Beech Tree News Network

          Most of us watched the scene of illegal immigrants crossing into the US this week, and the trauma of children separated from parents, and the frustration of border patrol agents trying to uphold the law, while showing compassion to the families, as well.  It is a large problem with no easy fix.  It would be easy to throw up our hands in frustration.  There are, however, people out there doing small things to help refugees fleeing their own countries.

            Omaha, Nebraska, has the largest Sudanese resettlement population outside of Africa.  The refugees that ended up there were fleeing civil war in their own country of South Sudan.  When children arrive in Nebraska from Sudan, they are enrolled in the school system there.  Assimilating into a different culture is challenging, especially for kids. 

            In the fall of 2012, Koang Doluony, a 22-year-old Sudanese MBA student from the University of Nebraska, met with two Sudanese boys to play a game of basketball.  They played on the court at Pulaski Park in South Omaha.  There was a single hoop.  Soon more Sudanese kids were joining the game on Tuesday nights.  When the group grew to 30 boys, they moved to the courts of Christ Community Church in South Central Omaha.  At 100 boys, they started meeting at North High School.

            By the end of that same year, the group of Sudanese boys, who had met on Tuesday nights to improve their basketball skills and hang out with Doluony, became the Omaha Talons, a basketball program where everyone, including Dolluony, was a refugee from South Sudan.

            Doluony came to Omaha from Sudan with his mother and six siblings.  His mother worked long hours to support them.  After school, Doluony and his Sudanese friends gathered at Pulaski Park for games of basketball.  He would eventually play for Indiana State University. The Talons program has given Sudanese boys an environment where they can interact and develop skills that will help them off the court, as well.  It has become the most recent effort to build good will between the city of Omaha and its South Sudanese community.  Talons has grown into a program of coaches and volunteers that help the boys with both academic and social issues.

            Akoy Agau, who plays basketball for Georgetown, first played power forward for Louisville.  He is a Talons success story.  Agau emigrated from South Sudan in 2003.  “Having to learn the customs of America is a big battle.  Being the outsider makes it harder to accomplish goals,” he said.  Agau met Doluony on the basketball court, where Doluony became a mentor for him.  “I started out just like these kids and all it took was for someone to reach out to me,” Agau said.  (Sports.Vice.com; ABC World News)

            There is a passage in Exodus (ch 22 v21) where God says to the children of Israel, “You must not mistreat the foreigners in any way.  Remember you yourselves were once foreigners in the land of Egypt.”

            That verse has crossed my mind many times in the past week.  I’ve had another thought right there beside it.  My ancestors come from England, Ireland and Scotland.  If the American Indians ever decide to take back their native soil, I’ll be put onto a slow boat to Europe.  We are all foreigners.