Mexico

A migrant waits at the border with the intention of turning himself in to the U.S. Border Patrol agents, on the banks of the Rio Bravo river in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. REUTERS/Jose Luis Gonzalez

I am not sure what else needs to happen so the entire U.S. church wakes up to the realities of the evils entrenched in our immigration system. Honoring the dignity of all people is our calling as Christians; no other entity is tasked with recognizing the image of God in every person. Our Latine brothers and sisters are leading the way, but the whole church should be outraged; we should be demonstrating without ceasing. We should not let people sleep until they see the humanity of every migrant.

A migrant is carried to an ambulance after a fire broke out at the National Migration Institute (INM) center in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico March, 27, 2023. Omar Ornelas/USA Today Network via REUTERS

At least 39 migrants from Central and South America died after a fire broke out late on Monday at a migrant holding center in the Mexican northern border city of Ciudad Juarez, apparently caused by a protest over deportations, officials said on Tuesday.

A woman holds a cross as relatives and friends of victims of femicide take part in a march called "Voices of the Absence" in memory of their loved ones and to demand justice in Mexico City, Mexico, November 3, 2021. REUTERS/Edgard Garrido

Holding aloft crosses bearing the names of murdered women, hundreds of people marched in Mexico’s capital on Wednesday to protest violence against women amidst a steady nationwide increase in femicides.

Chanting “we are your voice,” organizers used megaphones to read out the names of murdered women in downtown Mexico City.

The “Day of Dead Women” march took place a day after Mexico’s national holiday Day of the Dead. About 500 people took part in the protest, according to a Reuters witness.

People hang photos of their disappeared loved ones on a tree in Poza Rica, Veracruz’s Benito Juarez Park. Photo by Madeleine Wattenbarger for Sojourners

“My name is Maria Herrera,” she told the congregation, “and I have four disappeared sons.” She went on to plead for their solidarity: for anyone with information about where the brigade might find clandestine graves to speak out. The brigade, Maria emphasized, doesn’t look for guilty parties. They don’t care about finding out who took their loved ones. They just look for their family members, dead or alive.

Migrant people hold the now and the not yet in tension. In the midst of waiting to make it up north and taking their turn for a credible fear interview at the border, life continues. People find ways to feel alive, to keep hope alive. At La Casa del Peregrino, holding on to hope looked like doing karaoke, coloring banners, and making beaded bracelets. They were not devoid of life.

Aaron E. Sanchez 11-21-2018

Steve Shreve / Unsplash

The first cast in the ochre light of the dawning sun is a morning prayer, filled with hope and faith that ceremonies sought in earnest will feed the soul. I reel dutifully, waiting for a faint tap on the end of my line. My father stands at the front of the boat, scanning for ripples on the water in the low light. “Wachale!” he exclaims in joking Spanglish as he reels in the first largemouth of the day. Two Mexican-Americans bass fishing in Texas. This is the face of the Reconquista.

Douglas Massey 7-13-2018

Image via REUTERS/Adrees Latif

All data indicate that undocumented migration from Mexico, in particular, has ended and at this point more unauthorized Mexicans are leaving the country than entering it. According to estimates from the Pew Hispanic Center, the Center for Migration Studies and the Department of Homeland Security, the undocumented Mexican population stopped growing in 2008 and has been trending downward ever since.

Ed Spivey Jr. 3-28-2018

Image via Shutterstock/Succo Design

But back to the wall idea, which President Trump said could easily be built by the Army Corps of Engineers, because they’re, you know, in the army right? He assured skeptical Pentagon officials that the $20 billion would be more like a loan, because, duh, Mexico would pay it back. In fact, U.S. negotiators are already working with their Mexican counterparts to establish the precise terms of repayment. Asked if he prefers reimbursing the American treasury with a lump sum or in monthly payments, Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto replied, pleasantly, “How about nada? Does nada work for you?”

Jon Huckins 3-14-2018

People hold signs during a protest while standing in front of the current border fence and near the prototypes of U.S. President Donald Trump's border wall, in Tijuana, Mexico March 13, 2018. REUTERS/Edgard Garrido

President Trump, I personally invite you to also come down to the borderlands with me in Tijuana and San Diego and meet the people directly impacted by the stroke of your pen. I am a co-founding director of Global Immersion, and one of our primary organizational initiatives involves having cross-sector leaders from around the country come to the border to see the human face of immigration and build a set of tools for how to better care of the “stranger among us,” as my sacred text (the Bible) mandates.

A couple dressed up as a "Catrina and Catrin", a Mexican character also known as "The Elegant Death", kisses as they participate in a procession to commemorate Day of the Dead in Mexico City, Mexico, Oct. 28, 2017. REUTERS/Edgard Garrido

Dancing devils, towering skeletons, and altars festooned with marigolds made their way down Mexico City's main thoroughfare on Saturday to commemorate Day of the Dead in a country still mourning nearly 500 people killed in earthquakes last month.

Rescuers work at the site of a collapsed building after an earthquake in Mexico City, Mexico Sept. 20, 2017. REUTERS/Henry Romero
 

Desperate rescue workers scrabbled through rubble in a floodlit search on Wednesday for dozens of children feared buried beneath a Mexico City school, one of hundreds of buildings wrecked by the country's most lethal earthquake in a generation.

Immigrant Rosa Sabido, 53, cries as she sits on her bed in the United Methodist Church in which she lives while facing deportation in Mancos, Colorado, U.S., July 19, 2017. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson

Pastor Craig Paschal says the decision to turn his church into a sanctuary, and a focal point in the nationwide immigration debate, was not easy but he considered it a Christian duty.

Image via RNS/Reuters/Mike Blake

President Trump’s proposed border wall with Mexico raises serious questions about America’s moral standing, as the poor would bear the brunt of the suffering, a leading Catholic theologian says.

The Rev. Daniel G. Groody, an associate professor of theology at Notre Dame University in Indiana, said the wall would lead to a loss of life, as migrants are forced to find other ways to escape poverty across the border.

“What Trump fails to see is that state sovereignty is not an absolute privilege, but a moral responsibility,” said Groody.

Image via RNS/Reuters/Carlos Barria

President Donald Trump vowed to make good on a campaign promise to repeal the law that restricts political speech from the pulpit, speaking at his first National Prayer Breakfast as president.

“I will get rid of, totally destroy, the Johnson Amendment, and allow representatives of faith to speak freely and without fear,” he said on Feb. 2 to a gathering of 3,500 faith leaders, politicians, and other dignitaries from around the world, including King Abdullah of Jordan.

the Web Editors 1-25-2017

One action blocks federal funding for sanctuary cities, something in which many churches and communities of faith participate. An estimated 400 congregations nationwide support sanctuary or are actively opening their doors to immigrants. 

the Web Editors 11-14-2016

Image via Lightspring/Shutterstock.com

On Nov. 14 the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops asked President-elect Donald Trump to implement policies geared toward honoring the humanity of immigrants and refugees, reports the Associated Press. The Roman Catholic bishops made their call to President-elect Trump at the beginning of their annual meeting in Baltimore.

Image via RNS/Reuters/Ettore Ferrari/Pool

In an interview conducted on Nov. 7, on the eve of the election, and published Friday by an Italian daily, the Argentine pope declined to make any judgment about Trump.

“I do not judge people or politicians,” the pope told Eugenio Scalfari of La Repubblica when asked what he thought of Trump. “I only want to understand what suffering their behavior causes to the poor and the excluded.”

10-04-2016

Image via RNS/Reuters/Jorge Duenes

The bullet-ridden body of the Rev. Jose Lopez Guillen was found Sept. 24 on the highway outside Puruandiro in the western state of Michoacan, [Mexico], a region plagued by violent conflict. The 43-year-old cleric had been abducted from his home in nearby Janamuato five days earlier.

“He was an engaging personality,” said Maria Solorio, a regular at Lopez’s church. “He was an excellent priest and very devoted to the community. … What happened to him was a great injustice.”

the Web Editors 6-03-2016

Donald Trump continued his streak of racist comments on June 2, this time taking aim at a federal judge.

 

Rick Herron 3-07-2016

Coalition of Immokalee Workers. Image via CWMc/Flickr

The boycott stems from Wendy’s refusal to CIW’s Fair Food Program, a workplace-monitoring program that the group designed to prevent worker abuse and exploitation, according to the Houston Chronicle.

Wendy’s has moved some operations out of Florida — where tomato growers had begun implementing the Fair Food Program — to Mexico, where worker abuse in the industry has been widely documented.