Confiscated at the Border

As a lifelong Protestant, I don’t have much experience with the rosary. As a kid I joked about people who said the rosary. As an adult, I recognize the value and grounding effect it has for many. Still, it is out of my wheelhouse in the world of prayer.

So, I was surprised when the photo of rosary beads carried by migrants and confiscated at the US border hit me like a sucker punch to the gut. The photo is from several years ago, but it has become a flash symbol of the plight of migrant workers who are detained and put in concentration camps at our border. There are probably thousands of rosary beads that could accompany the ones in this photo.

The photo was taken by Tom Kiefer who was a janitor at a US customs border patrol facility in Azo, Arizona from 2003-2014. According to the Daily Mail, it was his job to dispose of the bags of undocumented migrants’ possessions taken from them at the facility.

He began sorting through the bags in search of food that was unopened, so that he could donate it to the local food pantry. When interviewed by the Daily Mail he said, “I was just expecting to dig through food and trash-legitimate real trash, not people’s personal belongings. Things like belts and shoe laces that could easily be considered potentially harmful, but not a Bible or rosaries or family photographs.”

Gradually he began collecting the personal items, organizing them into categories and photographing them. He hoped the photographs would show the humanity of the migrants, humanity that was largely stripped from them at the border.

The photo of the rosary beads shown here is part of a larger collection of items confiscated from those who arrived at our border in search of a better life. The entire collection can be viewed here. It includes toothpaste, condoms, wallets, cigarette lighters, bibles and family photographs–everyday items from everyday living, life stripped to its bare minimum.

This image of the rosary beads is burned into my being. I cannot get it out of my head or my heart. Sets of rosary beads lined up like so many prayers to God cut off in mid-sentence. It is an act of unspeakable cruelty, a way of robbing the faithful of a toe hold when their life is in mid-avalanche.

The rosary has been around for centuries. Its roots reach back to the Desert Fathers and Mothers who used stones to keep track of praying the 150 psalms. That said, the word rosary did not appear until 1597. It was given official approval by the Roman Catholic Church in 1568.

Many of the world’s religions including Hindus and Buddhists use beads to pray; it is not an original idea to Catholics. The use of beads by other great religious traditions speaks to the value of this as an expression of piety.

Many first world Christians have abandoned the rosary as an archaic expression of faith. However, it continues to be an important ritual for many Christians around the world. This includes the refugees who landed at our border, only to have their rosary beads ripped from their hands.

I am haunted by the photo. Whose hands held these beads? Whose hands folded these beads around the fingers of children, brothers, sisters and other family members they might never see again?  To whom did these beads belong when they were new?  Are they worn smooth from moving between the fingers of the faithful?

I imagine mothers, fathers and children praying prayers together as an act of hope and faith. I imagine the comfort they felt from saying prayers they knew in their bones. Over thousands of miles on a journey no one can imagine, how did these rosary beads strengthen and comfort them? With what hope and confidence were the prayers uttered as these refugees dared hope for a life different than the one they left behind?

I do not understand what threat this ancient symbol of piety posed.   What harm would come by letting people keep their prayer beads? Did the guards who took the rosaries see them as a non-essential item? Was it just about stripping them of all their personal possessions? Was taking this symbol of faith a way of showing who was boss and who was in charge? Was depersonalizing these individuals into an anonymous mass of humanity the goal?

We are a country of immigrants; all of us are here because someone had the courage to leave what was familiar and come to this country in hopes of a better life. The occupant characterizes them as thugs, criminals, and gang members in an effort to shift our attitude toward them.  Don’t let that happen.

These are people, individuals made in the image of the divine. They deserve to be treated with love and respect. They deserve to have their humanity recognized and their plea for a different life heard. To summarily dismiss and deport them is yet another act of cruelty.

The crisis at our border is summarized with no words in this image of prayer and hopefulness wrenched from the hands of the hopeful who come to our border in search of a better life.

May the Holy One have mercy on us.