I Still Believe in Welcome

My husband and I have lived in nine houses since we married in 1989. I don’t have a good explanation for this, and every time I worry that it points to something off-kilter in me—a psychological restlessness or worse, I remember that I have been married to the same man for thirty-five years and trekked to the exact same spot in Colorado every summer since I was eleven years old. This gives me comfort, but I’m pretty sure we have one more move to make once we can’t navigate the three flights of stairs, and so we can even out the number to a double-digit ten houses.

Despite the house-hopping, I am sentimental about the concept of home. Not the houses themselves, obviously, but the idea that we can create a place of welcome where our family and friends enjoy good food, laughter, comfort, and the feeling of being known and loved. When my kids were still living with us, more than anything, I wanted our home to be a place of refuge when their world was spinning out of control. They have homes of their own now, but our door is still open, and they know this. They can come here for a home-cooked meal, to vent, celebrate, unburden. This goes for our close friends, also.

Last week, I was grumbling that we didn’t have the back deck ready for spring. We love to extend our living space when the weather is nice, so we have a covered area off the kitchen with outdoor furniture, a rug, plants, and a Solo stove. At the moment, there is cat puke on the rug, dog hair covering the cushions on the wicker couch, grime on the coffee table, etcetera, etcetera. Ten minutes later, on my walk, I was listening to news about Panama.

Our country seems to be sending a heartbreakingly loud message that we are weary of welcoming people into our figurative “home.” Last week, a 29-year-old man named Hayatullah Omagh, along with 65 other migrants from mostly Asian countries, climbed off a bus after spending weeks detained by the Panamanian government. These were people who had been in the U.S. after fleeing horrific situations in their country that put their lives at risk. We deported them to Panama, who took them in, saying they wanted to work with the Trump administration to “send a signal of deterrence” to people hoping to migrate.

After weeks of living in a remote camp in Panama, the migrants were placed on a bus, dropped off in Panama City, and told they had thirty days to leave the country. Omagh’s words keep running through my mind: “We are refugees. We do not have money. We cannot pay for a hotel in Panama City. We do not have relatives.”

What are the options for these people we have shuffled out of our country? None, as far as I can see. So, I’m thinking about how, after all these years, while my husband and I were working to make our home a place of refuge, our country has also been a place of refuge for millions of people. You may or may not like this idea, but when you hear stories of the atrocities people perpetuate against one another in places across the world and how many innocent people get caught in the middle with no way out, it seems like we should offer something. We haven’t done a good job of streamlining and maintaining our immigration system. It’s a mess. Senators have tried to pass legislation to start improving it, but we’re a polarized country, and immigration is an effective issue for fearmongering, so nothing gets done.

And now, we’ve decided that we no longer want to honor our invitations to refugees or be a welcoming place for those who are trying to come here—or stay here—legally. We’re shuffling them out of here to places like Panama, a country that then followed our lead with its own brand of cruel behavior.

My day job is working as a legal assistant at my husband’s immigration law firm, so I could be blamed for being biased about this issue. But during the years I’ve been doing this work, it’s not the legal aspects of immigration that take up space in my head. It’s the stories. We sit across the table from asylum seekers who are fleeing persecution in countries where their faith is a crime, their ethnic identity is justification for burning their homes, or their political opinion against their violent military government is cause for torture. For some, it’s all three. They fear for their children and see no way out until they remember there is a country that offers refuge…if they can find a way out of their own country. Most don’t. In fact, only 4% of the worldwide population in need of refuge find it in the U.S. We don’t make it easy, despite what you might have heard.

And now, we’re sending a clear message that we want to close the door completely, and most people in our country don’t realize it’s happening. Or if they do, they feel it’s in the best interest of the United States—as if that’s the only litmus test for what is right. I could list all the reasons it’s not in our best interest to expel the immigrants from our country without good reason, but that would take up too much of your time. However, as one example, we should all research what a declining birth rate does to a country and then consider how immigrants can save us from the consequences.

We have an opportunity to be a place of safety, comfort, protection (because so many haven’t known it for a long time), and the feeling of being known and loved. I don’t know what will actually make America great again, but wouldn’t it be interesting to see if this might be it? It would sure feel better than fear and anger.

We should all seek out stories of people around the world who are living in desperate, dangerous, and terrifying places and then put ourselves in their place. What would we do for our children if we no longer had choices for a safe future? We would want a country that welcomed us, listened to our story, and gave us a place to stay until we could return home. (Most people want to live in their own country if given the choice. Wouldn’t you?)

Our country has never been perfect, but we’re better than this. I’m deeply worried for all the people who are cruelly being turned away. Whether they are wandering the streets of Panama or fearful in our own neighborhoods, our response to people who need refuge is important. Ultimately, it’s the answer to whether we believe in the truth of the words of Jesus.

Love your neighbor as yourself.