Migrant Shelter - Manuel’s Story

After Ana shared her story, Manuel* shared his - an equally harrowing, heartbreaking tale of very real realities. Also in his twenties, his eyes spoke of pain; he sat huddled, exhausted.

Manuel told us about his girlfriend, and about her ex-boyfriend. 

About how the ex was jealous of their relationship, how he didn’t want them together. 

How the ex joined a gang, chose a lifestyle of violence and rage. 

How he threatened Manuel and his girlfriend, set the members in his gang to attack. 

Again and again, the gang threatened Manuel, attacked him, stalked him, and jumped him. 

Manuel went to the police, but because members of the gang worked in the unit, they provided no safety. The gang could reach far; nowhere was safe. In light of the danger, his girlfriend fled to the US (and was admitted! - this was before more recent policy); they planned together for Manuel to follow shortly after. Before he left, however, gang members jumped him again after work one day; they beat him, leaving him unconscious.

When he recovered, he fled too - choosing the extremely dangerous route of riding on the tops of trains to make it to the US-Mexico border. He finally arrived after a harrowing journey, and he sought asylum. Again, like Ana, he described his time in detention as some of the worst days of his life. He was then released to the streets of Mexico, and he made it to the migrant shelter, where we met. Now, Manuel is awaiting his next court date. As is common, he fled only with a few possessions; he has no authorization to work in Mexico; he is at the mercy of generous churches and NGOs. Even with less than a 4% chance of being granted asylum by El Paso judges, he repeated over and over, "I want to follow the law.”

Except, the law has been built to exclude people like him. He is stuck, trapped, and powerless.

Like Ana, even here, he expressed an abiding faith in God. As he shared, I kept thinking of the word “honorable” to describe him. He also has zero chance, and I also can’t make his story resolved or comfortable or light.

The situation is complex, intricate, involved, and challenging. I cannot understand it all, but at the border, I did see this: with a mission to deter asylum seekers, we have made it into a competition. "Where will I suffer worse?” we have forced asylum seekers to ask. “By staying in my homeland, or by fleeing to the border?" It has become a lethal game to play, a heartbreaking duel.  

I wonder - is another response possible? How do we choose to love? What in the world do we do right here?

A potential response - and maybe our first, needed collective response, to Manuel’s story and to all the stories like his - could be to lament: to mourn and grieve at the complexity of evil, brought about both by the hands of those who deliver violence and by the hands of those who remain idle (my hands, our hands). We could begin by lamenting at broken systems, at war and terror, at injustice, at division, at the failure - at our failure - to provide healing in this space. We could wrestle with God, ask him what he’s doing, and lock arms with him and mourn together.

In scripture, songs of lament comprise around 50% of the Psalms. 

In our churches, songs of lament comprise around 5% of our worship.

Is it possible to heal if we do not first mourn? Is it possible to bring justice if we do not first grieve? In singing only songs of victory, have we forgotten God’s heart for his suffering people? For those on the outskirts and for ourselves as well, for those hurting in the margins and for those hurting in our pews? I wonder - when we see God’s heart for suffering more clearly, could we see God’s heart for our own brokenness more clearly as well? I think we could - I think we would find this to be true. 

And so - maybe, in this time, as we reflect and consider our response to the border, we could first choose to grieve.

We could set aside space to mourn the brokenness and injustice around - knowing that Jesus will one day set it all right, waiting in the middle until he does. Today, I’m lamenting: for Manuel, and for the hundreds of thousands more like him. Come, Jesus: comfort your people.