The Incarnation, a poem

The Incarnation

Let’s talk the “Incarnation”

because it is a big word

for something easy for me

to describe: God the baby.

God, who has the power

to shape-shift, turned himself from

a God into a human.

Sort of. It’s not exactly

that simple. Or…correct. I

may have tried to make this a

little sci-fi, easier

to swallow for we who don’t

like the idea that God

would turn himself into one

of us. We’re kind of screw ups.

Why would he want to be like

us anyhow? And why come

as a six pound, five ounce babe?

I find it impossible

to imagine you teething,

spitting up, dragging your full

diaper on the ground behind

you--you, a God, someone we

call Jehovah Jirah, God

the Provider, who is now

in his crib or trough crying,

wanting milk, needing his mom.

If I were honest, I would

tell you I like you like that:

small, innocent, pathetic,

unable to lift your head

even. Helpless. Like you’re like

me. Like you’re me who’s drowning

in the demands of people

who don’t realize that I

cannot even lift my head.

But I don’t imagine you

like that, not even on Christ-

mas when Nativity scenes

pop up everywhere. I

can’t stop myself from thinking

about you on that cross or

walking on water. You’re a

man with a straggly beard, not a

baby wrapped in tattered cloth.

I don’t picture you as a

babe, but maybe I need to.

Hospitals, sick babies & a remedy

A few weeks ago I got to visit a children's hospital in Sulaimaniah. We went to meet Dr. Aso Faiq Salih, the only pediatric cardiologist in Kurdistan, who's also a dear friend of Preemptive Love Coalition.

Dr. Aso's office was crowded with parents holding crying kids. Instead of having a waiting room outside of an office, Dr. Aso has a couch in the same room as his desk and the table he examines patients.

Dr. Aso is the friendliest doctor I've ever met. He's definitely a pediatric doctor. He's smiley and goofy. When we ask him about his children, he pulls out his cell phone and dotes on his sons.

Alex, Claire and I stood next to Dr. Aso's desk as he did an echo cardiogram of each kid's heart. He talks to us between patients, and sometimes during. Worried mothers look at us suspiciously, as we borrow Dr. Aso's attention. He will look at somewhere around 20 patients a morning. He tells us that he needs an hour with each patient, but time is precious. If he spends 10 minutes with a patient instead, he can see more in a day.

After each echo, Dr. Aso will diagnose his patients. If their problem is minor, he can give the child a prescription or schedule an in-country surgery. But since most heart problems are serious heart problems, he will send them to an organization - like Preemptive Love Coalition - to get help outside Iraq.

The day we visited Dr. Aso, we saw him examine baby Abdul. The 9 month old has a heart problem that will kill him if he doesn't get help. When Alex, Claire and I got back to the office, Abdul and his father had just met with Jeremy (see photo to the left).

We're now raising money to get Abdul to surgery with Remedy Missions in the fall!

--

It would be 100 times easier and quicker to get kids like Abdul into surgery in Iraq, if those treatments were available. But their not. Iraqi doctors just do not have the skills to treat major heart defects like Abdul's.

Doctors like Aso cannot leave the country for training either. Even as a member of the Association of European Pediatric Cardiology, he cannot get training in Europe because he's an Iraqi. This is why it's such an incredible opportunity for us to get Remedy Missions to come in and train Iraqi doctors.


We still need a lot of money to get the doctors here in the fall! PLEASE donate!

Consider donating a week's tithe or giving up a week's worth of lattes.

Do it for cute little Abdul.





Lauren

* photos by Lydia Bullock

She's Always Smiling

A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to meet Honya Mahdi, a 15 month-old who had surgery last November.

I remember reading about her on the PLC blog months ago, when I was first learning about Preemptive Love Coalition. I fell in love with this baby's Dumbo ears and big brown eyes.

Seeing her seven months later, healthy and laughing - it reminded me why I'm here. I'm in Iraq for my professional career, yes. I'm here for my IWU internship, yes. But I'm here because babies are dying in northern Iraq - and I want to help save them.

"She's Always Smiling" The Story of Honya Mahdi from Preemptive Love on Vimeo.

Life in Iraq: education

Yesterday afternoon, Claire and I visited Zeba and Amir in their office, two floors below the Preemptive Love office. One of Zeba's friends was at their shop and we conversed with him about womanhood in Iraq, life in Texas, PLC, autism and education.

He told us that when he was a student, back in the 1980s, the schools were very good and his teachers very knowledgeable. Coincidentally, this was during Saddam Hussein's regime.

Claire and I were confused: why would Saddam invest in education - especially for Kurds - when he was such a tyrant? We thought that most dictators liked to keep their people uneducated so they can't revolt.

We went back upstairs to an empty office - it was past five and the interns had gone home. Jeremy, our boss/friend/PLC visionary, was still around so we asked him if what our Kurdish friend said was true. After a quick Google search, we had our answer.

--

In the early 1970s during the oil crisis, when Americans were lining cars outside gas stations, handing over exponentially more money for gas than they had the previous year, Iraq was getting rich. Off of our money. This isn't a political statement, it's a fact. Because of the oil crisis of 1973, Iraq got wealthy.

Saddam Hussein, who was the vice chairman of the Revolutionary Command Council, used this newly gained money to fund domestic projects. A big part of this was the education system. He established a campaign for "Compulsory Free Education" which made all education - primary through higher ed - free. This is still true for Iraqi public schools today.

The school systems were so good that he won an award from the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization.

--

Today, public schooling is still free for Iraqis. It's free to go to college if your grades are good enough.

Classes are large with 25-40 students. Primary and secondary teachers aren't trained for their jobs. Teachers, like Media, whom I wrote about last week, aren't allowed to teach outside their assigned curriculum. If they are, they're punished. Students aren't punished for bad behavior like cheating, but teachers are punished for their ambition.

When we asked our ESL students if they wanted their kids to attend public schools, all but one emphatically answered, "No!"

--

So what happened? We learned from our ESL students that the public schools in Iraq are not good. How did we get from point A to point B?

Jeremy had some ideas. The Iran-Iraq War started in the early 80s. Since so much money was put into the war, not as much was put into education. The focus shifted.

Or maybe Saddam got scared, like many tyrants do, that his people would out smart him and revolt.

I'm sure there have been books written about this, or at least lengthy essays.

--

When discussing education in our ESL class, one student noted that people don't value what they don't pay for. I read an essay about this, regarding the environment. I see it as the same.

Who's going to invest time and energy into something that has no money invested into it?



Lauren

Remedy Mission

I'm going to be in Iraq in three days.

I'm not going because I'm trying to make a stand for some abstract cause. I'm not going because I see myself as a 21st century expatriate or a hippie or an IWU-approved world changer.

I'm going because little kids are sick and need heart surgeries. I'm going to help them, or help people help them.

--

Preemptive Love has the opportunity to bring Remedy Missions, international pediatric heart surgery teams, to perform 30 heart surgeries in August. (That's a lot of kids!) They will also train local Iraqi doctors and nurses, which means the children won't have to fly to Turkey for surgeries anymore. (That's loads cheaper!)

Please, please donate.
-Donate this week's tithe, or this month's tithe.
-Give up one Starbucks drink a week for the month. (We all know that adds up. ...)
-Deposit all that change in your coin jar, then write a check.
-You know that money you were going to donate to me? - wink! - write the check to PLC instead.
-Like you really need to hit Higher Grounds on the way home from work.
-NECC congregation: I think this is in line with Tony's AWAKEN. (Fast your money??)
-Tax return!

I bet you think I'm giving myself a break. (I wrote the blog. I posted stuff on Facebook and Twitter. I'm going to Iraq. ... blah blah blah.) Well, I'm not letting myself off that easy. I'd be a hypocrite to tell you to donate, and then do nothing myself. So I will. Right after I post this, I'm going to follow the above link and donate.

--

I have two nieces and three nephews, all ten years and under: Austin, Noah, Emily, Taylor and Aaron. I love them. I would do anything for them. I'd watch Thomas the Tank with Noah for hours. I'd let TayTay cry in my arms till Mommy comes home.

I love my nieces and nephews - but their parents love them more. And when they're sick, their moms - my sisters - are scared and nervous and assume the worst.

There are moms in Iraq that feel the exact same way. They dote on their children. They worry about them when they're sick.

But their kids don't have runny noses; they have holes in their hearts.

--

I've said this before: there aren't a lot of things I'm sure about. I doubt a lot about my faith, and I don't always know who I am, but I know that some things matter. Some things matter more than money and religiosity and comfort and patriotism and happiness.

Life is kind of important.
So is love.

Please help make this happen!


-Ezek.