By Hallie J Carl
In Part One of A Family Exiled (which I would ask you read first if you haven’t already), I shared my journey over the last year of pain and hurt. In this difficult season, I lost something very important. Hope.
I didn’t sense it’s absence because in its place I was filled with so many other emotions and feelings. They were heavy and left me breathless. They were loud and they plagued me. There was no room for something like hope to exist anymore. While my soul needed to become reacquainted with this old friend, my circumstances boxed me into a very hopeless place.
As a believer in Jesus, I know that my hope should come from Him.
In my life experience, I know He uniquely uses both people and creation to bring about hope. He is creative.
But right now, my hope was lost:
My dream job gone. A flock I cared for desperately, lost from me.
My children hurting. Wounded and angry.
Our family broken and confused. Bruised and anguished.
My husband and I endlessly discussing how we got to this place, how this could possibly be our new reality? I felt disembodied, as if the life I was meant to live was carrying on without me.
We were sojourners in a strange and unforgiving land, desperately needing a Good Samaritan to bring us to safety and to help bind our wounds. This went beyond thoughts and prayers, which were plentifully offered. I was laying wounded and bleeding out.
Parable of the Good Samaritan from Luke 10:
And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?”
He said to him, “What is written in the Law? How do you read it?”
And he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.”
And he said to him, “You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live.”
But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”
Jesus replied, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him and departed, leaving him half dead. Now by chance a priest (a religious official) was going down that road, and when he saw him he passed by on the other side. So likewise a Levite (a religious official), when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan (a foreign person, an outcast, often looked down upon by religious people), as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion. He went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he set him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him. And the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, ‘Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.’ Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?” He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” And Jesus said to him, “You go, and do likewise.”
Since July, 2022, I have felt depleted in a way I never have before. A simple conversation with someone will leave me drained for the day. I know this is due to the amount of trauma, PTSD, depression and anxiety* I am carrying along as a constant companion. I also began to experience disassociation.* Very suddenly I will feel a wave of nausea and see the room spin around me.
(*For those of you that may be wondering, I have been diagnosed with major depressive disorder, anxiety, disassociation, PTSD and trauma by both my therapist and psychiatrist. When I use those words, I do not use them lightly.)
These companions are unrelenting, heavy and stubborn. I would be triggered by the smallest things. A drive toward the vicinity of the church. A song that cued a memory of an event over the last 27 years. A photo of me with in ministry would bring on deep pain.
Pictured above: Me speaking at a women’s retreat in 2018
A few months ago I made plans with an extended family member, Shauna. I wasn’t sure what I expecting. It had been well over a decade since I had seen her. She has been incarcerated and recently been released. As I touched base and we made a plan for lunch, I wondered if I had enough emotional bandwidth for this encounter?
I sat across from her in a booth and ordered a Diet Coke. She ordered a Shirley Temple with extra cherries.
Over breadsticks, salad and pasta, she shared with me. I mostly listened, occasionally asking a question. She was articulate and transparent.
Shauna’s origin story is a tragically hard one. She met so many challenges from her birth and they continued into adulthood.
Her mother was sexually assaulted while an inmate in the Arizona State prison system by a guard, which resulted in a pregnancy. A prison birth. Little baby Shauna taken immediately from her mom.
*This drawing is from the Drapetomania Collective (see below)
Unfortunately, after Shauna’s mom was released from prison, her mental health difficulties and life hardships lead her to die by suicide. Shauna was only five. Unfortunately, from there, life presented challenge after challenge for Shauna. Eventually, the road of life took her to a horrifying moment:
“After Shauna survived a brutal domestic attack by her husband, who strangled her so badly he damaged her vocal cords and she was unable to speak for weeks, Shauna fell into deep and dangerous depression. She found herself traumatized, unsupported and in dangerous settings surrounded by drugs, just hoping to cope with depression by ‘being around people who made me feel better, made me feel alive, because I was so dead inside.’
– Drapetomania Collective
When Shauna was arrested, her child was taken away from her, in the same way and by the same system that separated her from her mother.”
Shauna recalled when her baby was taken from her, “This moment felt like death. I cried and cried. I couldn’t even say goodbye to my baby boy who was only 5-months-old. I am still devastated.“
As she spoke of her time incarcerated, Shauna recalled, “Each morning I had to get up and tell myself to not believe the words that were spoken to me by prison guards or other inmates. Worthless, stupid, nothing. I had to remind myself that I had a future and so much to be grateful for. I had to remember who I really was.”
These words caused a mental image of her opening her eyes each day for 10 years and making the difficult decision to believe the truth instead of a lie. To ignore the messages of those who were in power over her, those meant to protect, but rather humiliated, insulted and sometimes abused her.
I was encouraged by her strength. Her resilience. Her ability to remember who she was when others were saying destructive and harmful things to her. Assuming things about her. Speaking identity statements over her that are not, nor were they ever, true.
She worked hard during her incarceration. She applied and was accepted into several programs. She earned a degree, she applied for a job that many people tried to get but she received due to hard work and determination. This job paid her enough that she was able to help her three older children as they grew up. She paid all restitution and prison fees. When released she still had a decent savings, enough to pay for rent four months in advance and have a savings to lean back on until she was employed.
While incarcerated she also worked on a project called Drapetomania Collective http://www.drapetomaniacollective.org . It is an Arizona-based, inside-out, underground formation of formerly and currently incarcerated women and their impacted comrades on the outside.” Shauna (by another name in the study), is a contributor to this project.
Something stirred in my heart as she shared her story. It rose up in me, blooming. It caused a lift in my soul. While there was so much pain and hardship in her life experiences, I sat across not only a survivor, but someone who made a conscience choice to take steps forward even though the message loud and clear being spoken to her was hopelessness and finality.
As I bore witness to her story, it watered my dehydrated heart. It began to beat again with a a different rhythm.
She asked me questions about my life. I updated her, giving an abbreviated glimpse into the last year of our lives. She listened, she leaned in, she felt my pain. She empathized. Mercy poured out.
After 3 hours at Olive Garden we drove back to her rental house where she invited me in. She had decorated it with colorful towels, bright items. It looked as far from a cell as possible. It was warm and friendly.
She asked if she could read me a speech she wrote in prison.
Yes. Absolutely yes.
She asked if she could read me a poem she wrote.
Yes. Absolutely yes.
She asked me if I would like to see her journal from prison.
Yes. Absolutely yes.
This sojourner in a strange land found that God was using Shauna to bind up her wounds. What may seem like an unlikely Good Samaritan, is actually not.
For those unfamiliar with Biblical story, remember it was the religious or “righteous” people that passed a severely injured man, crossing to the other side of the road. But the one who saw the need of the wounded was a traveler often spoken to as less than, who saw someone hurting and went out of his way to care for this stranger. To show mercy on him. To show God’s likeness.
I got in my car to drive home from Phoenix, and I felt something new inside of me. I couldn’t pinpoint what I was feeling. Then it hit me:
–HOPE–
A Psalm 17 says, “As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness; when I awake, I shall be satisfied with your likeness.” I had spent four hours with someone who reflected the likeness of Jesus to me. And it satisfied a part of me that I didn’t know the depth of how unsatisfied it was.
As I reflect on the last year, I am saddened that my hope was another casualty to what my family endured. I never would have anticipated that sitting across someone who was freshly out of prison and hearing her story would cause hope to renew. Or that this beautiful person would display the likeness of Jesus to me.
I am learning that hope springs up from unlikely places. And that is what makes it so special. He uses the most unlikely events to show Himself to us. Hope’s spontaneity invites us in to feel it take root. What a beautiful thing that when hope arrives, it echos Jesus to us. His love. His presence. His likeness.
*Pictured Above: Shauna
For mother’s day, I got a tattoo. It is four redwood trees, clustered together. The redwood species are the “tallest of all living things,” according to the National Park Service. They can grow to be over 300 feet and can live for over 2,000 years.
The most interesting thing to me about these gigantic trees is their roots. They are only 6-12 feet deep which is very shallow, especially for these giants. Also, they do not have what most trees have, which is a taproot. A taproot has a very important function, it provides stability. So, one might wonder how do some of the tallest trees in the world not have one?
How do these redwoods get this tall and strong, surviving storms, floods, earthquakes and landslides?
These magnificent trees have a magnificent secret. Those roots, while shallow, spread outwards. 60 to 80 feet outwards. This means that those roots holding up these giants, are knit together with the roots of other redwoods for extra stability.
The four trees on my arm are the four Carls. The storms, earthquakes, landslides and floods of this life have grown out root systems to support each other.
While we are still learning how to support each other well, our roots are wide and intertwined, supporting each other when others couldn’t or wouldn’t or didn’t know how to.
As time has passed, there have been those who have allowed their roots to intertwine with us, strengthening us. All different types of people with stories of their own pain, loss and confusion. All displaying the likeness of Jesus, whether they thought they were or not. It is has been a beautiful display to me of God’s goodness.
As you read in part one, my hurt is deep. It is visceral. I am not ashamed of that.
When I hit publish on the first part of A Family Exiled, immediately, I had a trauma response. I began to shake, my eyes began twitching. I tried to take a moment to understand what I was feeling.
In this moment, where my body was reacting, it was telling me something. I now know it was telling me how desperately I needed “co-regulation.”
Some of you may have heard of “self-regulation.” This is when we offer ourselves concern, empathy, mercy and compassion in traumatic or difficult moments. There is also “co-regulation,” which KJ Ramsey says, is someone “suffering with and alongside us to soothe us into safety at the place our bodies most need.” I was more thirsty for co-regulation that I ever could have imagined.
So 15 minutes after publishing the blogpost, I began to get messages. Texts, comments on social media, emails. The amazing thing was:
They were supportive, caring and loving.
“Empathy isn’t the antithesis of the gospel.
– KJ Ramsey, The Lord is our Courage
It’s the incarnation embodied and extended,
as far as the curse is found. You are a friend of God–all of you.
That which we have been silencing might
be the substance of our greatest healing.
When we compassionately pay attention to the
parts of others and ourselves that have been
silenced and shamed,
we internalize a story of integrity.
We learn to live like our whole selves are being
sought by Shepherd who is determined to see us thrive.”
So as support began pouring over me instead of judgement, I began to feel hope arise again. I didn’t know that on a deep level I was bypassing the pain I had been holding, because it was just too hard to bear. But in that, I was also bypassing a part of healing that had remained untouched.
I was stunned to have the empathetic witnesses come out of the woodwork. I was no longer a disembodied voice.
I read message after message from my blog to the family. Some were specifically directed to one son or the other. Some made me cry tears of joy. Others were raw with people’s own hurts. By using my voice, I had somehow made a place were people felt safe to share their own pain.
But the mental health stories were the ones that I felt the deepest. We were not alone. So many others had difficulties due to bipolar disorder, depression, schizophrenia, anxiety, and more.
Unfortunately, a lot of these hard moments with mental illness occurred in church settings. Conversely, a few have found churches that love them in that space well. Which is beautiful.
Well over 200 people have messaged me in some form, and over 2,600 people have read A Family Exiled.
A few days in, I had someone that doesn’t know me very well slanderously accuse me that I was no longer following Jesus. The fact that I had pain from a church and spoke about it has nothing to do with my relationship with Jesus. In fact, this judgement made me angry and protective. We need to tread very carefully when we step into thinking we can judge or assume where people are spiritually.
The question we get asked the most: Where are you going to church now? The sign of spiritual health is not hopping into a new church community when you have stepped out of one. It is actually healthy to have some time to heal before you seek what He has next for you.
But for those who are curious, I will put your assumptions at rest.
I love Jesus. I follow Jesus. That never, ever stopped.
However, there are many people who have been hurt by churches who are on tender ground there. Church can equal Jesus to many, the lines blurring between who Jesus is to them, and who the church body is to them. Jesus is the Savior. The church is a group of people who are trying their best to lead flocks well, but sometimes fail or seem hypocritical. So when the church hurt us, or people in the church hurt us, it causes a lot of questions about Jesus.
It is so important to hold those people tenderly when they share. That space is a sacred space. Not a space to judge or assume.
All this is not to say that the last year has been easy for me spiritually, and that I always feeling His comforting presence. Sometimes He has seemed absent and quiet. Sometimes I have been angry at Him, repeating questions like, “how did you allow this to happen?” I will continue to bring these questions to the King of Kings, the Great Physician.
Jesus is very patient. He is there for us even when we don’t want Him to be. That is what his stedfast love is. Enduring, stubborn, lasting love. Nothing breaks that. His love is stronger than any tap root of a tree, or root system of redwoods.
After months of meetings, there was a moment toward the end of last year, where the entire elder board (a church leadership committee) at the church finally met with the entire Latvia team. This was the first time we had all been together since our plane landed in Arizona in July 2022.
After sharing an awkward meal, one of the elders opened the meeting in prayer and then began.
He shared that if they could go back,
they wouldn’t have let Caleb go on the trip.
He also shared that if they could go back,
they would have put Caleb and Lee on a plane home
after Caleb’s manic episode rather than having them stay in Latvia.
There was no explanation about this. There was no consideration to Caleb and his feelings.
Feelings are messengers and emotions are guides. The way my body was shaking, the tears pouring from my eyes, my mouth dry, my throat tight told me many things. My body told me I was hurt and outraged.
It was wrong when our team was chosen, to say that God had brought the team together, if they would later retract that statement.
It is wrong to presume that putting a manic young man on a plane and to fly them home in a emotional state is a good idea. It is actually very harmful.
To be clear, the elder board knew about Caleb’s bipolar disorder prior to the trip. They had even share that it was good for him to go because it would help students in Latvia who had mental health struggles. That God could use Caleb as an encouragement.
So, to come out publicly with a decision and state in a meeting to everyone there that you wish you could have excluded them, that is not a loving thing. It is just a rejection.
Just because things did not go “well” or something “bad” happened doesn’t mean that God wasn’t there. It also doesn’t give you permission to say their presence was a mistake.
On July 4th, the 2023 Latvia team got on a plane, flying off to that beautiful Baltic sea and people we love deeply. The day marked one year since we left for Latvia in 2022. Just writing these words, have filled my eyes with tears.
I am praying for the camps and the students at them. I will be praying for them to encounter the living God. The one who is patient with all of us, even when we cannot be.
As I close this today, I want to say a few things.
Some of you have asked me about forgiveness. I will continue to direct you to my post entitled The Fifth Web. In it I share about the journey of forgiveness and how God has met me in it.
The work of forgiveness is an ongoing one. I have questions in my heart about how to fully forgive people who can’t see they have hurt you, that think that you were the one at fault, when you see it the complete opposite way. I am not ashamed that this is a process for me. This is truthful and not me trying to hide something that I am not.
Secondly, I recognize that if you still call the church that hurt us home, I understand and am not trying to change that. It is filled with beautiful people, people whom I still count as some of my best friends. I understand this is our experience and our perspective and other people have different ones.
If you have questions, ask them. To us, but also to the leadership at the church. I know they would like to respond to those wondering. I would not want to stop those conversations at all. Hearing all of the people has always been a good idea.
Yesterday, the woman who gave me a pedicure, had some pain relief patches on her shoulders. I asked her if she was hurting. She shared about her back pain and how hard it was to work more than two days a week. She shared that her coworkers work 7 days a week and have trouble understanding her limitations. She said, “It is because they haven’t experienced what I have.”
That sat with me all day. For all of you reading, you can’t know exactly what I felt. You can’t know exactly what the 2022 Latvia team felt. You cannot know what the church leadership felt. And neither can I. Those feelings are all important and worth hearing. But for the sake of my healing and my heart, I wanted to share my experiences with you, even though you haven’t had the same ones. Our stories, the messy and the beautiful are meant to be told.
May we each walk the paths of life as Good Samaritans, not being afraid or scared by people’s pain, but willing to be the one who shows mercy.
“Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?” He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” And Jesus said to him, “You go, and do likewise.” Luke 10:36-37
Storytime with Hallie 
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