portraits of rambling thought

November 16, 2008

rwanda: roundup

This is what I wrote for the Truett Magazine about my Rwandan return

Rwanda
Summer 2008

By Kristen L. Nielsen

“It felt like a part of my soul had finally come home.”
Now, that may sound overly dramatic, to say that returning to Rwanda after only being there for one week during the previous year felt as though my wandering, wounded soul had found rest. But those are the closest words with which I can describe the experience. Leaving Rwanda’s Kigali International Airport and seeing thousands of rolling hills stretching out before me felt like coming home. Little seemed to have changed, and it was akin to slipping back into a comfortable pair of shoes that I had journeyed in before. I first traveled to Rwanda in June 2007 after spending two weeks in Kenya. Both of the trips were arranged through Baylor’s Spiritual Life department, and the teams were full of people that I trusted with the deepest parts of my being. The two weeks in Kenya had been life-altering for me. I encountered systemic poverty for the first time and had the privilege of sitting in people’s homes as they conveyed the struggles of their daily lives to me –– how to make the $6 rent that was due next month, or which child to choose to medicate since they could not afford medication for all. I was deeply humbled by the faith that I encountered –– how people who knew much more heartache than myself could assure me that God provides. My comfortable Western existence did not know that kind of trust.

The 2007 trip through Rwanda was supposed to be simply an advance visit. Seven Baylor graduate students, alumni and staff were going there to decide if Rwanda would be a suitable place for future trips. It did not seem too emotionally taxing, and when I stepped off the plane the first time in Kigali I wasn’t anticipating anything altering my life further than Kenya already had. But being in a country where genocide had occurred a mere 13 years before did not afford me the choice to leave as the same person I had been when I arrived. That week I felt the wheels of my life shift. I could not live in a world where grave injustice was happening and not do anything about it. The truths of the Rwandan genocide did not offer me the option of ignoring them, and I did leave a changed person.

When I returned to Waco I threw myself into research, trying desperately to find answers to the questions that were rolling around the floorboards of my mind. How can humanity stoop to such evil? How could other countries know what was going on and not respond? How could my own country simply turn its back? Where was the Church? The global family of God that I had put my trust in so long ago seemed to have failed in Rwanda and I did not know how to reconcile that. I still do not.

One of my main reasons for returning to Rwanda in 2008 was to see a deeper picture of reconciliation. I wanted to know if there were answers to the questions that had kept me awake all year long. I wanted to know what life looked like in a country that was still wrestling with trusting itself. Throughout the two weeks spent traveling through the country I got many answers. I danced with widows and orphans, sang with church members, learned from scholars and wept over the reality that the graves are still being dug.

I have more questions and fewer answers than I had before I came back, but my love for Rwanda is deeper than I ever thought possible. I have been deeply changed by the juxtapositions that dance through Rwandan culture, and I was ruined forever in the best way possible. I have yet to recover, nor am I sure that I want to.

November 5, 2008

yes we can

Posted by genvessel under community thoughts, happy thoughts, journeying thoughts, rambling thoughts, random thoughts
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I am not sure I have adequate words for the weight of this truth - an African-American man was elected to be President of the United States of America. In states where Jim Crow is not always just a memory and in states whose sons took up arms to secure humanity - they will have a President who 60 years ago could not share a water fountain with myself.

Last night - as my Wacoan family and I gathered in my living room to watch the results and eat a lot of homemade Hope Cake - I kept wishing that Dr. King was alive to see this moment. The moment where the color of a man’s skin did not outweigh the strength of his character. The moment where America’s promise was not shouted down by its greater demons.

This morning, Tom Brokaw made an excellent point while he was punditing on NBC. That the true test now is not for President-Elect Obama. The true test is in all of us who voted - to embrace his mandate that we are all in this together. That this was not his victory but ours. In a nation where it is not simply our right, but is our responsibility to question our leaders, those of us who voted for him (and those of us whose support he has not yet earned) we are to hold him accountable to his promises and take ownership over our government once again.

In 1863, the idea of America was being tested more than it ever had before. Were we to be a loose collection of states? Or a true nation with a central government and the understanding that living in a democracy means that sometimes the other guy gets to be right. President Lincoln understood this - that democracy is a complex and intangible idea and needs to be worked out. And that it can’t be done without grace and hope.

On November 19, he looked out over the battlefield in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania and urged us to remember that this idea called America was forged out of the idea that all men are created equal. That those of us who endeavor to be a part of the vision now owe a great debt to the people who have given their lives. That ” It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced.”

In the progress of being “unfinished” and constantly striving to best define hope and democracy in the world - many persons have sacrificed for this. Some have sacrificed the use of pantyhose during wartime and others laid down their lives so that their people could vote. From the suffrage movement to civil rights, from the Revolutionary War to the mess we’re in now - millions of Americans have striven and sought to make this place great. Many have paid with their lives and for their sacrifice I will be eternally grateful.

To truly be a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people” we have to constantly strive for the broadest definition and most egalitarian definition of “people”. It is a task that we have not always done well and still continue to fail on in many departments. The rampant fear that Obama was a muslim should speak to our unfishedness in this area.

Our situation now as a nation is not all together different than it was when President Lincoln looked out over that bloodstained vista. We are in the midst of wartime and we are a people of divided principles. However, I believe that last night marked a shift in the divisions. A moment where “red states” and “blue states” begin to fade from national conversation. A moment when the color of your skin does not define the content of your character. A moment where we can breathe deep and rest in the knowledge that the definition of “we the people” is broader now and hope belongs to everyone.

However - all of that to say - today is a new day. History changed last night. But it must keep changing. We must keep working. We must keep striving. We are all in this together and America is our nation. The time for apathy and laziness is over. This is our time. Yes, we can. Yes, we must. Yes. We can.

It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth. - Gettysburg Address, President Lincoln, 1863

October 29, 2008

a tree to hang your dreams on

Posted by genvessel under community thoughts, theology thoughts, youth ministry thoughts
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In the spring, I’ll be doing an internship at UrbanPromise in Camden, New Jersey. I’ve known about and been around UrbanPromise for a number of years now, but I’ve never worked there. It’s an opportunity that I am truly and absolutely excited about. Beyond being excited about it, though, I am honored by the opportunity.

Camden is the poorest city in America and has the highest homicide rate as well. More children are illiterate, hungry and without resources and more adults are unemployed and under-resourced than anywhere else. It was into this context that UrbanPromise was born. What started as a summer camp run out of a Baptist church in 1988 has spawned into a multi-dimensional community development organization - focusing specifically on the children of Camden. Their motto is “Building a City of Promise - One Child at a Time.”

Their focus on education and empowerment is breathtaking to me. I attended their annual banquet this past week while in Yardley and found myself tearing up as the children explained what UrbanPromise was for them. One girl commented that “Urban became the tree that we could hang our dreams on.” I found tears rolling down my face. A safe place for kids to dream and learn how to become the dream they inhabit. A place where their dreams and wishes are encouraged and resourced.

I am sure that I will pontificate more about the beauty that I see in the students when I’m there - and the ways that I’m sure they will completely exhaust me as well. For now, I want to introduce you to Camden and to UrbanPromise.

ABC’s 20/20 did a special on Camden last winter. The article on the special is here - and a short clip of the video is here. Below is a video that UrbanPromise made for their banquet last year. I hope it gives you a snapshot of the hope that exists in that place, despite crushing statistics.

October 28, 2008

more campus kitchen press

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October 27, 2008

you should read this now

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My semester? The whole point? Right here.

October 24, 2008

please watch immediately

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A. Freaking. Men.

“Invest in a girl and she will do the rest. It’s no big deal, just the future of humanity.”

Thanks to the amazing Ms. Gafford for this link

October 20, 2008

truth

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October 19, 2008

things i miss this week, part one

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I’m spending this week in Yardley in preparations for living here next semester. I’m doing my second MSW placement at UrbanPromise and Yardley is a better commute to Camden than Waco is. However, my mailing address hasn’t been 19067 since before I moved to Waringstown and it’s feeling a little surreal.

I laid in bed last night overwhelmed with the things that have filled my life since that summer. Journeys of discovery and mourning, times full of laughter and stretching and beginning to truly understand what I’m made of and made for.

One of those journeys, of course, was the first time I stepped foot on the African continent. Those three weeks spent touring through Kenya and Rwanda have shaped me in ways that I think I am still understanding. It’s the laughter of the children that I hear in my sleep and the faces of the dying that haunt my dreams. In the times that I can’t quite remember why I’m putting myself through all of the graduate school tortures, I remember the silent pledges that I made to myself and to the people I met. That I would spend my life trying to create a more equal playing field for them.

This week, as I prepare for the next seminal step in my journey, I miss who I could be while I was in Africa and wish that I could be that a little bit more here. I wish that I could be as unconcerned about semantics as I was there. I wish that I could trust like I do there and that I could have the kind of faith that I find it so easy to have there. I wish that I didn’t spend as much time missing it as I did.

So, at the top of the list of things that I miss this week is Kenya and the children that dance through my memories and teach me how to become better versions of myself.

“I am not the same having seen the moon shine on the other side of the world…”

October 14, 2008