By Msgr. Arturo J. Bañuelas
In El Paso and Ciudad Juárez, we are rooted in our identity as a border community. We are a people of resilience, encounter and strength. As someone born in Pecos and as a pastor in El Paso, I have lived this reality my entire life.
Here at the border, we also know something about standing together in difficult moments. Many of us still remember the tragic day of the Walmart massacre, when hundreds of people came forward with food, prayers, banners and quiet acts of kindness to support grieving families. In that painful moment, our community showed the world the strength of our hospitality and solidarity.
Today, our border region faces yet another critical moment that calls for the same borderland spirit. Many of our migrant neighbors are now living in desperate fear — fear of being deported or separated from their families. Once again, we are being asked to show what kind of community we will be.
Daily, we see and hear about masked agents pulling mothers out of their cars, entering homes without warrants, picking up people as they take their children to school, Americans getting shot, migrants getting deported to foreign countries. Downtown, I have seen the trauma of non-criminal migrants being detained as they leave court proceedings.
Business owners tell me of their concerns that workers are taken from construction sites. I have prayed with parents who are desperately worried that they are no longer able to work and provide for their families because the government has taken away their legal work permits.
When I visit with migrants in the Camp East Montana detention center, the largest one in the nation, with tears in their eyes they share their pain and desperation, praying that they may get to see their loved ones soon. It is unconscionable that there have already been three deaths there.
We can only imagine the trauma of persons and children having to endure so much suffering. Often, we hear racially motivated dehumanizing rhetoric about migrants as if some persons among us don’t matter. Bishop Mark J. Seitz often states: “Every human being bears within him or her the image of God, which confers upon us a dignity higher than any passport or immigration status.”
When the dignity of our brothers and sisters is threatened, our faith does not allow us to look away, and silence is not an option. For us to do justice is to love God in the way we treat each other.
Standing in solidarity with all who daily struggle to survive, it becomes evident that mass deportations only serve to divide families, negate the contributions of migrants specially to the economic well-being of our communities, obstruct the health and safety of our border area, and tarnish the human dignity of all peoples. God is on the side of justice, and our faith calls us to witness to this justice of God in our actions of solidarity.
This past Sunday in our parishes, Bishop Seitz spoke to us about the dignity of every human person and of our call to stand in solidarity with those who suffer. He also invited all the faithful and all people of good will to join us in prayer and a march to proclaim that all life matters, that families belong together, that our border remains a place of compassion and hospitality, and that mass deportations and mass detentions stop.
As residents of this border community, as people of every faith and people of goodwill, let us march together at 6 p.m. Tuesday, March 24, at San Jacinto Plaza in Downtown El Paso.
We will be joined by Evelio Menjivar, originally from El Salvador, who will share with us his powerful story of how as a young man he entered the United States in the trunk of a car at the Tijuana-San Diego border, and is now the auxiliary bishop of Washington, D.C.
Today a U.S. citizen, Bishop Menjivar is a tireless advocate for migrant communities in Washington and across the country.
Join Bishop Menjivar, Bishop Seitz and myself and the countless other El Pasoans who know that our identity as a welcoming community is something that no one can take away from us. March with us at this important moment to witness the power of faith and compassion and to stand together in defense of the strength and resilience of our El Paso border community.
Msgr. Arturo J. Bañuelas is a priest of the Diocese of El Paso and the founding chair of the Hope Border Institute.
The post Opinion: Let us march together in defense of our El Paso values appeared first on El Paso Matters.
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