Refugees, What Is the What, and the US Refugee Resettlement Program

Did you know that Saturday was World Refugee Day? I don't think many in the US gave it much thought since this weekend is also Father’s Day here.

At church, a short-term team gave a report, and a ministry-partner from the Middle East was visiting, and a speaker who works with the poor gave an impassioned plea to the church to do something about the hungry and suffering children of the world. He didn't say anything about refugees, but did make the connection between Father's Day and so many of the world's children growing up without fathers.

It was all too much “missions” for me, to tell you the truth. I swim in this stuff all week long. When I come to church I want worship and Bible teaching. But maybe that’s just me!

Nevertheless, I do seek out this kind of thing on my own.

What Is The What

I’ve been reading Dave Eggers' lightly fictionalized account of the life of a Sudanese refugee. The cover copy sums it up better than I can:

"What Is the What is based on the life of Valentino Achak Deng, who, along with thousands of other children – the so-called Lost Boys – was forced to leave his village in Sudan at the age of seven and trek hundreds of miles by foot, pursued by militias, government bombers, and wild animals, crossing the deserts of three countries to find freedom. When he finally is resettled in the United States, he finds a life full of promise, but also heartache and myriad new challenges."

S. is staying with us for a few days. She picked it up and read the quote on the cover from Khaled Hosseini (author of The Kite Runner):

“It is impossible to read this book and not be humbled, enlightened, and transformed.”

I rose to the bait, of course. “Impossible?! I bet I can do it… and come to work Monday not the least bit 'lightened! Nor humbled, neither!”

But what a world we live in. Such a blend of beauty and pain, goodness and injustice, each so huge at times it seems like that’s all there is in life.

When What Is the What opens, a man and woman have conned their way into Valentino's Atlanta apartment to rob him and beat him up:

"…my cheek resting in its own pooling blood, I know a moment of comfort, thinking that in all likelihood he is finished. Already I am so tired. I feel as if I could close my eyes and be done with this. … So I rest. I close my eyes and rest.

"I am tired of this country. I am thankful for it, yes, I have cherished many aspects of it for the three years I have been here, but I am tired of the promises. I came here, four thousand of us came here, contemplating and expecting quiet. Peace and college and safety. We expected a land without war and, I suppose, a land without misery. We were giddy and impatient. We wanted it all immediately….

"I have held too many menial jobs… Too many have fallen, too many feel they have failed. The pressures upon us, the promises we cannot keep with ourselves, these things are making monsters of too many of us."

What Is the What, pp. 7-8

What Can Be Done?

One of my ezine subscribers recently wrote to me,

"Please pray for the US refugee resettlement program, which is badly underfunded and in crisis at this time. While this humanitarian program is meant to rescue and provide stateside protection for those who cannot return safely to their home countries due to a well-founded fear of persecution based on their religion, ethnicity, nationality or political opinion, the funding for the program falls so far below the needs to actually stabilize new arrivals once they are here in the US that we now see many refugees precariously close to eviction or homelessness in the US after only a few months here. This just isn't right.

"I have worked with refugees for more than 30 years, and have never seen the program closer to implosion than it is now, nor have I seen so many heartbreaking cases of refugees facing homelessness in their new country before they even have a chance to learn the language, learn how to use public transportation, or get reliable work (increasingly impossible in this economy.) Yet the numbers of arrivals continue to increase.

"No one wants to see the refugees remain in danger in their homelands of the neighboring countries to which they have fled. Yet the US government must invest more resources in the program if we are to do justice to those we bring to this country. Currently, the non-profit agencies that have agreements with the Dept. of State to resettle refugees receive just $900 per refugee to resettle them. This must cover the security deposit and first month's rent on an apartment, furnishings for the apartment (all the way from beds and tables to towels, bedding, lamps, etc.) PLUS the staff time to provide orientation to life in the US and take the refugee to appointments at the health dept., English classes, Social Security, Social Services, etc. Many idealistic young college grads take these positions - and soon become burned out. This is a shame.

"Currently, most refugees are arriving from Burma, Bhutan, and Iraq."

To get a picture of ways you can make a difference for refugees, read Mary Pipher's The Middle of Everywhere: The World's Refugees Come to Our Town.