I am sitting in the international concourse at Newark Airport, seven hours into what would be the end
of a 30-hour journey to Taiwan. I am sitting in the middle of a world that is not my own, not the one I
grew up in, not the one I thought was universal and would always be. This is about the real world, the
world that belongs to everyone else on the planet, the world that is beyond my control and about my
development as a full human being.
I’ve been here over three hours now. I have heard snatches of English but not much and not often.
There are Malaysians on one side of me, speaking to one another in words I do not understand. There
are Russians and Indians and Chinese on the other, some of them sitting on the floor to survive the long
trip to the ticket counter, some of them rocking crying restless children. It is the Bethlehem of Babel
which God refused to allow to be erased for the sake of uniformity.
I am being asked, sitting here, to see God in these differences, to find God in these circumstances. All
of us strangers milling around here, unable to comprehend one another’s language, are clearly meant
to come to understand one another. We are expected to respect one another, to learn from one
another, to see the invisible God in one another.
Even the United States citizens who work at the Newport airport, who checked my passport and tagged
my luggage, do not speak English.
I suddenly realize here what I am inclined to forget at home in our small town where other languages
live in parts of the town where few people ever see: I am a refugee and a foreigner here, even in my
own land. What’s more, I understand with a start, we are all refugees from something, foreigners
somewhere. We are all on our way to somewhere. We are all journeying through life becoming our real
selves. But we cannot plan it, we do not always understand it, and we cannot avoid it. It is the journey
that counts. It is the journey that will make us. It is the way we go about the journey that will measure
us in the end.
Christmas, the journey that begins in Nazareth, goes through Bethlehem and culminates in Jerusalem, is
meant to happen to every one of us in every life. What’s more, it is a journey we are all meant to make
together.
The world has become a current of strangers washing back and forth across the planet, making
everywhere and nowhere home. And we are among them, like Joseph and Mary, hoping to be received
by them, trusting that God is in our own life journey, too.
from The Monastic Way (Dec. 2005) by Joan Chittister
of a 30-hour journey to Taiwan. I am sitting in the middle of a world that is not my own, not the one I
grew up in, not the one I thought was universal and would always be. This is about the real world, the
world that belongs to everyone else on the planet, the world that is beyond my control and about my
development as a full human being.
I’ve been here over three hours now. I have heard snatches of English but not much and not often.
There are Malaysians on one side of me, speaking to one another in words I do not understand. There
are Russians and Indians and Chinese on the other, some of them sitting on the floor to survive the long
trip to the ticket counter, some of them rocking crying restless children. It is the Bethlehem of Babel
which God refused to allow to be erased for the sake of uniformity.
I am being asked, sitting here, to see God in these differences, to find God in these circumstances. All
of us strangers milling around here, unable to comprehend one another’s language, are clearly meant
to come to understand one another. We are expected to respect one another, to learn from one
another, to see the invisible God in one another.
Even the United States citizens who work at the Newport airport, who checked my passport and tagged
my luggage, do not speak English.
I suddenly realize here what I am inclined to forget at home in our small town where other languages
live in parts of the town where few people ever see: I am a refugee and a foreigner here, even in my
own land. What’s more, I understand with a start, we are all refugees from something, foreigners
somewhere. We are all on our way to somewhere. We are all journeying through life becoming our real
selves. But we cannot plan it, we do not always understand it, and we cannot avoid it. It is the journey
that counts. It is the journey that will make us. It is the way we go about the journey that will measure
us in the end.
Christmas, the journey that begins in Nazareth, goes through Bethlehem and culminates in Jerusalem, is
meant to happen to every one of us in every life. What’s more, it is a journey we are all meant to make
together.
The world has become a current of strangers washing back and forth across the planet, making
everywhere and nowhere home. And we are among them, like Joseph and Mary, hoping to be received
by them, trusting that God is in our own life journey, too.
from The Monastic Way (Dec. 2005) by Joan Chittister
I AM A REFUGEE AND A FOREIGNER
 |  |  |  |  |
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Home||Benedictine Sisters of Erie||Catalogue||Joan in the News||Contact Benetvision Fund for Prisoners||Retreats||About Benetvision||Ideas in Passing Benetvision • 355 East Ninth Street • Erie, PA 16503-1107 • Phone 814-459-5994 benetvision@benetvision.org • Fax 814-459-8066 Copyrighted © 2007 Benedictine Sisters of Erie, PA |