The Hope of Immigrants
by Elizabeth Kaeton

Editor’s Note: The following sermon was preached at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Chatham, New Jersey on July 7, 2002.

Somewhere, between the Hebrew Scripture (Genesis 24:34-67) and the Gospel (Matthew 11:16-30), and in the midst of the background serenade of the Fourth of July fireworks, I found myself reflecting on the story of my own family’s journey to this Land of Freedom.

The story of Rebecca’s betrothal to Isaac seems a quaint if not irrelevant story about the serendipity of our biblical heritage. It has deep resonance with the story my grandmother told me about her journey here. And, the ancient themes of the genesis story are still heard in many of the stories told to me by the Liberian and Nigerian women I was privileged to serve when I was pastor at St. Barnabas and House of Prayer in Newark.

My own grandmother fled to this country at age 13. Maria Isabella was the youngest and only daughter of seven children born to Hyacinth and Joaquin Lima in a little village outside of Lisbon, Portugal. Life had been especially hard after the rise to power of yet another dictator whose oppressive government placed an impossible burden on the people — especially the farmers. My great-grandmother had just died, leaving the ancient heritage of a woman to her girl child: my grandmother was left the task of caring for her father and brothers until they could marry her off in an exchange that could bring an infusion of much needed money — or livestock or grain — into the family.

My grandmother told this story without an ounce of guile or anger. It was just the way it was then. Women were ascribed no greater value than any other property. Indeed, her value was directly related to how much she might bring in barter or trade.

It is not surprising, then, to learn that my grandmother, at age 13, feigned a deeper grief and debilitating melancholy than was actually the case. I suspect that one of her mother’s sisters supposed her little scheme, and devised a plan for my grandmother to spend some time visiting another of her mother’s sisters — in America. So it was that my grandmother came to this country — with a small bag of her clothing and her beloved ‘guitara’ — a Portuguese mandolin — on her back. She was to stay with her aunt in Boston and be hired out to work for some of the Brahmin families on Beacon Hill. She was to return at the end of the year with her savings, which would be used as a dowry to fetch an even better husband to elevate the status of her family.

My grandmother was 14 when she met my grandfather — a tall, handsome man who was a sailor in the Portuguese navy. He was from the islands — the Azores — and my grandmother would always say that she had married beneath her station in life but that, given the other possibilities, she had made a good choice. There was no way she was returning to Portugal to the fate which was laid out for her by her fathers and brothers. At least here in America, she had a chance to determine her own future.

Besides, she loved my grandfather. Or, at least, at age 14, believed she did. Fifty years later she still had pride in her voice when she told me that he might have picked her out of a bevy of eligible women in the neighborhood, but it was SHE who chose HIM to be her husband. Every now and again when she told the story she even giggled when she thought of how outrageous this was for a young girl of her time. What a demonstration of the heady new freedom of this country! Imagine! She actually had a say in the choice of her husband. What other possibilities lay ahead in this Land of Opportunity?

Well, twenty-two. Exactly. That’s how many children she and her husband, August had together. Twenty pregnancies and twenty-two children. She told me once, after a few glasses of my grandfather’s homemade wine, that it was only after her second pregnancy that she connected what she did in bed with my grandfather to the fact of her pregnancies. Only fifteen of her children lived to be adults. By the time I was born, only nine survived — a few uncles having died in the war, a few aunts to influenza and diabetes (before the discovery of insulin) and a one uncle who died in a factory explosion.

I grew up hearing the stories of my aunts and uncles as if they were still alive. Indeed, in my grandmother’s heart, they remained very much alive and lived on as long as her heart continued to beat. Their memory was what provided the fuel for the energy she and my grandfather and uncles poured into the Labor Union Movement in Fall River, Massachusetts where we lived. My earliest memories are of men’s voices around my grandmother’s kitchen table — organizing for benefits for the workers: better wages, decent hours, safer working conditions.

The story of the factory explosion that had taken the life of their first-born son became the galvanizing force of their efforts. When the men went on strike, my grandmother organized the women in the neighborhood to make food for them. I remember conspiring with her to ask my parents for a Red Wagon for Christmas so she and I could better take pots of soup and homemade bread to feed the men on the picket lines.

And, as the strike wore on and their wives and children began to appear at noon, we fed them too… adding water to the soup to make it stretch. It was my first understanding of living the gospel miracle of the Feeding of the Five Thousand.

It was during these years, listening to the stories of the men and women who had come to this country for the chance to build a better life, that I heard the words of inscribed on the Statue of Liberty through the filter of the Gospel message of Matthew. The poetry of Emma Lazarus is inscribed on a tablet in the pedestal of the Lady with the Lamp:

" . . . Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door."

Even as a child, it was not a difficult task to hear these words as an echo of the words of Jesus. "Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden in light."

I learned the deeper meaning of these words of Jesus through the experience of the immigrants of my youth. I learn them, still, though the experience of the new immigrants, those who make their way to these shores from the war-torn countries of Africa and oppressive governments in Europe and Asia.

The words of Oscar Wilde resonate with the words of St. Paul in today’s epistle (Romans 7:15-25a), "We are all of us in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars." There is one reason that the yoke of the Gospel is easy and the burden of a life in Christ is light. One reason which can be expressed in one word. And, that word is this: hope. The hope that one’s life is worth more than the work one can accomplish in one day. The hope that one’s life is worth more than the circumstances one finds oneself in. The hope that the future we build today will be better for our children and our children’s children.

This hope is an ancient hope. It was the hope of Rebecca and Isaac. It was the hope of my grandparents, Maria and August Lima Medeiros. It was the hope of my parents, my father John, who fought in World War II and my mother, Lydia, who helped to organize the Lady Garment Worker’s Union. It is the hope of the new immigrants who come into this country every day, who live in Newark and Jersey City, Paterson and Union City. And, truth be told, it is the hope of the children and grandchildren of immigrants — of me and you and people like us who are sitting next to you in these pews who have not lost touch with the stories of their own families — their own heritage.

…the problem with this great country of ours is not urban decay or the threat of terrorism, or any of the other "problem-solving-by sound-bites" which is a method promoted by the news media. The greatest problem with this country is that we forget our stories.

If you do not remember your story, then there will be little joy in your holiday celebration. The noise of the fireworks will seem a rude intrusion on an otherwise lovely summer’s night. Recalling the imagery in the words of Jesus, it will be as if someone played the flute and you did not dance.

Remembering your own story will help you remember the story of the foundation of this country. More importantly, remembering your story will help you enter into and live more faithfully these words of Jesus: "Take my yoke upon you and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls."

May God bless America with the wisdom in the Spirit of these words. Amen.

The Rev. Elizabeth Kaeton is a regular contributor to A Globe of Witnesses. Her monthly column is Another Word for Justice. Elizabeth may be reached by email at EMKaeton@aol.com