At the beginning of December, my students and I participated in a march in solidarity with migrants in transit through Mexico. We walked 20 miles along the train tracks from Huehuetoca to the Methodist church in Apaxco, joining two migrants from Honduras: a father and his 16 year old son.
We started out well, and I naïvely thought it wouldn’t be as difficult as I had imagined. After awhile, though, my backpack started to weigh on me and the sun grew stronger. I slipped on a greasy part of the tracks. I was okay (just covered in grease), but my water got carried off by someone who had stopped to help. My boots felt tight. I was thirsty. I began to wonder if I would make it the rest of the way. We were walking such a small percentage of the journey from Mexico’s southern border to its northern border, yet we were exhausted.
I felt tired and sweaty and thirsty, and as I observed homes and restaurants off in the distance, I felt far from everyday Mexican life. My anger grew. No one should have to live this way, traveling clandestinely and running into thieves, drug cartels, gangs, and exploitative government agents, but U.S. and Mexican immigration policies make it so. I felt in my body a little of what migrants feel every day, and that cemented my frustration with how we treat other people and what our governments have done to do cause this situation. I felt that pain and fatigue in my body, and I won’t soon forget it.
We walked north, towards Mexico’s northern border. The goal is the U.S. for most and Mexico’s industrial northern cities for some (they say there is plenty of work in cities like Monterrey). As we walked, I thought of the U.S. at the end of this 40-day journey—the U.S. on the other side of the border marked by walls and the unforgiving Sonoran Desert. The U.S., my home. I thought of my family waiting for me for Christmas. Some of the people that walk the train tracks towards the north also have family in the U.S. They also think of the U.S. as home. They walk day in and day out to get back there.
Before we began our trek, I had received good news. Isaac, my partner of three years, had gotten approved for a tourist visa to travel to the U.S. After two previous failed attempts and a few years of hoping, this time he had finally been approved. I felt ecstatic—he would finally know my home and my family—and yet on this walk it felt bittersweet. As we walked kilometer after kilometer with our faces towards the U.S., we knew in a few weeks we would fly there together, but we also knew that we couldn’t take along our new friends. Why were we more deserving of a safe travel than them?
When it came time to fly to the U.S., I also thought of my friends from Deportados Unidos en la Lucha. They go to the airport to meet the three planes that arrive every week filled with people getting deported from the U.S.. I was at the airport to fly in the opposite direction. My friends are deportees who call the U.S. home (or a home) and who have family still there who miss them every day. Why am I more deserving of a trip back home than them?
The truth, of course, is that I’m not more deserving. We’re in this situation because of the unequal political and economic power distribution between the Global South and the Global North. We’re in this situation because of xenophobia and racism and racial profiling. Therefore, we can and should give a blanket to a migrant in transit and offer work to a deportee, but we also have to work to dismantle our unjust systems.
When I arrived in the Republic of Nicaragua I found everything very different from Brazil, but I decided to open myself up to new experiences. Without creating expectations, I tried to accept this new country into my life. I chose to prepare myself for the “non-knowledge” of things. I opened myself to the new culture, the new place, and all the POSSIBILITIES that presented themselves to me while I watched everything carefully.
I came curious to work together with an NGO that works on issues of social justice, community development, and health, so after GMF training and training in the capital of the country, I went to the Caribbean Coast and started a cultural immersion that would change my life!
The Autonomous Region of the North Caribbean of Nicaragua is very interesting and fun. Interesting because it is everything different from what I already knew, and fun because that is how I see my learning process and adaptation! I love meeting people, and my biggest investments have been directed to new relationships I’ve made.
Even though sometimes people look at me as if I’m from another planet, it’s fun! Once I was accompanied by my friend from work and a very humble lady asked my Nicaraguan friend, “What country is she from?” I looked at her and answered in Spanish: “I’m from Brazil!” I smiled, but that lady was very embarrassed because I spoke to her without knowing her. After I said my name, she already gained more confidence and continued asking questions!
In Brazil I have always loved going out for a walk and having coffee outside the house every day; this is something important for me. However, in my place of work it is impractical, so I have reorganized my lifestyle. Now I like to make homemade coffee, wash clothes by hand with a specific soap whose smell I love, do exercises in the workshop room of my work (where I live), and sit on the porch talking to a work friend! I rewrite Bible passages and study my actions together with some friends of my GMF class! This is good!
We are all beings that adapt, and I can say that I am very happy to live as I live and to meet so many nice people. The important thing in all of this is to be well and have fun even in a complex context. I choose to smile every day in the midst of my sadness, and it makes me grow a little stronger.
My gratitude is for being able to do what I learned to enjoy. I continue to learn how to be, how to learn, and how to do. My learning is constant, and in Christ I can say with great confidence: everything is fine!
Quando cheguei na Republica da Nicarágua achei tudo muito diferente do Brasil, mas decidi me abrir para as novas experiências e sem criar expectativas busquei aceitar esse novo país na minha vida. Escolhi me preparar para o “não conhecimento” das coisas, me abri para a nova cultura, o novo lugar e todas as POSSIBILIDADES que se apresentavam à mim enquanto eu observava tudo atentamente.
Cheguei curiosa para trabalhar junto com uma ONG que atua em questões de justiça social, desenvolvimento comunitário e saúde, então após capacitações e treinamentos na Capital do país, fui a Costa do Caribe e comecei uma imersão cultural que mudaria minha vida!
A Região Autônoma do Caribe Norte da Nicarágua é muito interessante e divertida, interessante porque é tudo diferente do que eu já conhecia e divertida porque é assim que eu enxergo o meu processo de aprendizagem e adaptação! Eu amo conhecer pessoas e meus maiores investimentos foram direcionados a novos relacionamentos que fiz, mesmo que as vezes as pessoas me olhem como se eu fosse de outro planeta, é divertido! Uma vez eu estava acompanhada com minha amiga de trabalho e uma senhora muito humilde perguntou a minha amiga nicaraguense: de que país ela é? Olhei para ela e respondi em espanhol: Sou do Brasil! Eu sorri, mas aquela senhora ficou muito envergonhada por que eu falei com ela mesmo sem a conhecer, após dizer meu nome ela já ganhou mais confiança e seguiu fazendo perguntas!
Sempre amei sair para passear e tomar café fora de casa todos os dias, isso é algo importante para mim, mas no meu local de atuação é inviável então eu readequei meu processo de qualidade de vida e agora gosto de fazer café artesanal em casa, lavar roupas na mão com um sabão específico que eu amo o cheiro, fazer exercícios na sala da oficina do meu trabalho( onde eu moro) e sentar na varanda para conversar com uma amiga de trabalho! Reescrevo passagens bíblicas e estudo minhas ações juntamente com alguns amigos de minha turma GMF! Todos nós somos seres que se adaptam e posso dizer que estou muito contente de viver como vivo e conhecer tantas pessoas legais, o importante em tudo isso é estar bem e se divertir mesmo em um contexto complexo, eu escolhi sorrir para a tristeza todos os dias, e ela me faz crescer um pouco mais forte.
Minha gratidão é por poder fazer o que eu aprendi a gostar, sigo aprendendo a ser, aprender, fazer e ser, minha aprendizagem é constante e em Cristo eu posso afirmar com muito consciência: vai tudo bem!
It was in the early evening when the 0628 flight of Ethiopian Airlines landed at Ninoy Aquino International Airport. A few minutes later, my excitement of arriving started to dissipate. Walking into the immigration office at the airport took me longer than I thought. By the time I walked out of that office, the airport was almost empty. As if that was not enough, while heading to claim my baggage, I saw my suitcase wrecked with half of my clothes out. From there I knew that things would be tough for me in the Philippines. Once outside with my recycled clothes, I heard my name. Looking across the street, I saw the KKFI’s van with a couple of people who had come to pick me up.
My world turned upside down in my first three months. I went through everything that a missionary could, and I didn’t expect it. From the visa process to culture shock to language barriers to work supervision hardships to anything that you can imagine. In my head, the verb “to resign” was reoccurring quite often, but thank God the verb was never conjugated. The turning point was my relocation to Pulilan. While still skeptical about what was waiting for me there. Turns out, Pulilan became my perfect spot while supervising KKFI’s programs. It’s the reason why I’m still in the game.
Pulilan has been a great place, with great young people with whom I am working. Satisfactory would my program’s rating. Dealing with 41 scholars from three different communities has been very hectic and challenging for me. Programs such as care group (once a week) and church service (Sundays) have help me connecting with these young people, which has made my work somehow easy. However, since it is a mandatory requirement for scholars to attend care groups, some started losing interest in it, thus making it hell for me. I really don’t blame them because they would never understand the pressure to be in my shoes as a foreigner trying to do my best. Tutoring was the most frustrating and complicated sessions for me. Let alone that I had to carry them in the communities sometimes alone, but even those held in Gilead tend to be challenging. For instance, some youth would willingly oppose my planned lessons, schedule, and everything. Then, I decided to save my time and energy, and let them plan whatever they want to learn at each session. Because, some won’t attend or will just walk away if I do plan. Thus discouraging the few that would be attending.
Truth be told, my status of missionary has never favored me. To many, I was just an outsider with no power. Don’t get me wrong here! I’m not saying they should “worship me,” but I always felt that I was irrelevant to their eyes compared to other staff. This has been my mission journey reality. Well! Every story has an end–even the movie “The Passion of The Christ” ended. So, praise be to God my ending is coming.
Assuming that all things were ready with my Honors Degree in Psychology and Theological academics, I packed my bags heading for Brazil full of hope, faith, expectations, enthusiasm, and zeal of participating in fulfilling the Great Commission. Through experiences of serving with communities through churches and different organizations in the past, my mind could only testify to my readiness for mission work beyond borders.
After serving God for more than a year in Brazil, I have realized that God wanted to mold me even more. Not only have I participated in the transformation of the world, but I also have experienced personal growth and internal transformation. My mission work experiences have taught me some lessons. Ask me about victimization, racism, depression, bitterness, desperation, hopelessness, and frustration, and I can deliver a thousand lectures. I never expected to experience such things, but for quite some time it has been my lunch and dinner. Maybe surprisingly I do not regret experiencing them but I am proud as I have become ten times stronger in different ways.
God taught me about patience, humbleness, contentment, perseverance, dedication, loyalty, and being positive. Life has a way of kicking us when we’re down. And just when we think we can’t fall any lower, we get kicked again. After all it is said, “We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed…” (2 Corinthians 4:8-12) and “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?” (Romans 8:35). In every situation we are molded by God for even bigger roles in His kingdom. God’s love for us is always in abundance. We endure and tarry in different situations for His sake as great promise awaits us. “And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or farms for My name’s sake, will receive many times as much, and will inherit eternal life” (Matthew 19:29).
I am humble that through the Global Mission Fellows program, God chastened and quickened me mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. At last I managed to participate even more than I expected. I’m kindly encouraging each and everyone to continue with the good work no matter what we go through. Let’s encourage each other to continue and start the good work. “And he said to them, ‘The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest'” (Luke 10:2). May our good Lord continue to bless those supporting mission work through finances, material resources, and prayers.
On Sunday, February 18, we celebrated Migrant Sunday in the Methodist Church of Mexico. In preparation for the day, I wrote a liturgy and an essay that were sent to all Methodist pastors in Mexico. Below is a translated version of the essay I wrote:
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Every year when we as the Methodist Church of Mexico celebrate Migrant Sunday, we have the opportunity to reflect upon what has happened this year for the migrants among us.
Unfortunately, this year brought us a lot of bad news. The U.S. government continues to deport Mexicans (among others) in impressive numbers. In Mexico, these deportees receive little or no help from the government or civil society. In September, the United States announced that it will cancel the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, which protected from deportation certain undocumented youth. Because of this decision, many Mexican young people are at risk of deportation from the U.S. In November and recently in January, the U.S. government declared that it would end Temporary Protective Status (TPS) for Nicaraguans, Salvadorans, and Haitians, in addition to the Sudanese. The members of these communities with TPS could be deported once their protection ends and eventually could try to transit through or live in Mexico. There are already communities of Haitians that have established themselves in Mexico—especially on the northern border—when they were not able to enter the U.S.
The demonstration “One Year with Trump” was organized by Deportados Unidos en la Lucha and took place outside the U.S. embassy in Mexico City. The group brought articles collected from deportees arriving to the Mexico City airport, including the white plastic sacks given to migrants to hold their belongings.
Mexico continues to be a difficult trajectory for migrants in transit. From the southern border to the northern border, migrants in transit face violence—including sexual violence—at the hands of Mexican society, drug cartels, the government, and sometimes other migrants. The Mexican government continues to deport more Central Americans than the U.S. Many people suffer human trafficking or are mistreated by the coyotes that guide them (for example, the cases of more than 100 people dying of thirst and abandoned in the back of semi-trucks).
Thousands of migrants every year walk along the train tracks of the train nicknamed “La Bestia.” On this journey, they face extreme conditions, including violence.
Throughout this year there were also many happy and hopeful stories: the visas, residencies, and citizenships that were approved; the graduations of im/migrants or their children; the migrants that have found home in their new place of residence; the groups of migrant activists that have come together to fight for their rights; the new opportunities for work and education; and the communities that have welcomed foreigners. It is important to recognize the injustices, but it also important to celebrate the victories and the beautiful moments.
The gospel reading this week is Mark 1:9-15. In this passage, Jesus is baptized by John and receives confirmation that he is the son of God. Afterwards he spends 40 days in the desert, where he is tested by Satan. Following the desert, Jesus goes to Galilee to proclaim that the Kingdom of God is drawing near.
If we read these passage with the lens of migration, the first thing that draws our attention is the desert. The desert is an image and experience extremely present for Mexican and Latin American migrants that have crossed the desert to reach the United States. In addition, it is an important symbol in the Judeo-Christian imagination: the time that Jesus spends in the desert reminds us of the experiences of Moses and Hagar in the desert and of the 40 years that the Israelites spend there. All of those biblical figures are also migrants. Hagar is an Egyptian woman that is thrown out of Abraham’s home twice (the first time pregnant and the second time with her son) and experiences thirst in the desert as a result. Moses is an Israelite but lives in Pharaoh’s house and flees to the desert, where he lives for years, gets married to someone outside his community, and builds a whole new life. In the end, he returns to liberate his community from slavery, and he guides the Israelites for 40 years in the desert but never enters the Promised Land.
With his experience wandering in the desert, Jesus shows us his identity as a migrant and an aspect of his incarnation: he experiences with us the difficulties of life and temptation. The theme of Jesus as a migrant can be found throughout the gospels. Other gospels tell us of migrant baby Jesus born in Bethlehem, of migrant child Jesus that flees to Egypt, and of Jesus the adult who does not have a place to lay his head (Mt 8:20).
Jesus’s time in the desert follows his baptism. Baptism in the Christian life announces the end of an era and the beginning of a new era. It is significant that the time in the desert goes together with his baptism because the desert is often a space of liminality and transition. For Jesus it is a part of his transition to enter his ministry. For the migrants on their way to the U.S., crossing the desert is a rite of passage; the space of the desert marks the change between their place of origin and their destination. For those that transit through Mexico, the path of the train “the Beast” is a part of their rite of passage and their transition.
It is following his time as a migrant in the desert that Jesus goes to announce the gospel—that the Kingdom of God draws near. His good news come out of his suffering, his tribulations, and his temptation. After such a difficult and heavy experience, perhaps you and I would have offered a more pessimistic or hateful message. After a year of such injustice for migrants of all kinds, we could draw negative conclusions—that the situation will never improve. However, Jesus comes out of the desert with a message of hope and justice. His hope and his fight for justice are based on a drawing near to the human reality, and that’s how we realize that his gospel is not something empty or shallow. Jesus knows our context, but he also knows that the Kingdom of God—a kingdom of justice, love, peace, and equality—will prevail.
In the same way, we can familiarize ourselves with the situation of the migrants among us, seeing all the injustice, division, violence, and sadness, without concluding that all is lost. We can follow the example of Jesus and of activists by recognizing the reality but at the same time seeking to change the world. The migrant journey through Mexico is difficult, but there are churches like the Methodist Church “La Santísima Trinidad” [1] in Apaxco, State of Mexico, that have organized themselves to offer hospitality to migrants. There are borders that divide us, but El Faro: the Border Church[2] meets on both sides of the wall between Tijuana and San Diego to celebrate a binational Eucharist. There is human trafficking, but Dreams[3] goes into various migrant detention centers in Mexico to accompany migrants and to detect victims of trafficking. Deportations interrupt lives and divide families, but groups such as Deportados Unidos en la Lucha[4] in Mexico City and Dreamer Moms[5] in Tijuana are fighting for their rights. I invite you to investigate and get to know the reality and the inspiring work of migrants in your region.
The challenges are great and the realities are complex (Jesus knows it well), but Jesus invites us to participate in bringing the Kingdom of God on earth. This Migrant Sunday, let us celebrate the victories and the beautiful moments, let us recognize the injustices and the suffering, and let us commit ourselves to seeking the Kingdom of God and fighting for a better Mexico and a better world.
To close, I offer a litany that I wrote:
For welcome upon arriving to a new community, we give you thanks. For the feeling of being at home, wherever that may be, we give you thanks. For work and educational opportunities, we give you thanks. For policies that open doors to us, we give you thanks.
For bridges, we give you thanks.
For generalized violence that causes us to flee, we ask you for justice. For governments that deport migrants and divide families, we ask you for justice. For human trafficking and coyotes that abuse us, we ask you for justice. For communities that don’t accept deportees and returnees, we ask you for justice.
The Book of Fellows 