Having Hope in Times of Hopelessness
Editor’s Note: As she serves in the US-Mexico border region, lay missioner Kim Wagner reflects on how she finds hope during a seemingly hopeless situation.
As I finish setting bowls and spoons on the kitchen counter during my shift at El Centro de Recursos para Migrantes (The Migrant Resource Center), I check my watch one more time — 1:00pm; It’s time to start serving lunch to the folks at the Center. I walk to the dining room, see a family of four and one single man sitting at the tables, and tell them that lunch is ready. I then do my normal routine of checking the side and back of the building for more people to let them know that lunch is ready, but I don’t see anyone else. The mom of the family sees me looking for people, laughs, and says to me “Who are you looking for? It’s just us.” She’s right.
In the past few weeks, the people in Agua Prieta awaiting their asylum appeal interviews with Customs have been told that there will be no interviews until November. This announcement caused many families, who had already been waiting for their appointments for months, to lose hope of entering the United States and gaining safety. Out of the seven families at the shelter, five of them decided to gamble with their safety and go back to their homes.
Watching these families lose hope over the past three weeks has given me a mix of emotions — I am angry and heartbroken that these families had to make the choice to go home. I have also been examining the concept of hope recently and have questioned where I put my hope — if we can’t put our hope in systems meant to help people, where can we put it?
One night, when I was preparing a prayer night for my community mate Julia and me, I came across the poem titled “Hope” by Steve Garnaas-Holmes. The parts of the poem that spoke to me the most that night were “Hope is not optimism, not wishing, not a bet on the future, but trust in what is already present, unseen” and “My faith is that love is at work. I trust in hidden love even as injustice runs loose.” Reading these lines helped me to reevaluate the concept of hope right now. We can’t always have hope in how things will work out in the future, but if we look around, we can always find people in the present to put our hope into.
Every day, I see examples of people loving others through their actions — my fellow volunteers who have shown up for months for the people seeking asylum and continue to do what they can to care for them. Reframing what hope can be in this way has been an invitation for me to look around and see the acts of love that people do every day in a new light to replenish and maintain my hope. In this season, I am working on reminding myself to put my hope in the love that others give. No matter the political situation in the United States or Mexico, I know there will be people in both countries ready to welcome and care for people who are migrating — and that will always give me hope.
Question for Reflection: Read “Hope” by Steve Garnaas-Holmes. Which lines stand out to you and offer you a deeper understanding of hope?
Tagged in:
