2013:10 - Waiting

If “tension” was the word of the of the day yesterday, “waiting” is the word for today. All day we have been waiting for news, for action, for noise, for anything. As sunset fell we started hearing horns and voices on the street again, but for most of the day Ma’adi remained quiet.

The news at dinner tonight is that 2 million people are protesting across Cairo and that protests are being held in each of Egypt’s 26 governorates and in cities and villages across the country. What this means is the discontent with the current government is widespread which is what we’ve been hearing since our arrival 3 weeks ago. So far protests have remained peaceful and non-violent. As I write this I can hear a flurry of horns not far from here. The fifth call to prayer has also begun and so Cairo sounds more like itself at this moment.

Students predict that the protests will continue tomorrow, but that is just a guess for now. We’ll have to see what tomorrow brings. I’m grateful that we’ll return to our weekday routine tomorrow. It will be good for us and for the students to have the distraction of class.

Waiting today involved catching up on work, reading books, Facetime with Hans, an afternoon nap and a movie with my colleagues. Abuna Bishoi is working hard to keep us all happy with food! He brought us an assortment of beverages today and tonight at dinner he had ice cream for us and another sweet Egyptian treat that means “knit together” in English.

We continue to watch, to wait and most of all to pray for the peace and security of Egypt.

2013:9 - Tension

The first year I was in Cairo I was overwhelmed by the noise. Every time I walked down the street taxis would honk to see if I wanted a ride. Drivers in general use their horns to communicate their plans like Americans use their signals and so there is a constant din of sound – horns, sirens, train whistles, the call to prayer, vendors driving down the streets calling out the wares that they’re buying or selling, planes and helicopters.

We know that Cairo is tense today because as I sat with my teaching colleagues discussing our options for the coming days everything outside was silent. SILENT.

There were enormous protests in Cairo, Alexandria, Port Said and in other cities across Egypt yesterday that lead to 3 deaths and many injuries. The protests tomorrow will be even larger and everyone is anxiously waiting to see what will happen. We continue to get alerts from the State Department and are monitoring the situation very carefully. If we need to we will leave. In the meantime we will stay put and feel very safe and secure.

On the one hand it feels like a lazy, quiet, summer day in Egypt. On the other hand, the tension in the atmosphere is palpable. We feel it, the students feel it, the priests feel it.

I have found myself drawn this week to the words of Philippians 2:5-8 "Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross." I take great comfort in the notion that God made flesh in Christ joins us in our human experiences and walks with us in the tension, in the uncertainty, in the waiting. 

I invite your prayers for Egypt and her people and also prayers that all of us would be filled with the peace of Christ in the midst of such uncertainty.

2013:8 - What's the news?

One of the phrases of greeting that I’ve learned in Arabic asks “What’s the news?” The person using the greeting isn’t really asking what’s the news, because the response is usually something like “Perfect! Everything’s good.”

Asking “What’s the news?” in Egypt these days is a loaded question. Because there’s lots of news floating about. If you’ve not yet heard about it in the news you are likely to hear of it in the coming days and over the weekend. Here’s what I know about what’s happening.

30 June marks the one-year anniversary of Mohammed Morsy’s presidency. Most Egyptians are very unhappy with his leadership, with the leadership of the Muslim Brotherhood and other more conservative groups. In the last year the situation in Egypt has deteriorated. There is a fuel shortage. When we are out an about we regularly see enormous lines along the side of the road with drivers lined up for hours awaiting their turn for gas. We hear that in parts of Upper Egypt that gas stations are simply closed because there isn’t gas. The Egyptian pound has plummeted – this is great for tourists who come to Egypt – but horrible for the millions of poor people throughout the country who find the price of food and other basics rising. In addition to the struggling economy, the electric grid is overwhelmed by need. I’m thrilled by the addition of air conditioning in some rooms in the seminary but the reality is each new air conditioner installed in Egypt draws more power away from an overtaxed electrical grid. The result is daily rolling power outages throughout the country. Again, these are worse in Upper Egypt, but even in Cairo we have experienced several blackouts this summer. If all that weren’t enough, Ethiopia has begun to build a dam on the Nile which threatens Egypt’s water supply. This is perhaps the gravest concern of all because it threatens Egypt’s ability to provide water and food for it’s 70+ million people.

Do you sense the growing despair that these conditions can lead to? As a result opposition groups have been collecting signatures for many months calling for Morsy to step down and asking for early presidential elections. These petitions will be delivered to the presidential palace on Sunday and plans are underway for what are expected to be enormous demonstrations throughout the country.

The government and the Brotherhood are opposing these demonstrations and the rumors of impending violence are rampant. The military came out over the weekend and said that they will not tolerate violence. Since Monday we have seen the military and government preparing as soldiers and police are mobilized and moved into position. Roads are being closed which has resulted in even worse traffic than normal in a city famous for it’s traffic. (I’ve been in two of the worst traffic jams I’ve ever seen in the last few days, but I’ll save that for another post).

The US Embassy has announced it will be closed on Sunday and has advised American citizens in Egypt to stock up on provisions, stay home and keep a low profile. We will be heeding that advice.

With all this going on around us, Egyptians continue carrying with life as usual. The markets are full as people are preparing for Ramadan, which begins on 9 July. The conversation at dinner this week has been more apt to be focused on Egypt’s latest World Cup qualifying match or the seminarians own football exploits than on 30 June. But this morning for the first time we felt the tension at breakfast. The seminarians were unusually quiet. When asked why they complained of the hot night which made sleeping difficult and their fatigue after two evenings of football, but when pressed one student admitted to one of my colleagues that everyone is worried about what will happen this weekend.

I have every confidence that we will be safe, protected and secure in the coming days. First and foremost I want you to know that. I have never felt in danger in Egypt and I don’t expect to in the coming days. If worse comes to worse we are registered with the US Embassy who is giving us updates and will help us to evacuate. We will not be venturing out to see if we can glimpse the protests. I’m planning to get a good book today and I figure out I’ll have a quiet weekend of reading and studying Arabic. I know you will be praying for our wellbeing and safety and I’m grateful for that.

But please don’t end your prayers there. I hope you will also pray for the continuation of Egypt’s revolution, which only began on 25 July 2011 and has not yet been completed. The Egyptians who peacefully protested for the removal of the Mubarak regime longed for freedom, peace, security, justice and opportunity for ALL Egyptians. Those ideals have not died though they have been frustrated over the last 2½ years. Those protesting against the current government in the coming days are not thugs or extremists. They are ordinary Egyptians who have not yet let go of the new vision for their country that begin in Tahrir in 2011 and is yet to be brought to fruition. As a student said to me last year, “The French Revolution lasted for 20 years. We cannot expect that ours will be completed in a day, or a week, or a month.” I hope you will join me in praying for the peace, justice, opportunity and security for ALL Egyptians and for a peaceful continuation of the people’s revolution.  

2013:7 - And the Holy Spirit will come upon you ...

Yesterday someone asked me via Facebook if I could explain what is about Egypt that keeps me returning.  

The unfolding of my morning gives a glimpse of what it is about Egypt that keeps me coming back.  

My alarm went off at 5:30. I had to get up early to prepare for an online conversation with a colleague on the West Coast at 6:00 in order to be ready for a meeting in Chicago that will happen right after I return from Egypt. By the time my conversation was finished, I was running late so I skipped my morning shower, dressed quickly and prepared myself for the morning. I started a load of laundry since my 10 attempts over the weekend to do laundry were each met with a occupied washing machine (and if I don’t start it first thing in the morning, it’s likely that there will not be water again until after sundown and by that time another student will occupy the washing machine) and then I went to chapel with only a couple of minutes to center myself before we began morning prayer.

When I sat down in chapel the student who I was expecting to preach was seated across from me studying his homily. He approached me and asked for help in pronouncing a few words and then he told me he didn’t think he was preaching until tomorrow. I tried to ask if he was ready to preach this morning and he said that he would, but he had written down the 25^th(tomorrow). I thought that perhaps I had given him the wrong date and at that moment we began morning prayer and so we were both occupied with the appointed psalms.

As we prayed I worried about the student now sitting next to me. I know how hard it is to preach in any language to say nothing of preaching in a foreign language. I have so much respect for my students that they are willing to be vulnerable in front of their priests, teachers and classmates and I want them to feel confident and prepared when they stand up to proclaim the Word with their words. So as morning prayer ended I leaned over to my student and said, “I want you to feel confident when you preach and I think you are not ready today. I will preach today and you will preach tomorrow.” He was grateful and I frantically started searching through Luke’s gospel for text to use as the basis of a very brief homily.

I chose Luke 6:12-19 where Jesus calls 12 of his disciples to be apostles. As mass began I prayed for the power of the Spirit and trusted that something would come. At the time of the gospel, I stood to read it and then stood in front of the chapel and prayed and preached. I said something like this:

Holy Spirit come and fill my words with your truth and fill our hearts with understanding to know Christ’s love, his mercy, his grace and his forgiveness today and always. Amen.

I am not dressed like a pastor today because I did not think I would preach. But there has been some confusion about who would preach today and so I will speak a few words about the gospel.

When I first began seminary I was the kind of person who needed a lot of order in my life. I always wanted to be prepared for what would come next. I wanted to know what my next step would be and the step after that and the step after that and the step after that. It didn’t take me very long to realize that something would need to change if I was going to be a pastor in Christ’s church.

One of the things that we see about Jesus in the gospels is that he is always listening to the people who call for him. He is always seeing the people who need help. He is always willing to stop what he is doing and make room for someone who needs him.

I could be a pastor who always needs to know the next step, but I would not be a very good pastor or be a pastor very long if I couldn’t be open to listening and seeing and noticing like Jesus. Many days I begin with a list of things that I want to get done. But if someone comes to me and says, “Pastor Amy I need your help with a problem” she will not want to hear me say, “I’m sorry could you come back tomorrow, I’m very busy today.”

Jesus called many different kinds of people to be his apostles because Jesus needs many different kinds of people to proclaim his word. But one thing that he taught the apostles as they followed him was that they would have to be able to make room for the people who wanted to reach Jesus.

We are all called to be disciples of Christ and as his disciples we are called to do ministry in his image. This means that we must also learn to listen like Jesus, and to see like Jesus and to notice the needs of people around us like Jesus. But Jesus doesn’t ask us to do this all by ourselves. He promises to be with us and he has given us his Spirit to give us strength and power to do what we must do. And so when someone comes to us and needs our help and we don’t know how to help, we can pray to the Holy Spirit and trust Jesus promise that this Spirit will give us the power and the ability to do what Christ needs us to do.

By 8:30 I was at breakfast eating my morning portion of ful. As I reflected on what happened between 5:30 and 8:30 this morning I realized that this is a piece of why I keep coming back.

The truth is that I am still a person who likes a plan, a to-do list, an agenda, a schedule. I don’t do very well with interruptions and I’m not my most comfortable when I’m working on the fly. But I also know and believe with all of my heart that in the vulnerable places of my life, when I am out of my comfort zone, when I am forced to address the events that unfold before my eyes, when I arrive late and hot to church on Monday morning and realize that I have to stand up and proclaim Christ without any prior preparation, in those moments I am more open to the power of the Holy Spirit than I am at any other moment in my life. In those moments, I trust more in who I am as a Child of God and an heir with Christ to God’s promises than I do at any other time. In Egypt each year I am forced to practice my faith in the power of God to lead, guide and protect and keep me more than I need to in the comfort of my home and my usual routines. I keep coming to Egypt because each day when I am here my life becomes a living confession that it is not I who live, but Christ Jesus and his Spirit who lives in me.

You can’t learn this, you must simply experience it. And in Egypt I experience this more than anyplace else in my life … and for this I’m grateful. This is the experience that keeps me coming back.

2013:6 - Precisely

Egypt is often described as a “Mediterranean” culture, which is short-hand for relaxed and laid back when it comes to time. In a recent class a student asked me what “precisely” means and in explaining the word I gave this example: in America when a meeting is schedule for 3:00 pm it usually begins precisely at 3. In Egypt if a meeting is scheduled for 3:00 pm it may begin at 3:00 or 3:30 or 4:00 or 7:00 or tomorrow. The students laughed and now when I use the word “precisely” they understand.

In general I’m a precise kind of person. At home I am unhappy if a meeting scheduled for 3:00 doesn’t actually start until 3:10. But I learned long ago that if I was going to survive in this environment I would have to learn to practice more patience. In general I do pretty well.

Today (because I couldn’t handle rice at yet another lunch) I decided to have lunch at an Italian pizza place on Road 9. I don’t think anyone would ever call the wait staff at this restaurant “attentive” but the food is good, the air conditioning is not set too cold, and when you’re tired of rice, rice and more rice, pizza with cheese seems like an exotic alternative. As I was finishing my meal an English-speaking man entered the restaurant. I didn’t hear him well, but I’m guessing he was American. He asked for a place to sit and planted himself at a table for 6. When the menu didn’t appear within 3 minutes, he went searching for a waiter to give him one and when that waiter did not come to take his order within 3 minutes of getting the menu, he looked around, got up and walked out of the restaurant.

In this laid back and relaxed environment (especially when it’s 97 degrees outside) I’ve been trying to imagine where he ended up going where he could receive better and faster service. As for me, I enjoyed my Sicilian pizza with eggplant and cheese … and no rice!