Finding beauty beyond walls

Last year, biblical and religious studies major Mindy (Harmeling) Abraham ’05—under the pen name Sonora Brown—wrote “Beauty Beyond the Walls,” a book about her journey through Afghanistan and how her interactions with the women who lived there strengthened her relationship with God. 

Before becoming a published author, she enrolled at Eastern University in St. Davids, Pennsylvania, to purse a Master of Business Administration. While in the program, she learned of an opportunity to intern at a non-governmental organization (NGO) and to help start an importing business in Afghanistan.

After much consideration, she remembered something her religion professors at Messiah College had said: Travel to a Muslim country to see the world in a different context. So, she packed her suitcase and boarded a plane for Afghanistan.

Once she arrived, Abraham connected with female survivors of war. One of those women worked as a janitor at Abraham’s office. On her small salary, the woman supported seven children, an ill husband and a disabled sister. The two women began meeting for lunch weekly, where Abraham listened to stories of the Russian invasion and living in constant fear of the Taliban. This connection, and others like it, inspired her to write a book about her experiences in Afghanistan.

“Once I had the title ‘Beauty Beyond the Walls,’ I began reshaping the book around the theme of finding beauty in Afghanistan beyond the physical walls there and the invisible walls we as Westerners put between ourselves and places we don’t understand, like Afghanistan,” she explained.

Today, she works overseas in the country of Lebanon as an international development and humanitarian worker. She heads a support department that helps provide health care, clean water and shelter for Syrian refugees. Reflecting on her Afghanistan experience, Abraham said, “Jesus took me to a place where I was totally alone and broken. He was more than enough. Experiencing this changed me.”

— Emily Koontz ’20