Long Road back to Italy

The times I think to update my blog are the times when I have no time to do it. To give justice to our experiences preparing for this Italy Mission trip, I would feel the need to spend considerable time; delicately selecting words to appropriately convey our circumstances.

As I may have mentioned, we were asked, and happily accepted the challenge to lead our church on a short term mission trip. Between Stella and I, there are sever countries represented and well over 15 short term mission trip experiences.

Back in May (2018) we purchased our tickets to fly to Rome and take the train to Naples for the 20th Anniversary Festival with Doug Valenzuela and the Evangelical Church there. Our presence is not for our benefit, but to help the Italians with their ministry. The "American" influence has an attraction power which I don't fully understand, and feel that we do not deserve. Italians love Americans.

We have been planning and preparing since before we purchased our tickets, we have been fund raising, and recruiting; Stella taught Italian courses for Americans planning to go, I built Chairs to raise funds, We sent support letters, and the Church held fund raisers. We have been planning booth activities, accepting roles on the missions team, and preparing our affairs at home to allow for the trip. Included in some of these affairs are, finishing up my working role at Interior Technology, Moving out of our apartment, and of course, preparing for our trip. Each of those 3 events constitute a considerable amount of work. Our lives have been turned upside down preparing for this trip. We had even planned to visit Stella's parents for the first time in 2 years. We were going to stay with them for 4 weeks, which everyone is very excited about.

Another matter:

We were required by the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) to apply for renewal 90 days prior to Stella’s Green Card expiration Date.In following this requirement, we filled out paperwork called “Form I-90, Application to renew Permanent Residence”, and sent it in.

We found out last week that the application we sent in was denied due to the Form I-90 not being required. (received a few weeks after the Active Green card expired)We did some research online and discovered we filled out the wrong form. We filled out the correct form, “Form I-571, Application to remove conditions on Permanent Residence”, cut a check for the fee associated with the application, wrote a letter of explanation, and put next day air to the processing facility in CA.We were told at the Portland USCIS office, “unless they can receive, and process the application, you will not be allowed back into the country should you leave. We have flight Itinerary for 6:30AM departure on Monday Morning for Italy. Stella is sitting in the immigration office today checking in on her status hourly, hoping to receive a 60 day travel stamp in her passport. To receive the stamp the Immigration

Department must find the application in the incoming mail, open it, and enter it into their system. They will send a receipt number when this happens. Once we receive the receipt number we can get the Stamp, but not before.

Stella and our Pastor, Dave Morris, spend a few hours calling people of influence with no result. When we first applied for the Green Card, my Uncle Bob suggested we call a congressman for help, so that is what we did. Stella and Dave called the office of Congressman Kurt Schrader, and they were happy to take interest and help us out. The immigration specialist there sent congressional letterhead to the ICE in CA, and informed them that our circumstance was of "Congressional Interest". I do not know if this will help someone find our envelope in what I imagine to be a sea of envelopes, but it sure feels good to know that they are doing what they can to help. 

Little did I know, the Immigration department is approximately 150,000 cases behind with respect to addressing and solving them. I do not know how far behind in opening envelopes and distributing receipts. Their estimate is up to 30 days to get a receipt number after sending in an application. It’s been almost 4 days since we sent in ours. If we do not receive the receipt number today before 2:30pm, we will have to cancel/reschedule our flights. Our entire mission trip and connecting with Stella’s family after 2 years will most likely be be scrapped.

80 Americans in Italy will be down to a total of 2 translators, the logistics team will be down a driver, and our church team will be without their team leaders. God is big. He is more than capable of not only opening an envelope, but also of filling in gaps should we be sitting this trip out. Please pray that someone at Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) finds the envelope!