"Stubborn Twig"—Immigrants, America and the Kingdom of God

This year, 2009, Oregon celebrates 150 years of statehood, and in response the Oregon Library Association has named one particular book as the one all Oregonians should read. I was intrigued by the title and the strong recommendation and checked it out. Stubborn Twig: Three Generations in the Life of a Japanese American Family, written by journalist Lauren Kessler, is a non-fiction narrative attempt to understand one particular part of the American immigration story. Each of the three sections deals with the stories of a different generation of the Matsuo Yasui family, in the setting of Hood River, Oregon.

The first section deals with the issei, Matsuo and his wife Shidzuyo, first generation immigrants from Japan who settled in the community of Hood River in 1905, learned English, converted to Christianity, raised a family of eight children and slowly became productive members of their new community. Yet the laws of the land prevented Asian immigrants (in contrast to European immigrants) from becoming legal citizens.

Kessler writes, “Matsuo could learn English and he could become a Christian, but he could not remake himself into an American, as did millions of early-twentieth century European immigrants….The Statue of Liberty showed her back to the Orient, and this was more than a symbolic gesture of exclusion. Although arrivals from Asia were sometimes welcomed as cheap labor, regardless of how long they lived in America and how Westernized they became, their faces would forever mark them as foreigners. But Matsuo was blinded to the barrier created by his racial differences. He believed intensely, almost single-mindedly, in an idealized version of America, the classic immigrants’ version, where race, class and ethnicity mattered little in a land of unparalleled opportunity, a nation founded on the principles of equality. And while this willful ignorance of the reality of twentieth-century America enabled him to go forth in the world with energy and optimism, it also imbued in him the false hope that he could Westernize himself into full acceptance by the white community. Almost four decades later, he would find out how wrong he was” (p. 18).

“Four decades later” refers, of course, to the bombing of Pearl Harbor, the entrance of the US into World War II, and a dark chapter in the history of our nation in relation to the Japanese American community. On November 12, five days after the news of Pearl Harbor reached Hood River, Matsuo Yasui was arrested as a potential enemy collaborator, and eventually interned in one of the many Japanese concentration camps on the west coast. In time, other family members were interned, though not all in the same camp. More than 110,000 Japanese Americans spent time in the camps. It wasn’t until the end of 1944 that the US Supreme Court ruled that “loyalty is a matter of heart and mind, not of race, creed or color…. Racial discrimination of this nature bears no reasonable relation to military necessity and is utterly foreign to the ideals and traditions of the American people.” This ended the internment, but it did not end the pain and disillusion of its victims. Matsuo was not actually released until the beginning of 1946.

The second section of the book tells the stories of the nisei, the American born children of Matsuo and Shidzuyo, their struggles at always being half in one world and half in another. Much of these narratives takes place in the internment camps. The third section tells the stories of a few of the 27 grandchildren of the Yasui family, the sensei, the acculturated, Americanized citizens of today.

In the introduction to the book, Kessler points to the need to look at both the dark and the light-filled sides of American history: “Yet, despite racism and wartime hysteria—the dark side of this American tale—the Yasuis and tens of thousands of other Japanese families like them succeeded. This country, grudgingly, unhappily, too slowly, gave them that chance. While never forgetting how unnecessarily tortuous the path was for families like the Yasuis, we should also not forget that the path existed. And so we can believe in both versions of America: the light and the shadow, the country that provides opportunity and then works overtime to prevent some people from getting access to it” (p. xiv).

In noting the acculturation of the younger Yasui generations and their full acceptance into the life of Hood River today, Kessler notes that this does not mark the end of racism. Contemporary discrimination across the nation is now directed toward Hispanics, especially towards seasonal laborers whose documentation is uncertain.

This touches us in the Northwest Yearly Meeting of Friends. I’ve recently become involved in a yearly meeting immigration task force, and we’re searching for ways to cooperate with what God wants to do among Hispanics in our midst, many of whom are our brothers and sisters in Christ. One of the tasks that’s been proposed is the gathering of stories that would awaken a tender spirit among Friends and that would also document injustices and cruelty. (Kessler’s book serves as an excellent example of the power of narrative.) We’re joining forces with Mennonites in the area who have a similar concern, and this gives me hope. But we’re still searching for the way forward.

Waiting is hard when the need is great. We need wisdom, and that doesn’t come quickly. In the meantime, in my urge for an active role, I’ve become a participant in a community sponsored school that brings together Hispanics who want to learn English with Anglos who want to learn Spanish. It’s basically a format to encourage people to learn from each other and form relationships. So I’m making new friends, perhaps the most important thing I can do right now.

This coming Sunday, our local Friends meeting is welcoming an Hispanic group that will begin meeting as a Bible study in our facility. This is another opportunity to extend our hands and stand alongside people who have seen more than their share of the shadow side of our country. I hope that this cooperation will become more than two groups of believers sharing the same building. As members of the kingdom of God, there is much more that we share, and I long to live that out in the reality of our worship and our lives.

May God grant us wisdom, show us mercy and give us together the courage to be His people. At this time. In this place.