Find this episode and subscribe on:
Border Perspective exists to equip, educate, and mobilize people of faith through biblical resources and serivce-learning experiences along the U.S. and Mexico border. Yonathan Moya and Jennifer Moya are a dynamic brother and sister team creating immersive experiences, transforming the immigration conversation, and serving the body of Christ.
In this conversation, Elizabeth Behrens talks with Yonathan and Jennifer about their experiences in this work and the real implications of policy decisions. This discussion will help you walk in your peacemaking journey.
Join in the conversation on our social media pages on Facebook and Instagram and LinkedIn to let us know your thoughts on this episode!
Executive Producer – Latasha Morrison
Producer – Sarah Connatser
Links:
Become a Donor of Be the Bridge
Connect with Be the Bridge:
Our Website
Facebook
Instagram
Join the online community BTB Connect
Connect with Border Perspective:
Connect with Latasha Morrison:
Facebook
Instagram
Not all views expressed in this interview reflect the values and beliefs of Latasha Morrison or the Be the Bridge organization.
*this was transcribed by Spotify and has not been checked for errors
0:02
Welcome to the Be the Bridge podcast.
Be the Bridge exists to empower people and culture toward racial healing, equity, and reconciliation.
Latasha Morrison founded Be the Bridge in 2016 to foster needed dialogue and brave spaces and to give people the tools to pursue racial justice.
0:22
We provide resources and community to do just that, and this podcast is one of those resources.
You’ll hear interviews hosted by Latasha and our team, conversations about current events, and encouragement for your racial literacy journey.
Thank you for listening, subscribing and engaging in this important work.
0:44
Welcome everyone to the Be the Bridge podcast.
I am Elizabeth and I work in the training department here for Be the Bridge.
I create curriculum and lead trainings.
And if you’ve been in our Academy, you’ve probably seen me around there a lot as well.
But today, getting to feel a different role and I’m excited about today.
1:01
We’re talking with Jonathan and Jen, who are running a really interesting organization that I’m excited to have them tell you more about in just a minute here.
But would you to like to first introduce yourselves?
Yes, of course.
Thank you for having us Elizabeth and to our listeners, thank you so much for tuning in to this podcast.
1:21
I hope that it is brings you a lot of insight into the work that we’re doing around immigration and specifically at the border.
My name is Jonathan Moya and I get to have the role of director and lead border perspective.
We are an organization that provides service learning experiences for groups of students, young adults and adults alongside the US and Mexico border.
1:44
And so we provide immersive educational opportunities for many, many people throughout the years.
Here’s Jen.
Yeah.
Hey everyone.
My name is Jennifer Moya.
I serve as the Operations Director for Board of Perspective.
I’ve been serving alongside my brother Jonathan for about 3 years now.
2:02
He’s been doing the work since 2017 and then further on with our family.
And so it’s a pleasure to be here and to be a part of this conversation.
Thanks for having us.
Thank you both.
So I’d love to you have a little insight into what border perspective is.
Can you give us a little history of how it came to be?
2:20
Definitely, definitely border perspective as a independent entity really only has about an 8 year history, but really we are standing on the shoulders of many people that came before us.
And so just to give you a little bit of context and then more into the last eight years, really our family has an immigrant story from its origins.
2:43
And so my parents came from Northern Mexico, going to South Texas with really a, a gospel calling.
My grandparents were pastors and my parents were sent by my grandparents to come and learn the ways of ministry in the United States and also being carriers of of the good news of, of the gospel.
3:02
And so they settled in South Texas in a place called the Rio Grande Valley in the early 1990s.
And so both Jen and Eyes upbringing is really filled with growing up in the church ministry to immigrant families and immigrant communities.
3:20
And so immigration in a lot of ways has been a part of our story.
It’s a part of our DNA.
It’s not something that we’re engaging because we’re just learning about, but it’s really because it’s a part of our livelihood.
And so over the years, specifically when it comes to my story, at the age of 18, I moved to the Midwest to go to school and eventually ended up marrying my wife, who’s from Minnesota.
3:48
And so I’ve been living for for many years in the Midwest leading up to 2015, 2016, 2017.
And I was wrestling a lot with the the conversation around the border and really immigration.
4:04
And so at that time, I found myself as an immigrant, as a person of color in majority culture spaces.
And really when people would find out that I had ties back to the US and Mexico border, my parents did ministry there, they were intrigued.
4:24
And so we would engage a conversation.
But to my realization, people were actually more interested in my in the politics or what they thought I would believe in politics rather than a faith story or rather than my testimony or even just what is culture like down in South Texas.
4:44
And so that caused me to invite one of my brothers on a nine day border trip.
It was really a storytelling photographic journey that took us all along Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California border, sometimes on both sides of the border because our family has ministry ties and Type 2 also missions.
5:09
A lot of different churches or groups that were connected to.
They saw what we were doing and started reflecting and also asking could we be a part of this?
Could we be a part of also assisting some of the need that was really rising throughout the year.
Specifically in 2017 and 2018, we started hearing about the caravans and asylum seekers coming to the border.
5:32
And so that was around the time that we had done this photographic journey.
And so out of that, really out of this personal seeking journey, border perspective was born.
Never was the intention to start a non profit or to lead a ministry, but really given the need of the time and a stepping into into that with the blessing and really collaboration and partnership of the local church in South Texas, we we dove into it.
6:04
And so it’s been eight years, you know, we Fast forward eight years, we, we invite people from all across the United States to come to the US Mexico border to witness, to come and see, to really go beyond the headlines.
6:23
Because we believe that when we are in proximity with people, when we are in partnership and in collaboration journeying with them, those perspective of ours will begin to broaden.
And so we over the last eight years probably seen close to about 2000 people come on what we call service learning experiences.
6:46
Some are intensive weekends, some are 7 day long trips.
That is full of both, just as our vision says, it’s both service and learning.
That’s fantastic.
You know, I love, I love this idea of allowing people to see things first hand, you know, getting to like not just, well, First off, not just have to take in what’s they’re getting from the news about what’s happening at the border, but actually see for themselves.
7:15
You know, as especially as someone who’s an immigrant has this immigrant story, is it challenging for you to see how much people have to see it for themselves to believe what you’re saying or what your experience is?
Or do you find it like there’s just no way to really explain what’s happening unless people can see it for themselves?
7:35
Yeah, I mean, unfortunately, right?
Many people need to see things first hand before they truly believe or understand something.
I think that’s just a part of our human nature.
We even see this in Scripture.
People didn’t believe Jesus was the Messiah until they witnessed his miracles, right?
7:52
Until they saw him after resurrection.
We learned Easter Sunday that Mary Magdalene herself didn’t truly or fully recognize him until he called her by name.
And so in the same kind of way, skepticism continues to show up, especially when it comes to immigration on the border and immigration at the border and with any other topic, right that we are are uncomfortable with.
8:22
But proximity does really change perception.
When someone comes face to face with immigrant leaders, with community members, or even like migrants themselves, it removes this layer of fear or assumption because it’s no longer an abstract issue.
8:39
It now becomes personal.
That human connection helps people see the new sort of ICE, and it creates space for empathy and it creates space for transformation in a way that distances rarely can.
8:54
And so it’s a part of our human nature.
It exists, and that’s why we’re creating these proximity experiences, so that people can come and be and be a part of something that they feel so distanced from.
9:12
Absolutely.
You know, I was thinking about it and I think similar to whether it’s a servant, you hear or a pot, you’re like, oh, I so wish this person would listen to this.
And I’m guessing even with these trips, there’s plenty of people that come like, I so wish I could convince fill in the blank to come with me or to come see this.
9:31
But for those who are the ones wishing other people would, but they they themselves go down if they already have this this deep well of empathy for immigrants and this desire to understand the story, what has still been like when is real still eye opening for them that they didn’t realize or they, you know, they thought they went in with this great understanding.
9:51
And then they’re still, I’m sure, either shocked or just, yeah, just like, what is that experience like for them?
Yeah.
I think something that really separates us perhaps from other short term trips is the way that we go about approaching our program.
10:10
We, before anything, approach our program through a biblical lens.
And so although there are a lot of people that already come carrying a deep compassion for immigrants, what often surprises them is how much Scripture speaks about the foreigner, about serving the stranger, about the outsider, right?
10:32
There’s surprise between the contrast between the way the border is often negatively portrayed and the positive human experiences they’ve encountered while they’re here.
I think that sometimes and often we tend to read scripture to the way that perhaps it fits best with us.
10:52
And so something that I love about the biblical approach that that we offer this like lens, it’s that it reframes what it means to love your neighbor, especially the neighbor that is transient or vulnerable.
And they gain this perspective by engaging people that they’ve never perhaps really heard from.
11:14
We meet with Border Patrol agents that we have just built a relationship with, and they have allowed us for or they’ve allowed for honest dialogue that has made people uncomfortable in in many different ways.
11:33
But they see the hearts and the minds of, you know, these just humans that are following a policy, right, that was placed by the federal government.
And so even those that are caring, that have a deep care are often surprised by how much Scripture speaks of this.
11:54
And we’ve seen hearts and minds transformed, not because of anything that we do, but because people allow the Holy Spirit to move.
Yeah, absolutely.
I we’d love to also just hear from you.
You get to talk with a lot of migrants, with people working at the border, all those things.
12:14
I’m sure you’ve heard just so many personal stories of, of there being a million reasons that people end up at our border.
What are you seeing as some of the big themes of of what brings people to to decide that this harrowing journey to get there is?
12:30
What is the one they need to take?
Yes, of course, there’s many, many reasons.
And over the years, as you encounter and meet with a variety of individuals, it’s, it’s not just one core group of people, it’s often families, mothers, fathers, children, I mean, from really newborn age to, you know, their teenage years and so many people.
13:02
We’ve really early on in 2017 and 18 and 19, we were seeing a lot of people come from Central America in the Caribbean, primarily the country of Cuba, in the Northern Triangle, countries like Honduras and Nicaragua and El Salvador.
13:20
And shortly after that, then it started to expand more towards South America.
So we started to see more Colombians and Venezuelans and even people just from different places in the Caribbean.
And eventually we started seeing people from Africa and then also people from Eastern Europe and even people from Asia, right?
13:43
So this has been over a trajectory of many years, but one of the things that is so eye opening is that a lot of the stories are similar.
It’s often hardship that is really causing people to move.
14:02
Oftentimes people are trying to just find a place of refuge and hope, not just because they long for that, but because they’re really facing extreme corruption in their communities, their maybe their countries facing an economic collapse.
14:19
Maybe they are being led by regimes that because of maybe their political faith or even just their their faith alone are are being persecuted.
Oftentimes 2 different natural disasters and, and climate impacts is drawing people out of their homes, whether it’s drought, hurricanes, right?
14:44
A lot of communities have a lot of different impacts that are really causing them to look externally, right, for a different place to, to find that place of refuge.
And so it’s interesting because not one, even though these themes overlap in many stories, there’s also a desire oftentimes to reconnect with family.
15:15
There’s oftentimes to be in a place where they are safe, to be in a place where there is also economic opportunity in a lot of ways.
And one of the things that I often reflect on is the physical reasons why people are coming.
15:34
And I think a lot of us often see that specifically if we’re not at the border, if we see things through the headlines and the news.
But one of the things that I’ve been really deeply impacted by is that the shoes of the migrant in the journey of the migrant is actually not so much different than our own journey.
15:56
Because when we look internally into our souls, I too am longing for peace.
I too am longing for refuge.
I too am longing for a place to belong, to be loved, to be included.
Yes, somebody else’s story might be living out in this physical external migration, but our internal journey is also, I believe, searching for the divine.
16:25
And so I think for me, even though there’s so many themes and so many hard realities of what people are moving, that is one thing that just brings me back to this whole idea of we’re not that much different than each other because we have these correlations and internally we’re all longing for similar things.
16:53
Absolutely the in that’s so beautiful and like, I’m like, give me a minute.
You know, along with that, there are there’s some reality historically around EU s s role in creating the situations or maintain the situations that bring people to the border or that create the you know, it’s often described as chaos at the border, which is in curious turn of phrase compared to some of your lived reality there.
17:26
What do you see as some of those, those the big impacts of what the US is doing that is that is manufacturing this crisis in a lot of ways or manufacturing this as a as a political talking point?
For sure.
I’ll start with this.
17:42
I think there’s so much focus at the US and Mexico border and I think US people who live in the United States, right, Like, yes, that is a huge region of our country, but we often say specifically through the people that we work with and those that participate in our programs.
18:01
In order to understand the reality of the US and Mexico border and the migration coming to the US and Mexico border, we actually have to look beyond the US and Mexico border.
We actually have to look at really what’s happening globally.
We have to look at what’s happening economically in different locations of the world.
18:21
We have to look at is there any, any sort of intervention maybe potentially involvement military wise.
We saw the implications of the Russia and Ukraine war shortly after that conflict began that then we started seeing Eastern Europeans, you know, show up at the US and Mexico border within months, right.
18:46
And so in different ways you can you can see how even conflicts that are might seem foreign, but yet have support from various entities around the world are also impacting and causing for people to be on the move, right.
19:04
And so over, over the years, one of I think back to some work I did in Haiti for a number of years after the 2010 earthquake.
And it was interesting because Haiti and even in the current state right now, right, it is just a hard place to, to, to live in a hard place to, to visit.
19:26
But during my time there, I realized that there was a lot of aid being pumped in from USA to a lot of different foreign entities as well.
And so one of the realizations, and throughout history, you’ll learn that really it was aid.
They killed farming and made their own farming and their own way of living unsustainable, right?
19:48
And so that was really A cause and effect issue of why you can say that maybe a country like Haiti is in the conditions that it is today.
Obviously there’s many factors, right?
But you can say that that is a big one.
And so, yes, the decisions that we make, the decisions that are impacting or sometimes we think.
20:10
Might be helping oftentimes too.
Throughout history, we learned that they actually have more of an effect that really eventually we might start to begin to see some of the realities even in our own shores, right.
20:25
And so I really think about that experience.
I wonder what the country of Haiti would be if farming was strong and they didn’t depend on foreign in foreign food right to survive.
And so I, one of the realizations as, as we see many people coming and really thinking through all of this is I think back to different countries who have authoritarian regimes and are being persecuted and think about communism in, in Cuba and in Nicaragua, leaders in Venezuela.
21:03
And so there’s, there’s a legitimate reasons why people are leaving.
And so in order for us to really understand why they’re coming, we also have to understand and maybe dismantle what has our involvement been in those countries, what are we doing now in those countries, or what ties do we have throughout history that might have caused a part of this to be happening today?
21:29
Absolutely the, you know, when you’re talking about the, the farming in Haiti and it just makes me think of.
So we just go in with really good intentions, right?
Or thinking we’re doing that, really thinking through those long term implications.
And I think we see that in the church as well.
21:45
There’s a lot of debate around missions work and whether that’s a healthy thing or an OK thing, whether it’s short or long.
And I think too, as you all are doing these short learning trips that people might try to put that in the same basket as like a short term mission trip where I don’t personally think that’s what you’re doing.
22:06
But you know, there are those issues around like short term mission trips where it’s, you know, are you sending down a group of teenagers to build a school when those those teenagers aren’t educated in building any kind of building?
And yet there’s probably unemployed, you know, construction workers in that in that country who would who would happily take that, you know, be paid to build that same school.
22:27
You know, in what ways do you feel like that you all are able to avoid some of those pitfalls of of through wanting to do something good, you know, creating another just another new problem out of it.
Yeah.
I think something that again separates us from other organizations doing short term trips is that one, we have a team that has over 40 years of experience altogether, perhaps even 50 of working in some type of missional something, right, whether it was missions when we were younger, whether it’s in church settings, whether it’s with nonprofits.
23:14
And so we each bring something really amazing to to this program, to this, to this organization.
We’re all very intentional about how we go about talking about immigration, about our neighbor in our community.
23:31
I live in South Texas.
Life is here for me in South Texas.
I’m on the borders 24/7.
My parents, you know, lived here for 35 years.
My mother still continues to.
And so we’ve seen the borders inside and out from very different perspectives.
23:50
And because it is our home, right?
We want, we want to, we want people to know our home, the good and the bad, right.
And so in that we are very intentional about structuring our trips because we’ve seen how first hand short term submissions can be more harmful than good when they’re not grounded in the needs of the community.
24:12
We have a model, it’s called our service learning model that’s not project based at all.
It has a big emphasis on showing up, on listening, on learning how to love the neighbor.
And it’s not necessarily a goal of ours to build or accomplish something this week, but it is our goal to to walk alongside people that want to know how to love well, that want to sit in the tension and that want to serve with humility.
24:44
We often get feedback right from our participants and say, oh, I felt like we just didn’t do enough.
I felt like I could have, you know, like you said, build a school or I felt like we could have painted more or whatnot.
25:01
And I said, I’m actually really glad that you didn’t do more and that you felt uncomfortable in the not doing anything, not anything.
But it felt uncomfortable in the fact that you have to sit with the tension of what a short term mission could possibly look like and how the and the way that we’ve structured these service learning programs.
25:23
We work really closely with long term local partners and we meet them where they’re at, where they’re at.
We’re not trying to create extra work just because we want to accommodate a visiting team.
We’ve seen how that can actually overwhelm our nonprofits on the ground.
And we committed, we’re committed to them to walk alongside them rather than ahead of them.
25:44
And so sometimes that means that instead of building something, we’re talking with the local partner and we’re building relationship because that will go much longer than you focusing the entire 4 hours, let’s say, on painting a ball.
26:02
We’ve had many participants, alumni that have come back because they said, I remember, you know, two years ago I was serving with Mario at border missions.
I want to see if he’s still there and he’s still there and people come back and they have this like connection again with Mario.
26:18
And so for our organization, from the moment somebody reaches out and they are interested in coming, our team is really intentional about walking alongside them and preparing them and even guiding them to a spiritual posture for the week.
26:34
And once they’re here, we invite them to step into our shoes, to experience the reality of the border as we and our local leaders and nonprofits do.
Not from a tourist or a savior mindset, which is often a mindset that people come with, but like a slow, often very uncomfortable but transformative process that makes it that much more meaningful.
27:00
Those relationships and that discomfort piece I think is so important.
I think we do so much to avoid discomfort and and forget how much growth actually happens only when there is discomfort that and for that discomfort to be accompanied by that relationship and by that experience where it’s like the the opportunity for growth is there and exists.
27:24
I’m sure one of the things that you are dealing with right now is just the broad swath of anti immigrant messaging that’s coming from all levels of of government and society.
And what what active harm do you see happening on the ground based on what is being said at higher levels?
27:51
Yeah, that’s a really important perspective because immigrants are throughout the entire nation, right?
But there is a core focus as well, right, at the US and Mexico border.
And often times large narrative, rhetoric, just words from leaders carry real world consequences and carry a lot of weight.
28:16
And so often times these types of messages reshape the public perception of certain people groups or even certain regions of the country.
One of the one of the most questions that we actually answer for those that want to come down to the US and Mexico border on one of our experiences is, is it safe?
28:39
That is the number one question right all around.
And it’s interesting because all the sudden we’ve turned this region, which is US territory, it’s on US soil, but we hear the words like thread, invaders, criminals, right?
28:57
And it actually causes more fear, more panic.
And it really is spreading misinformation because just like Jensen, right?
Like she lives down there 24/7.
There’s churches that are actively serving, there’s communities, there’s schools, there’s Starbucks, there’s, you know, anything that you would find probably in your home context anywhere around the nation.
29:18
You also find it at the US and Mexico border.
It’s not this deserted place that I think sometimes we, we view it as one of the other things that I think rhetoric, specifically negative rhetoric has.
It has the tendency to fuel hate, violence, discrimination.
29:37
Often time this is not excluded from everyday actions.
It’s actually something that we’ve seen throughout the last several years of instances where there’s been actual incidents that because of rhetoric, people have taken action and harm communities and harm, you know, people specifically the in the immigrant community.
30:01
And so it has several consequences, definitely very severe consequences.
And one of the most disheartening things for me as I see negative rhetoric happening around the border, immigration, immigrants, is also it distorts our view of policy and it really blocks us from finding a way forward towards solutions.
30:28
Because oftentimes we don’t see the practicality really right in the policies that might help us uncover or a solution and really gear us far from.
30:44
I think the real issue, which is we, we need real immigration reform because sometimes really compromising with each other maybe looks weak, you know, for, for one side of or one party versus the other.
31:02
And so it really delays as in fixing broken systems, systems like the asylum, the visa backlogs, just the border infrastructure, national security, right?
Because really it’s politics that’s really profiting from keeping these areas broken and often times putting blame on regions or specifically people groups because of you can just to categorize it, the chaos that we see, right?
31:31
Or sometimes the chaos that is actually not present there.
And so, and then the, and then the last thing I would say in this context is that it also has implication on immigrant communities, specifically families and, and the young children often times, and I’ll tell you because this is part of my personal story, when, when I think back about why I started border perspective, it’s because I was wrestling with this idea of like, do I belong here?
32:07
Does someone like me belong here?
Does someone like my family belong here?
And so it, I think specifically right now, when we’re hearing fear of deportation, I think that brings a lot of anxiety.
It brings a lot of fear to communities.
32:24
I think the fear shapes this sense of lack of entity, safety, opportunity.
And so a lot of these tendencies have just a huge, a huge implication.
And I’m not, that’s just more I think in society and social implications.
32:42
I think when I also think about faith-based implications, that negative rhetoric contradicts the core teachings of the gospel.
I think it’s really alienating us, you know, from each other.
I think it’s we’re missing opportunities to, to, to, to be bringers of good news and hope to to our neighbors.
33:04
And so just like my last point there, I think also negative rhetoric also has the potential to harm immigrant believers within the church.
I think it it really deeply causes tension and and possibly even deep wounds that maybe we won’t see in the moment.
33:29
But I think throughout history and throughout the years, I think we will be probably be uncovering of the implications of all of this.
Yeah, it can be so, so disheartening to see particular is I don’t know current all the current stats on it, but I know it’s the reality that it’s more likely that someone that’s crossing the border.
33:54
It’s more likely they’re a pastor than a felon is the reality around that.
And yet and so how we are and even how we would should we shouldn’t even be dehumanizing if it was the other way around.
And so to see so much rhetoric coming from church spaces especially, I mean that just that is so that causes so much harm both to to all parties involved.
34:17
And I think engaging in dehumanizing others is harmful to oneself as well.
That does something to us to dehumanize other people.
There is.
And with that dehumanization has come policies to match, right?
34:34
Like the lived reality for immigrants right now in America is probably described as tenuous at best, right?
Like it’s, it’s pretty scary out there.
How, how have those policies and shifts in this current administration impacted the, the work that you do or what you’re, what you’re seeing, what you’re hearing from the migrants that you’re serving there, How is, how is it shaping their decision making?
35:01
And that and those sorts of idea things are trying to figure out.
Yeah, you mentioned right how perhaps somebody that’s coming as as a pastor, not necessarily a criminal.
If you look at at stats, you’ll see that at least I believe the last one that I read was less than 1% are are actually criminally based.
35:26
A lot of people are seeking refuge from just very challenging conditions.
Others are seeking to, to come here for a better opportunity for their, for their children, for themselves, economical opportunity often.
35:44
And it is, it is a heavy, yeah, it’s, it’s a heavy concept.
Immigration.
I’ll say that if people are often, you know, they, they want answers to everything.
Immigration is so great it, it lives in a lot of the Gray that often times when they come to our, to our program, they leave with more questions than they have answers.
36:09
But that’s amazing because then that just continues, right?
They continue this journey to, to find more and, and to seek more.
The current administration has definitely tightened access in ways that have effectively erased the possibility of seeking some type of lawful refuge for many people.
36:29
Specifically a policy like the Remain in Mexico policy that has forced the vulnerable individuals and families to wait in sometimes some unsafe conditions on the other side of the border, often for months or years.
They go without support or legal clarity.
36:47
And for for some, especially those that those that were just on the cusp of gaining entry before January 20th, it meant that their cases were cancelled altogether.
And so the doors that once seemed open were suddenly shut.
37:03
And for many of them, they are now trapped in a system that doesn’t acknowledge their humanity or the right to seek safety.
And we’re seeing that here in the US, but also on the other side of town, we’re hearing heartbreaking stories from people who’ve done everything that they were supposed to do, who waited their turn, who followed the legal process and still found themselves discarded by a system that keeps shifting the the goal posts, if you may, Their families with children, individuals fleeing violence, persecution, economical collapse, like Jan mentioned.
37:38
People who aren’t just looking for a better life, but are trying to survive that we are no longer seeing this pathway for them.
And as an organization, we’ve had to sit in this tension.
And it’s not the first time.
We, we have been through many administrations here on the border.
37:57
We’ve had to sit through many different tensions.
We’ve had to hold space for people who were counting on a pathway that no longer exists, right.
We continue our work as as policies change because our work has not just become about providing support and advocacy for people, but it’s also about standing in solidarity with people who feel forgotten, who show a need for a spiritual, a spiritual hug, if you may.
38:30
And we’re showing them that they’re not alone.
We’ve had to learn to adapt and to pivot very quickly because things on the border are often and always changing to meet the needs of the individuals while still telling the truth about what’s happening.
And it doesn’t get easier for us.
38:48
There’s a very big emotional weight that that is upon us as we watch our undocumented neighbors bear the full cost of these policy decisions.
We, we’ve had to sit in this tension where our asylum seekers are refugees are bearing the full cost of this policy decision.
39:10
And it’s, it’s heavy.
It’s really heavy.
If I may, I’d like to share a quick story about a camp that we visited in in, in Matamoros, Mexico.
This is a camp that is currently and temporarily being hosted by the local authorities there.
39:31
It’s currently housing perhaps around 280 individuals there.
And we have a local partner that we visit there and, you know, we come to the camp with him.
And recently in the last couple of weeks, we’ve been to this camp several times already, but it was the first time that we see and we meet this baby.
39:51
She is three months.
She was born in December.
Her parents had been waiting to entry to enter the US.
They had actually an appointment already on hand.
It was January 26th that they were supposed to come through the lawful pathway.
40:11
The female was pregnant with the baby, but she ended up being a preemie and she was born in December and she had the baby in Mexico.
Because the baby was a preemie.
I think she was born at seven months.
She had to be put in an incubator and stayed at the hospital, right, Just so that they can check her, check on her.
40:32
Well, in that time that the baby was born, that she’s there in an incubator, they get the e-mail that January 26th is the date that they’re that they need to be crossing.
And so the parents are now faced with, OK, well, the baby’s born.
40:47
We have a date.
Do we leave the baby here with the, with, you know, my uncle and aunt and we go or do we, do we not go and we miss our appointment.
It was a really tough decision for the family and they actually ended up taking the appointment date and leaving the child and the incubator.
41:08
They thought if we go to our appointment, we’ll get an opportunity to bring her in right through the application that they had filled out and everything.
And the baby is yet to be reconnected with her family and they’re only miles away from each other, like 25 miles from where this camp sits to where this family sits in Brownsville, TX.
41:38
And she is a miracle baby.
I mean, I, I held the baby and I just, I couldn’t help but just cry and I couldn’t understand just all the all the things that go into the decision of this family, right?
I’m sure that they thought about this is the opportunity for a family.
41:58
We already have something in place and we’ll just bring her after we’re there.
And then after January 20th.
Now their case is no longer clear.
Now they are subject to deportation.
42:15
And so there’s a lot of tension.
And this is just one of the millions of stories that we’ve heard along the border.
I know maybe people might think, well, why did them?
Why did they leave them?
42:30
Why did the parents decide to leave the child?
Man, I think that, and if you’ve ever been in situations where desperation is really the only choice, like you want to make what’s best for the entire family.
42:47
And sometimes we’re so quick to judge.
We’re so quick to judge the decisions of others because we don’t fully understand them.
And we’re very, very slow to stand in solidarity with somebody or stand in the tension, in the supporting, in the advocacy of what that looks like.
43:06
And so yeah, things don’t get easier with policies that change.
They just get more emotionally heavy and and very weighted down for sure.
That’s intense.
I I feel for the family.
43:22
I can’t.
I think I agree.
We are so often quick to judge people’s choices without understanding what options they actually had on the table, assuming better of ourselves than we assume of someone else who actually is living that experience and not just sitting on the outside making judgments about it outside of of that story.
43:44
Jonathan, I’d like to hear as well from you if like is there a story that you still it sits with you.
You know, the ones that people come into our lives and you know they come to mind often or since we’re laying Ben can’t fall asleep.
This is the story or the person that comes to mind.
44:01
Who is that for?
You for sure.
For me, I think the theme of perseverance really comes up a lot in in in different stories.
In one particular scenario, I think about also visiting an asylum, seeking asylum seeker camp and wanting just the opportunity to engage in people’s story really in this particular conversation actually LED us to prayer.
44:30
And it was a hunter and mother and with several children who was waiting for their asylum, you know, processing case.
And I, I know I, I invited, I asked for permission if I could pray for them.
44:48
And, you know, I paused.
But in that pause, she started praying for me and her prayer was more bold her, her prayer was more hopeful, her prayer was stronger, and her faith evoked conviction also within me.
45:11
And there was nothing about this particular scenario or this individual in their family that really connects to the type of rhetoric that we hear.
And it’s oftentimes people’s perseverance, people’s faith, people’s endurance that really will spark, I think for me, right, this, this solidarity that that we want to find with each other.
45:42
And so it was no longer me asking for permission to pray for them, but it was actually both of us praying for each other and praying with each other.
And I think that was just a beautiful moment because often times we only see people from this position of maybe resources or privilege, but in the way we see the other people on the other side is the the people that are in poverty are in need.
46:10
And but especially in the faith context, she blessed me, she was able to contribute something to me, right?
Even though I’m on the opposite side, say, economically, even documentation wise.
46:27
And so it’s stories like that.
It’s moments like that that are heartfelt.
It’s moments like that that keep me full of hope because I know that even though we’re battling some of the red, the rhetoric that’s happening and the headlines, the intimate stories, the one-on-one conversations that we have completely flip that upside down.
46:49
Thank you so much for that.
I mean, I want to sign up for a trip now, but if there are other people listening who would like to either get involved by by coming to the border and seeing what’s happening for themselves or to or to support you all in whatever way they can from home, where, where can they find more about what you all are doing?
47:13
Definitely, yes.
So you can view all of our work at borderperspective.org.
We’re all over social media.
Our website has a lot of informations.
We have service learning trips available for groups, churches, small groups, cohorts.
47:30
We also have intensive and immersive weekends that we do in the spring and in the fall.
And so if there’s another way that you want to support our border response, this is just alleviating the suffering of people specifically now on both sides of the border.
47:45
You can also find ways to get involved in and give at borderperspective.org.
That’s wonderful.
Thank you both so much for giving up your time today.
And just your expertise and your experience is so valuable and needed in this really challenging moment around immigration.
48:03
And not that immigration’s ever been simple or straightforward or not challenging, but it just feels especially heavy right now.
So I really appreciate your time.
Yeah.
Thank you, Elizabeth.
Thank you for having us.
Thank you so much.
Thanks for listening to the Be the Bridge Podcast.
48:21
To find out more about Be the Bridge and what we offer, visit bethebridge.com.
Partner with us in this work at bethebridge.com/give, Connect with us on social media, and remember, you are not alone in your pursuit of righteousness and justice.
48:37
Latasha Morrison is the executive producer, Sarah Connatser is the producer, and transcripts are done by a wonderful team of volunteers.
Thanks for listening.
Leave A Comment