what's in a name

When I was a little girl I remember hearing a story about my grandmother. It fascinated me and sometimes I had a hard time believing it. On the one hand my grandma was known for always having the best snacks, planning an adventurous day at the pool or an afternoon bowling for me and my sister, or buying us unnecessary toys, like the pom poms Tavia and I got at the store down the street from her house. Those green pom poms thoroughly entertained us and we were cheerleaders the whole summer long. My grandma as I remember her was the one that invited me to snuggle when it was too late to be up, or made an ordinary afternoon into a glamorous beauty pageant because she was always designing us a new dress that we modeled as she adjusted the length. She listened to the stories that my parents were too busy to hear with all the other distractions going on. She was truly delightful.

I heard a story told about her a few times growing up. Maybe she even told me herself once. I can vaguely recall standing next to her while she was washing dishes one evening, and asking her about it. I believe it went something like this…One day my grandma was returning home from the store or an errand of some kind and she had only just moved to Florida from New York to be with us. She was living in a community, lot 35, off of Beach Blvd, which ironically was nowhere near a beach. Shortly after entering her house she found that she was being robbed at gunpoint. She said there were two men and they had bags full of things they were stealing. And this is the part that gets me, as the story goes; she said that when she found herself face to face with them, all she could do was shout the name of Jesus over and over. And I guess it freaked them out so much that they dropped what they had in their hands and fled the scene.

As a little kid I loved hearing the retelling of this story, just because I always felt perplexed that right there in my own family, my sweet huggable grandma, was a real live evidential story of how Jesus’ name had power to it. It wasn’t just something people sang about, apparently it really worked. Of course little kids love stories where the bad guys loose and Grandma lives, but I remember thinking, as I grew up, more about that story and how much faith she seemed to have, that she would think to call on Jesus’ name when faced with such a scary situation. Sure, people believe in Jesus as a savior, thus one who saves, but in the practical, how often do we think, “Ah, forget grabbing the bat to knock one of these guys out and dropkick the gun out of his hand, no I think I will call out the name of Jesus?” As a little kid, I often thought that if I were ever in real danger, I would try to remember to do the same thing. I haven’t thought much about that story, probably not in years, but the other night it all came back to me.
Since being here in the Philippines I have been working with an organization called Samaritana and they labor to empower women by providing several alternatives to those involved in prostitution. Once a week I get to tag along with a staff worker to high traffic areas to speak with several women. My eyes can see that I live in a very naïve world. The masks of fluff and romance that come to mind when someone says mission work fall quickly as I walk the streets of Cubao. My eyes meet her eyes. She is the girl working the stairs just ahead. She’s too young, maybe 15. Her makeup is thick, her demeanor - tough. Something in me shakes. She’s working to survive, to eat tonight, to feed her baby who she never intended on having, or to pay rent for a space that should in no way be called home. And as we pass her I watch another woman who scurries along, she says hello to us but she can’t talk, she’s with a customer. As I glance at the next woman, I can see the cares of the world hanging in her cheeks and she has fear in her eyes as she recalls the threats of the past week. I see through the dark streets that the women here are only a few inches away from each another, yet alone, and the stares of the men who come to prey on them are all too many to count. We pick up our pace, it’s dangerous here and the women seem to multiply. I can not keep up, there are too many of them. I nearly step on someone sleeping in the walkway. I can see there are tiny feet poking out from underneath the cardboard. It is a child about three years old and nearby her mother is careless, only concerned with her evening employment as she continues to work these streets. There is no thought that can remedy this. I feel desperate and everything in me wants to shout out Jesus. There’s no other thought, no other response, just this overwhelming feeling. I have never felt so fraught to see evil end and for justice to come. My world back home does not lend itself to moments like these.
During the past two weeks I’ve felt this way during the outreaches and I can’t explain it except that I found myself face to face with some things that are very wrong in this world and things that I have no control over. It makes me think no dropkick even by the toughest person could fix this wrong, (although part of me wants to try), but that it will take someone much more powerful, someone who does have control…
Sometimes the women look away; they clearly don’t want to be seen by us. I want to call out “Beautiful” and for them to know it’s their name. I want all of their identity, what has been stolen from them to be placed at their feet, returned to them, as their predators flee the scene of their lives. For them to know they are loved by God and created by Him, for them to recognize they were created for something great…that when they call his name He hears them. The times I have been on the street I’ve been a little surprised at this feeling of helplessness, this need to have Jesus hear me. Overwhelmed, I felt maybe for the first time in my life, a longing, an urgency for Him to return and make things right.

unfamilar cup

Do you ever feel like you have a lesson to learn and right away you can see how difficult it’ll be for you to grasp? Like it stands there, waiting for you- a dark figure in the distance… And maybe you’ve seen it before and tried to avoid it, but walking past it only maps you in the same direction? I’ve felt that way this week. Before we got here I anticipated and feared the thought of what my life would look like or rather how I would be defined without all the things and roles that were currently defining me. Perhaps I feared this because, I would be disappointed with whom that person is, but I forgot to consider that I’ve used some of those things to protect me from experiencing particular feelings like pain or joy. Perhaps the loss of these two things, is the greater fear than the original disappointment. But there’s no protecting here or very little, I am who I am and I find myself symbolically unclothed and ashamed. I realize that I have a kaleidoscope view of myself. I look through a lense to see several angles of what looks to be different pictures only to discover that they are all angles of me.
One of the things I’ve been thinking about is the severe contrast between the familiar world I live in and what I am witnessing here. I think to myself there are so many needs and secretly question my faith in God to meet them.
While working at Samaritana this week I came across an article by Thelma Nambu, which seemed to fit with my thoughts. It talked about how we cover up the pain in our lives and try to forget it ultimately escaping healing. “When this happens we fail to offer our authentic selves to others and fail to love genuinely.” Embarrassed, I looked down at my costume. It is tattered and worn, I’ve outgrown it, my makeup is smeared and though I know my lines well, they sound all too much like an actor overacting. I’ve been playing this part for the majority of my life. I temporarily bandage up the wound, hoping it magically heals itself and return to the stage.
The article continued, “Paradoxically, true joy is often hidden in our sorrows. Henry Nouwen said, “The cup of life is the cup of joy as much as it is the cup of sorrow. It is the cup in which sorrows and joys, sadness and gladness, mourning and dancing are never separated. If joys could not be where sorrows are the cup of life could never be drinkable.”
I felt this was a true description of what we’ve seen here, though overwhelming at times, maybe what makes it feel like so much is this deep contrast, this unexplainable truth that there is great suffering here and equally there is great joy to be had. I take in my fill as I walk the crooked paths, and drink in both. The tension inside does not know how to digest it.

Thelma said, “It is when we acknowledge our pain that we begin to connect our own little story to the divine story, our sufferings with those of Jesus Christ. “ She then said that according to Nouwen to heal does not primarily mean to take pain away but to revel in the realization that our pains are part of a greater sorrow, that our experience is part of the great experience of Him.”

some pictures from the journey