International Women's Day!

Today is International Women’s Day. My Facebook newsfeed is full of stories from pages I have liked—pages of non-governmental organizations serving refugee women, survivors of human trafficking, and other vulnerable women.

I have long been honored to be a woman. The first time I felt it was a privilege was the summer of 2012, in a refugee reception center in eastern Hungary. It was there that I recognized my place in the international community of women, there that I recognized that I have a place there, that I belong.

You see, sometimes I do not feel worthy of the honor of calling myself part of the world’s community of women. Even today, as I woke up and remembered the date, I also remembered my frequent complaints about my relatively easy and certainly good life.

Every morning at about five, I wake up in a warm bed, in a house that lavishes me with space and comfortable chairs to sit in. Every morning I choose what to eat for breakfast, put on a warm coat and durable shoes, and walk one mile to my job, where I work hard and it is stressful, but no where near as stressful or as hard as working in a factory or doing manual construction, or farming, or raising children, or living in a war zone, not having clean water, good health care, good relationships, etc. etc. Sometimes, I simply do not feel worthy of this honor God has given me.

By honor, I do not mean my easy life, I mean being a woman. How I live my good life leaves me not feeling worthy of the way God has made me because my hardships probably sound like a vacation to many of the community I have been ushered into. In the midst of this, I remember the women I met in Hungary.

While I will probably always feel a twinge of unworthiness to be part of this community, the women in the refugee camp did not seem to begrudge us our place there. The beautiful, wise, strong women I met in Hungary knew who they were, that they were strong and beautiful, that they had been through horrific hardships, and yet they did not look down on us for our easy lives. They lived. We lived. We met each other and talked of the usual things (marriage, parties), we ate together, drank tea, and danced. We talked about the hardships and we talked about clothes. We shared one commonality. We spent hours together, simply. They will forever be part of my story and I will forever be part of theirs.

I came away from that place knowing that I am part of the world’s community of women. We are extravagantly different. We have hard lives and easy lives and that is how it is. And I, though I often feel unworthy, am honored to be part of it. And, I'm amazed at how God has made us. Nothing I did let me be part of this community, it was all God, and WOAH. Just, WOAH.

Happy International Women’s day, you magnificent creations!