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The thing that strikes you most about Dayna Curry, 30, and Heather Mercer, 25, is how unlikely they seem to be the kind of women who'd become pawns in the war on terrorism. Or that they'd be the central figures in a controversy over a missionary's role in a country that outlaws proselytizing. Today, as they curl up on a couch in a hotel room in their hometown of Waco, Texas, for their TCW interview, they're more like the girls next door.
That girl-next-door image has been reinforced by countless media stories. Yet as the women reflect on the 105 days they spent in the custody of the Taliban in Afghanistan for sharing their Christian faith, a more complex picture emerges. It becomes apparent their troubled pasts led each into a life-changing relationship with Jesus—and to the kind of risk-taking faith that motivated them to serve the "poorest of the poor" in Afghanistan with the relief agency Shelter Germany.
While Heather seriously questioned God during captivity and readily admits "prison was devastatingly hard," she and Dayna still wrote and sang praise songs amidst the mice and filth to the God they'd already seen perform miracles in Afghanistan, to the God they hoped would perform just one more on their behalf.
What hasn't often been discussed is how Heather and Dayna, often shown smiling with arms linked, experienced periods of friction in prison due to the different ways they responded to the crisis of their imprisonment. Yet today they hold a united front when answering tough questions about the "real agenda" of their work in Afghanistan, a controversy stirred by Heather's mother's appearance on Dateline NBC to protest what she considered an illegal mission from the outset. They also speak in unison about their desire to go back to the country where they ironically claim they experienced the greatest sense of freedom ever.
out of the frying pan…A year ago on November 15, the American public couldn't get enough photos of Heather and Dayna in Afghan dresses embracing their parents on an airstrip in Islamabad, Pakistan. Their exuberant smiles said it all: At long last, they were free. This happy ending was preceded by months of confusion, fear, parasites and scorpions, squalid living conditions, and countless prayers for Heather, Dayna, and the six other Shelter workers arrested with them for sharing their Christian faith in a Muslim land. Through the prayers of believers around the world and the efforts of U.S. and anti-Taliban Northern Alliance troops, the group was miraculously freed.
Unfortunately, the drama didn't end in Afghanistan. As the women began making national appearances on TV shows ranging from Larry King Live to the Today show, and in magazines such as People and Glamour, a dissenting voice emerged from the most unlikely place. Heather's mom, Deb Oddy, began making public the protests she'd voiced since her daughter first told her she wanted to go to Afghanistan. When Heather had told her mother of her intentions, Oddy, still reeling from the death of Heather's sister Hannah from a prescription drug overdose just eight months before Heather's proposed departure date, pleaded with her not to go. She feared for her daughter's safety. When Oddy's words seemed to fall on deaf ears, she wrote her congressman and the State Department, carbon-copying Heather on each letter, urging them to stop what she called an "unconscionable, ill-fated mission." But because the trip didn't break any U.S. laws, there was nothing the government could do.
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