“If Only We Knew Who They Were”
11 May 2016 • Blog Post
Refugees are like you and me. They have different worries from us—instead of worrying about what needs to be done at home, what’s for dinner, and what’s going on at work, they worry about fleeing their homelands, feeding themselves and their families, and finding jobs in strange countries—but like us, they are God’s children. At this moment, these beloved children of God are strangers to most of us, and we to them.
The refugee crisis, though relevant today, is not a new phenomenon. Years ago, Elder Marion D. Hanks reminded us of the plight of these suffering and outcast souls:
They can never go home again. Their home isn’t there; the street isn’t there; the people aren’t there; their loved ones aren’t there, and very frequently they are not with them either. They are casualties of war.
After a call to action in this past general conference, I wondered about these refugees—Who are they, and how can I serve them? Reading their stories, I couldn’t help but be overwhelmed by the Spirit for these precious people. In my limited amount of space, I can only share one story that touched me most, but there are many more (even within Elder Hanks’s address) that I would encourage you to seek out and be inspired by. As you read, I invite you to remember that these stories are true, that each of these people live or have lived, and people such as these are living today, perhaps within your community. To quote Elder Hanks,
The refugees are not undesirable or weak people. Sometimes we get the notion they are different from us. They are different, all right, in that they have lost substantially everything we hold dear. But they are not different in their aspirations and their intelligence and their ties with families and their emotions and their desires.
Our Savior, the Refugee
During a cultural orientation class in a refugee camp, some sister volunteers taught about Christmas and Christ’s nativity story. At the end of the story the students remarked, “Why, that sounds like a refugee story. . . . And no one knew who that baby was, did they? Because if they did, they would have gladly given up their own beds.’” In response to this, the sister teaching wrote:
These words have haunted me: “And no one knew who they were.” That’s my own feeling about the refugees. If we only knew who they are, we would do anything for them. But not many know, and so many seem not to care. So they suffer and remain here, obscure, despised, ignored, rejected, homeless, hungry, mocked.
“If we only knew who they are,” would we do more? I would invite each of us (myself included) to take a moment out of our busy days to consider what ways we might be able to make at least a small difference in these brothers’ and sisters’ lives.
For more information on how you can join the refugee cause go to iwasastranger.lds.org.
Aubrey Milligan Zalewski is an editorial assistant for BYU Publications & Graphics. She enjoys short walks on the beach and long naps on the couch. Her hobbies include catching comma splices, creating parallel structure, and shortening run-ons. She’d say that she considers language an artform, but that would be incorrect; it’s “art form.”
