Last Sunday, June 30, I celebrated with joy one year since the priestly ordination. It has been a challenging but grace-filled year. This quote has inspired me to walk with, to listen to, and to be with the refugees rather than trying to do too many things:
"Our biggest temptation, on seeing the distress of the refugees (...) is to begin
projects, to give material things, to decide en masse what the refugees
need. They often arrive in exile without shoes, with only one torn shirt,
hungry, without a clear plan. But they did not undergo this experience in order
to get a shirt or shoes. Their human experience is to be respected. They are
traumatized by violence, lonely, rejected, exhausted in body certainly, but
also exhausted by their loss of a place in a stable society, and sometimes
feeling guilty at what they did to survive. They want to be understood, to be
heard. Their frequent question is: Why is God doing this to me? They have the
right to ask this question. But it cannot be asked unless someone listens. This
is our primary role, to listen to the questions, to the longing and to the
fundamental human need of the refugees."
