violachic

This past Sunday, it was three months since our four friends in Iraq went missing.

This coming Sunday, it will be one hundred days.

Life here at the office is certainly not nearly as insane as it was, and much of life has returned to normal. Or, at least, normal for this place- we have resumed our usual meal and prayer schedules, and our day-to-day tasks, and decided to go through with our January training. But there are still constant reminders that things are less well than they should be. Daily conference calls, preparation- both physical and emotional- for a resolution, the deluge of media (although distinctly diminishing as time goes on), the periodic and erratic emotions that overtake one or another of us on a regular basis.

We have photos of the four men up in two places in the office- one set, where we gather for prayers and team meetings; and one in our dining room, where anyone can spot them as soon as they walk in the office. Often, there are candles lit under each of their smiling faces.

The photos are fairly unnerving for me. Where my desk is positioned, I look at them all day. Harmeet’s, in particular, is especially strange; he had been looking directly at the camera when the picture was taken, which gives the eyes the eerie effect of seeming to follow you wherever you go. For me, it is easy to feel as if I’m being scrutinized by him all day long. The fact that he is one of the two I haven’t yet met makes it a little weirder yet. For some reason, I don’t think it would feel quite that odd if it were Tom or Jim.

This entire episode has certainly caused me to think long and hard about an awful lot of things. I know it worried my loved ones, who already get nervous when I go across the world into a conflict zone. But I am somehow relieved to be realizing that not only have I not shied from my values, but they are redoubled. My eagerness to continue what I’ve started is high.

There’s a great deal of musing going on, comparing what we are going through to what those we work with go through every day. The result is a great deal of guilt, and- from time to time- a light bulb of empathy. I remember when the news first broke, telling my Palestinian friends about what had happened. As we talked, although I knew the sympathy was genuine, I realized that I was, in the most accurate sense of the phrase, “preaching to the choir”. Not only was I telling them something they didn’t already know about, but something in which they could give me quite an education- abductions, arrests with no charges, killing of innocent people- whether by execution or other means- torture, and all sorts of things I’ve never dreamed of. It gave me a first-hand look at the kind of life experienced by those we work with, and work for, and a first-hand feeling for those washes of emotion- anger, questioning, grief. For that, I’m grateful in a way, but it shouldn’t have had to happen this way.

I’m learning a great deal of life lessons that most middle-class, white girls from the suburbs rarely learn. I’m learning that there is often a basis for what come out sounding like conspiracy theories; learning that there are those who are so eager to take advantage of another’s grief; learning that no matter how logical your arguments sound to you, you can’t change someone else’s thinking if they are convinced of their own logic; learning that there’s ever more shades of gray than anyone thinks possible. Most of all, I’m learning that the likelihood of the FBI listening in to my phone conversations is frighteningly high.

When they first went missing, Christians all around the world were just entering the season of Advent. It made a good metaphor- waiting, hope, light shining in the darkness, and all that. This metaphor gave us comfort and hope. We sermonized about it, we wrote about it, we talked about it, we prayed about it. And now, three months later, we’re entering the season of Lent. What is the metaphor that comes out of this?

I’m almost afraid to find out.