children's prison.

this week, my aunt took us to a children's prison on the outskirts of the city.  kamp, as i'll call it, is a "children's rehabilitation centre" that was started, we think, by the british back in the 1950s or so.  when my aunt's friend, the director of foodstep, first came to the prison two years ago, the two hundred children living there were all naked so that they wouldn't run away and would be easily spotted by local villagers who would return them for a reward.  children from babies through 18 years were staying together, boys and girls in the same dorms, dirty and malnourished.  they had no access to running water, medical care, education.

my family with the kids who were around at kamp.

so why are these children in a prison?  a variety of reasons, or lack of reasons.  some of them have committed crimes, but these are very few.  one teenage girl is there because her stepfather was raping all the girls in her village, and she was next; so she hit him on the head with a lead pipe, which led to his death and her imprisonment.  another sixteen year old boy is in the prison for "playing sex."  some of the children are there because their father remarried and their stepmother wanted them out of the house.  some of their parents took them their because they were being "too bad."  (my parents sometimes jokingly threatened to send us to finishing school for poor manners, but i cannot imagine being taken by my parents to a prison for acting out at home.)  some children there are orphans with no where else to go.  and many, mostly the very young children, were rounded up in downtown kampala for begging on the streets (usually with mom watching nearby) and brought to the prison for begging.  these little ones are the victims of generational, systemic poverty, and all they know is how to beg.

being at kamp broke my heart.  there are close to two hundred children there right now, but during our visit, many of them were at school.  in this, there is hope.  the work of foodstep has brought running water, sponsors for children to go to school or vocational training, clothing, supplemental nutrition like milk, hygiene products.  foodstep has also advocated for several of the children who were there for no real reason other than being orphans to be released to a home that the non-profit runs.  during our time at kamp, we visited the five children who were in the local health clinic, where other children were taking care of them despite lack of medical attention or knowledge of local health workers about their conditions.  it was meaningful for me to be at the bedside with these little boys and girls, amazing how comfortable i felt despite language, age, and cultural differences to hold a hand, bring water, provide presence, thanks to joseph's house.  we then went to the children's worship service, where the kids sang many songs and shared testimonies.  this was one of the most hilarious moments of the day - the kids were singing a song that i didn't recognize or understand.  the song went:  "Jesus is a weein-ah man, a weein-ah man, a weein-ah man, a weein-ah man."  my sisters and i exchanged glances - what in the world were they saying?  Jesus is a weiner man??  it wasn't until the next stanza that we got it:  "satan is a los-er man, a los-er man, a los-er man, a los-er man."  haha.

sitting at the bedside with one of the girls in the clinic.

after worship, we walked past a cell where six children had been locked up for about two weeks.  they hadn't received food that day.  they had no shirts on - they were in "black out."  we touched their hands as they reached through the bars.  again, the tears were close.  as we walked back towards the cars, we played with the kids, doing hand clap games, exchanging english words for luganda ones for hand, sun, eye, head, drawing pictures in the dirt.  we gave them some toothbrushes and other things that we'd brought.  as we were leaving, several of the little ones made a motion with their hand, from their mouth to outstretched, asking for money.  i had none, and it broke my heart that this is all they knew to ask for.  love is what you need, i wanted to tell them, and that you will always have.

clasping hands with the kids locked in this tiny cell.

playing with some of the kids.

as greg boyle writes in tattoos on the heart (still favorite book!), "recognizing that we are wholly acceptable is God's own truth for us - waiting to be discovered."  these children have been told they are bad, they are useless except for begging, that they must be hidden away, punished.  the truth that i want for each one of them and for all of us is that they, that we, are loved, deeply loved, and that is our deepest truth.  our belovedness defines us at the deepest level - not what we've done or what others say about us, but our wholly acceptableness that God delights in.  i hope and pray that in the next several weeks of spending more time with these children and continuing to support the work of foodstep, that truth will sink deeper and deeper into these kids' hearts, healing the wounds of abuse, neglect, rejection, and criticism.  may we all know more fully our own core goodness and light, and may we live in that light as our deepest truth.