require legal status for admittance, he was left with no option but Annunciation House. ICE called us and asked if we would take him in. We said yes.
Javier, from Honduras, worked in a Mexican restaurant in North Carolina. One day, ICE raided the restaurant and picked up him and his friends. He was detained for six days in El Paso, but then released because they were running low on beds. ICE gave him a court date, and released him in hopes that he will show up. Unfortunately, he was released in a city he has never been to with no support network. That is how he ended up with no other option except Annunciation House. ICE called us an asked if we would take him in. We said yes.
Gloria, from El Salvador, was 4 months pregnant when Border Patrol picked her up crossing the border with her husband. They separated her and her husband, detained her for a few days, but then decided that they didn’t want anything to do with the medical needs of a pregnant women. They released her, leaving the medical expenses to the public, and gave her a court date. Most likely, once she has her child, she will be deported. ICE called us and asked us if we would take her in. We said yes.
The act of calling us, and asking for our help, is verification by ICE of our necessity and also of problems with the current system of catch and return. It is ICE admitting, “we need you, because we have cracks that people are falling through.” And this is precisely the reason that they show up at our door asking for help, and not ready to raid.
The ICE guests show up at our house because under the current system people are detained and then displaced upon release with no status to either travel back to where they have a support network, or to get a job for survival. They are left in a limbo, and Annunciation House exists to lift the bar and let them get through without breaking their backs.
This current program isn’t one without economic consequences as well. In FY 2010, our detention program will cost us over $1.7. Take Adam for example, who is in the process of getting asylum and who was in detention for 13 months. That means that the taxpayers spent $54,990 to detain someone who would eventually receive asylum. This strikes me as unfair to everyone involved.
One alternative to the detention system that many people in the immigration reform movement support is the switch to electronic ankle bracelet monitoring, which shows a rate of higher than 90% for getting people to actually show up to their immigration appointments. The cost of this is $12 per day per person, and is arguably more humane detention. However, a guest at our house has one of these ankle bracelets and it is not problem-free. He wears pants no matter what to avoid the embarrassment of people seeing the bracelet and assuming that he is some kind of criminal. Playing soccer, looking for jobs, hanging out with friends, he has to be wearing pants. Also, he has to sit by an electrical outlet for hours each day to charge the ankle bracelet. The dignity provided in this situation is certainly questionable.
The current system is overwhelmingly expensive, sadly inhumane, and clearly incomplete, leaving places like Annunciation House to pick up the slack. In 2006, when the catch and release program was visibly ineffective, major congressional changes occurred and created the system we now have. Today, in 2009, as the catch and return program is visibly inefficient and inhumane; it seems time for major changes once again. A ver.
* Governmental organizations and many media sources use the term “illegal aliens” to refer to those who are undocumented within our borders. Because of this, the term “illegal aliens” has become a common term in public use. However, it seems very clear to me that no person is illegal and no person is an alien, they simply don’t have proper documents—they are undocumented.
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