'Our ladies' of Antioch: Waco church rejoicing following rescue of captive missionaries
By TERRI JO RYAN Tribune-Herald staff writerFrom http://www.wacotrib.com/auto/feed/news/2001/11/16/1005891029.21267.5060.7577.html
In a rescue described as a "miracle" by one aid worker, and as thrill-a-minute as any spy novel, eight employees of Shelter Now International were liberated from a Ghazni, Afghanistan, prison Wednesday morning by anti-Taliban rebels shooting the locks off the doors.
John Mercer hugs his daughter, Heather Mercer, after she was set free from an Afghan jail. (AP photo)
It was a Northern Alliance force and they were suddenly liberated by an armed man shouting: “Azad! Azad!” — “Free! Free!”
The astonished detainees were led into the streets, where friendly crowds thronged around them, offering food and the women clothing. Ghazni is located about 50 miles from Kabul, where they had been held for most of their 105-day confinement.
As they waited for the U.S. helicopters to take them to freedom, the eight aid workers were concerned they could not been seen on the ground. It was plucky American Heather Mercer's idea to remove their Islamic head scarves and full-body burkas and use them to start a small brush fire that became a beacon for their liberators.
“It was like a miracle,” Georg Taubmann said of the rescue. Taubmann, Kabul manager of Shelter Now International, and his comrades in the German-based charity were reunited early Thursday with relatives in Islamabad, the Pakistani capital, after spending Wednesday night at an undisclosed air base.
"Thanksgiving has come early to Islamabad, Pakistan," reported a jubilant Jimmy Seibert, pastor of Antioch Community Church in Waco.
Speaking to two dozen reporters from across the nation Thursday morning, Seibert — who left for Pakistan late Thursday for a weekend reunion with Mercer, 24, and Dayna Curry, 30 — related the jubilation of his 1,100-member congregation, which had maintained a 24-hour prayer vigil for the safe return of the two missionaries.
"It was wonderful to see with our own eyes the answers to our prayers," he said, noting the television coverage of the captives' release.
Seibert said he learned some of the harrowing details of the imprisonment from the women in a 20-minute phone call he made Thursday morning. It is a narrative, the pastor said, that is as action-packed and tension-filled as any Hollywood movie.
After being removed from the prison in Kabul, an action they initially thought meant their imminent release, the detainees were driven several hours south of the former Taliban capital. In Wardak Province, they were locked overnight into a steel shipping container with no blankets to fight the cold. The containers, war correspondents report, are remnants of the once thriving smuggling trade and the kind of place that Taliban forces have used to torture and suffocate prisoners in.
Until the aid workers climbed aboard the helicopters for the flight to Pakistan, they really didn't feel free, he said. Curry and Mercer, both Baylor University graduates, couldn't sleep for all the excitement surrounding their release. But they showered and and "got their hair done," Seibert said.
They cannot comprehend that their confinement became an international news event, and that two women from Waco could generate this much attention, he said. "I told them, 'Hey guys, remember, whatever you say the whole world is listening'," Seibert said. He reported they laughed at the very thought.
The regular Wednesday night service at Antioch Community Church turning into "two hours of shoutin' and dancin' and praise," with all the good news, Seibert said. But even that gathering offered just a small taste of the warm welcome his congregation will offer upon the return of Mercer and Curry.
The two Central Texans will likely return to their hometowns for a visit after Thanksgiving day, and Seibert said he hopes they will return to Waco for a community homecoming sometime in December.
Kevin Johnson, an associate pastor at Antioch, said "We'll be sure to have a hoe-down celebration."
Danny Mulkey, another associate pastor at Antioch, was in Afghanistan and Pakistan for more than eight weeks, seeking Mercer and Curry's release. Seibert said Mulkey would be headed home soon, and could be back in Waco by Wednesday — just in time for Thanksgiving dinner with his family and football on TV.
A season ticket-holder for Baylor football, Mulkey will be able to catch the last game of the 2001 season at noon Nov. 24 in Waco against Southern Illinois.
Seibert reached Mulkey before the church's man in Islamabad went to bed. Mulkey reported that everyone was feeling well-fed after dinner at the German ambassador's home, and that the captives, who hadn't slept for three days, were finally ready to close their eyes. Before they left, though, Mercer and Curry sang some of the songs they had composed in their 105 days as prisoners of the Taliban.
Shelter Now detainee Silke Duerrkopf said the group sang religious songs — and made up other, less pious tunes. One, by the Americans, featured the refrain, “I hate this place, I wanna go home!”
Curry and Mercer had also received a "very fatherly, loving and compassionate" telephone call from President George W. Bush early in the day, Johnson said. Mulkey reported that the women were ebullient.
In a news conference Thursday at Crawford High School, near his ranch, Bush — whom Seibert praised as a "man of prayer" who had "carried the girls in his heart" during their three-month confinement — hailed the dramatic turn of events.
“They both said to say thanks to everybody for their prayers,” Bush said of his conversation with Mercer and Curry. "They realized there is a good and gracious God. Their spirits were high and they love America.”
Seibert said the two Americans and their families will be taken to a location in Central Europe where they will meet with a team of professional counselors for a "de-briefing."
"And then we'll see what the Lord has for them next," he said.
The pastor would not name the exact location, saying the Currys and Mercers need time out of the media glare to process all that has happened to them. He explained that they will have an opportunity to work through their feelings and learn to deal with their new-found "notoriety." While it is not the first time his organization has had to de-brief missionaries returning from the field, he said, it is certainly the most in-depth case he's had to handle yet.
The co-director of Shelter Now International, Joachim Jager, said in Germany that the eight aid workers planned to take a few weeks to recover from their ordeal.
Johnson said the experts from Shelter Now are orchestrating the de-briefing, because they have experience "in extreme situations, such as these." The families all agree with this decision for a retreat from the spotlight, he said.
While the women had been warned that Afghanistan was a volatile place, and that they were placing themselves in danger, Johnson said, even local church leaders didn't realize the full extent of the hazards involved.
Asked if the two Americans will head back to Afghanistan and the missionary life, Seibert replied, "We haven't gotten into that yet."
Seibert said his mental state has traveled from sober reality to intoxicating joy. He said he wasn't able to fall asleep until 4 a.m. Thursday — grinning as he hit the pillow and rising up with a smile a few short hours later.
In addition to Taubmann and Duerrkopf, the other employees of Germany-based Shelter Now International who were captured after Mercer and Curry were arrested Aug. 3 by the Taliban were Germans Margrit Stebnar and Kati Jelinek, and Australians Peter Bunch and Diana Thomas. The 16 Afghan natives arrested in August with them were released after the Taliban fled Kabul, wire reports say.
For all the Taliban has put his group through, Taubmann said, “We are Christians and the Bible tells us we must forgive them. Some people have been very bad to us, but we don’t want to see any revenge.”
As Seibert put it Thursday at the news conference: "We aren't against anyone, we're for Jesus."
Taubmann said the group intended to resume its work once security is restored.
Terri Jo Ryan can be reached at tjryan@wacotrib.com or at 757-5746. The Associated Press and Cox News Service contributed to this story.
© 2001 Cox Newspapers, Inc.
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