from mexico to the 'promised land' cover story package for our sunday visitor, national catholic...

7/27/2019 From Mexico to the 'Promised Land' Cover Story Package for Our Sunday Visitor, national Catholic weekly, by Ste

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INSIDE THIS WEEK

N FOCUS FAMILY

Despite their childrens disabilities andsicknesses, a New Mexico husbandand wifes trust in God have led them to

celebrate every conception.

From Mexico to the promised landPOOR JOB PROSPECTS AND LACKOF BASICS DRIVE MANY NORTH

Each year,roughly 500,000 Mexicanresidents migrate illegally to theUnited States. That has led the unau-horized migrant population from

Mexico to rise to 6.2 million, accord-ng to data from the U.S. Census

Bureau.In this issue, Our Sunday Visitor

examines the economic, political andcultural factors that cause both low-ncome and middle-class Mexican res-dents to make the often-perilous treko the United States in search of oppor-unities that elude them back home.

Such challenges include a lack of accesso good health care, education, clean

water and employment.We also explore the challenges they

face on this side of the border, includ-ng assimilating into life in their new

parish communities.

PAGES 9-12

PAGE 8

NEWS ANALYSIS

Nun who ministeredin U.S. is new saint

A

mong four saints tobe canonized by Pope

Benedict XVI today isMo t he r T he o do reGuerin, a French nunwho came to Indiana andset up numerous schoolsin the United States. Shealso founded a congre-gation of religious, theSisters of Providence ofSt. Mary-of-the-Woods.

PAGES 4-5

O C T O B E R 1 5 , 2 0 0 6

VOLUME 95, NO. 25 $2.00 www.osv.com

CATHOLIC CLARITY IN A COMPLEX WORLDKATRINA EVACUEES COPE WITH LIFE OUTSIDE OF NEW ORLEANS l PAGE 3

ESSAY: EUROPE COULD LEARN FROM U.S. CHURCH-STATE VIEW l PAGE 13

COLUMN: SALUTING ANNIE MOORE AND ALL WHO CAME BEFORE US lPAGE 17

MAKING A

SPECIAL

CONNECTION

TO THE

SACRAMENTS

At a Mass at St. Patricks Cathedral, New York Cardinal EdwardEgan confirms Jeanine Piznak while Paul Papa waits his turn.The Archdiocese of New York has a program to prepare spe-cial-needs children for sacraments. PHOTO BY CHRIS SHERIDAN OF CATHOLICNE W YORK

Dioceses offer catechetical and sacramental-preparationprograms to young people with developmental andcognitive disabilities to show families and parish

communities that there is a place for them in the Church.

FAITH, PAGES 14-15

Crosses bring couple closer to Jesus

Mother GuerinSHUTTERSTOCK

PHOTO


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OUR SUNDAY VISITOR l OCTOBER 15, 20

9

The week before,Erica Dahl-Bredine,the country man-ager for Mexico of Catholic Relief Services in Tucson,Ariz., was in Mexico City attending the Second LatinAmerican Congress on Catholic Social Teaching agathering of about 250 bishops, clergy and laity fromMexico and South America who got together for theecond time in 15 years to discuss possible solutions to

poverty,unemployment,corruption,child labor and otherproblems endemic to Latin America.

Dahl-Bredine said that the streets of Mexico City werebusy, noisy and filled with the preparations for thendependence Day holiday. The country prepares forhe celebration during the whole month of September,he told Our Sunday Visitor via e-mail from Mexico.

Everywhere you go, there are huge Mexican flags andred-white-and-green decorations on almost every street

and every major building,and there are many street ven-dors pushing carts along the sidewalks streets selling

In FocusCrossing the Border

VISAWhy many leavehome without it

A woman and her children walk through a slum in Tijuana, Mexico. Many Mexicans have to

make do without a regular paycheck and benefits, enticing them to head north to the UnitedStates. ZUMA PRESS PHOTO BY JAMES ARONOVSKY

Stories by Stephen James

On Sept. 16, Mexico celebrated its annual

Independence Day holiday with parades,

rodeos, bullfights and feasting. Its a day com-

memorating the 1810 beginning of the countrys

break from Spanish rule,which was initiated by

a Catholic priest.

Most U.S. undocumented workers

come from Mexico, a country that

offers little chance for a decent living

56Percentage ofthe unauthorizedmigrant popula-tion in the UnitedStates whosebirth country isMexico 30

Percentage thatunauthorizedmigrantsaccount for ofthe foreign-bornpopulation in theUnited States 11.1

Number, in mil-lions, of unautho-rized migrants liv-ing in the UnitedStates in 2005,based on CurrentPopulation Survey


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flags, streamers and all kinds ofother Independence Day deco-rations.

Political upheavalThis year,however, the patri-

otic emotions associated withthe holiday were complicated bythe still-lingering aftereffects ofa bitterly contested presidentialelection that occurred July 2. Asa result, Mexico City avenuesand alleyways were decoratedwith more than just flags andstreamers, Dahl-Bredine said.

I see political banners and signsalmost everywhere I go in thestreet.Some of them support thecandidate who was recentlydeclared the winner. But in thepoorer and more working class

areas,almost all ofthe banners aresupporting the opposition can-didate who is calling for a recount,she said. Those banners accusethe current Fox administration ofbeing a traitor to democracyandcall on the government to recountall the ballots, polling place bypolling place.

On Sept. 5, the countrysFederal Election Tribunaldeclared that the right-of-center,market-oriented candidate FelipeCalderon had officially won theelection by a less-than-1-percent

margin over the leftist, populistAndres Manuel Lopez Obrador,although many citizens continue

to dispute the election results.Lopez Obrador and his sup-porters have threatened to set upa parallel government, and thedrama continues to unfold. Butregardless of who ultimatelybecomes the new president ofMexico when the term of the cur-rent president,Vicente Fox,endson Dec. 1, the countrys eco-nomic and social conditions thatresult in roughly 500,000 residentsper year illegally migrating to theUnited States are expected toremain essentially unchanged.

In search of basicsOne in every seven Mexican

workers migrates to the United

States, and it is estimated thatroughly 10 percent of Mexicospopulation ofabout 107 millionis now living on the other side ofthe countrys northern border.Last year, Mexicos expatriatework force sent home $20 billionin remittances,constituting oneof the top three income sourcesof the country along with oilexport and tourism revenue.

Migration is clearly a sign ofthe times, a manifestation of aneconomic model that is in manyways failing the poor,and increas-

ingly the middle class as well, inmuch of Latin America, Dahl-Bredine said.Opening its bor-ders to increased competitionfrom imports under the NorthAmerican Free Trade Agreement(NAFTA) has been devastating

for Mexicos small farmers andits small and medium-sized busi-ness sector.

The leaders of the Catholicconference discussed how hugesegments of the population inMexico and Latin America areeffectively excluded from a dig-nified way of life and access tobasic rights of health care, edu-cation,clean water and dignifiedemployment because of the eco-nomic incompetence of govern-ment institutions.

The bulk of the jobs beingcreated in Mexico these days isin the informal economy,mean-ing a huge segment of the pop-

ulation has to create its ownwork, selling food in the streets,sewing clothing,repairing appli-ances,selling used clothing, youname it.These folks have no reg-ular paycheck,no Social Security,no safety net,Dahl-Bredine said.

One problem is that in imple-menting NAFTA, the UnitedStates and Mexico did not con-sider the pre-existing economicdisparities between the two coun-tries. When the free-trade com-ponents of the European Unionwere established, development

funding was provided fomember countries beforing them in the tradinThis was done to establislevel playing field in thand reduce the possibwidespread displacem

workers and farmers in thcountries,which has occMexico, she said.

Squeezed in middlIn addition to Mexica

bottom ofthe socioeconoder who come to the Unitto provide their familihome with the basic necefood and clothing, manshrinking middle class apelled to go north to earnto buy or build a home in

A big problem is thhave good access to lenditutions, explained DMassey, a sociology pro

Princeton University wworked with the U.S.Conof Catholic Bishops ongration issues. So onmajor motivations to mto the United States isfinance the constructihouse because there is ngage market in Mexico.Ifwere to improve its mmarkets, a lot of the mofor migration would dis

Stephen James writes fro

California.

OCTOBER 15, 2006 l OUR SUNDAY VISITOR

In November 2004,Arizona voters passed Proposition200, which requires residents of the state to produceproof of citizenship before they can register to vote orapply for public benefits.

The initiative was triggered,in part, by the perceptionthat undocumented immigrants were burdening publicservices, and each year the state legislature considers orpasses dozens of similar bills that target migrants, saidRon Johnson, executive director of the Arizona CatholicConference.

Its just a lot of red meat,just a lot of fervor that politi-cians are throwing at all sorts of constituencies that justsee the broken immigration system, Johnson said. AndI think people, unfortunately, are desperate to do any-thing and are grasping out at what are sometimes somenot so good ideas.

One bill that passed the last legislative session and willbe on the ballot in November proposes to deny adult edu-cation and college financial assistance and child-care assis-tance to undocumented immigrants. Johnson pointed

out that if voters approve the measure, the educational financial aide to the children ofmwerent born in the United States but yet have elementary, middle and high school in theeffectively deny them a meaningful future bthe cost of their tuition, he said. Its just u

MisperceptionsWhile many Americans believe that un

workers bleed taxpayer and government fu

Undocumented workers contributions outweigh their costs to nati

Mexican Economy 101Labor force: 43.4 million

Labor force by occupation: Agriculture,18 percent; industry, 24 percent;

services, 58 percentUnemployment rate: 3.6 per-cent, plus an underemploymentrate of 25 percent

Populationbelowpoverty line:40 percent

Source: CIAWorld Factbook

Mexico

Mexico City

Illegal immigration from Latin America risesThis chart shows the size and characteristics of the unautho-

rized migrant population (in the thousands) based on the 2000Census (in red) and the March 2005 Current Population Survey(in green).

In that time, the number of unauthorized Mexicans increasedby 1.5 million, from 4.7 million to 6.2 million. During the sametime period, the number of undocumented workers from CentralAmerica increased by 465,000, to 1.4 million; those from Southand East Asia by 365,000, to 1.4 million; and those from SouthAmerica by 160,000, to 705,000.

Source: Pew Hispanic Center

Migration is clearly a sign of the

times, a manifestation of an economic

model that is in many ways failing the

poor, and increasingly the middle class

as well, in much of Latin America.

ERICA DAHL-BREDINE

In Focus: Crossing the Border10


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In Focus: Crossing the Border

OUR SUNDAY VISITOR l OCTOBER 15, 20

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nment subsidized health care, housing and educa-numerous studies have shown immigrants pay intostem significantly more than they take out. For exam-

most undocumented workers use fake or borrowedl Security numbers and pay withholding, social secu-nd Medicaid taxes that they effectively forfeit to thenment.eople will say they cost U.S.taxpayers a lot of moneyedical and educational benefits,the kids go to school,use the emergency room as their primary physicianuse the emergency room cant turn anybody awaylot of them are on welfare and they dont pay taxes,ined Father Charles Goraieb of Queen ofPeace Parish

in Mesa,Ariz. But between what they pay in withhold-ing, Social Security taxes, which they dont get back, andwhat they contribute to the economy in terms of theirpurchasing and sales taxes far outweighs whatever tax-payer money is spent on education and medical bene-fits.

Douglas Massey, a Princeton University sociologyprofessor who also works with the U.S. Conference ofCatholic Bishops on immigration research, said studieshave shown that undocumented immigrants produceincome for the government above and beyond the costof services they use.All the studies show that it is a netgain overall, he said.

State and local governments that pay for medical,edu-cational and other migrant services can, however, canend up shortchanged since much of the revenue gener-ated by undocumented workers ends up in federal cof-fers.

And the federal government currently does not havea way in its revenue sharing formula to pay back statesand localities for the cost of taking care of and harbor-ing immigrants, he said. Its up to the [federal] gov-ernment to even out the costs and the benefits so thatnobody gets screwed,and theyre not doing that theyregaming it. Its easier to beat on the immigrants for polit-ical points than to actually solve the problem.

Vicente Lopez (not his realname) was born about 24

years ago on a farm near a smallown in the state of Sonora,

Mexico, about 100 miles southof the U.S. border. Lopez and hiswo sisters and two brothers were

raised mostly by their motherbecause their father left to workn the United States he enteredhe country legally on a work visa.

Lopez attended Mass at a smallchapel in the area where he lived,and took catechism lessons froma priest who traveled from themain parish to the rural farmingcommunity. He attended ele-mentary school near the farm and

hen completed middle and highchool in a small town about 10miles away. Growing up, heenjoyed playing baseball andother sports with his cousins andextended family.

Family affairWhen he was about 18 years

old, he got a job working as areceptionist at a hotel in a townnear where he was raised. Heworked full time and was paid$40 per week. About two yearsater, his sister and brother-in-aw suggested he come to the

United States, where they wereiving and working as undocu-

mented immigrants.To get across the border,Lopezobtained a tourist visa, and hehas lived in the southwesternUnited States for four years. Hes employed as a plumbers assis-ant and makes $11 an hour

working for a small,six-employeecompany where his co-workersare also undocumented immi-grants. He sends some of whathe makes home to his mother andpends the rest on living expenses.

On the weekends he said likes togo out to dinner and see a movie

with friends.Lopez attends Mass on Sunday

and two or three times during theweek. Still single, he applied tothe join the diocese as a semi-narian and was tentativelyaccepted until they found out hewas in the country illegally.Hewas very deeply hurt,his parishpriest Paulo Santana (not his realname) told Our Sunday Visitor.It was a real personal blow tohim,feeling he has this calling byGod to be a priest, has this voca-tion.

Putting down rootsSeveral immigrant advocates

have pointed out an unintendedconsequence of the governmentsimmigration crackdown, whichresults in more migrants puttingdown long-term roots in theUnited States.

Historically, many migrantswould leave families behind andcome to the United States towork, with the intention of oneday returning home permanently.In the interim,they would oftengo back and forth across the bor-der to bring money home andmaintain family ties.

But now,coming to the UnitedStates or returning to Mexicooften means a perilous, life-or-

death journey or paying smug-glers, known as coyotes, toarrange border passage. As aresult, some immigrants withfamilies will now come to theUnited States,find work and thenarrange to have their family fol-low to live in the United Statesindefinitely, if not permanently.

Our Sunday Visitor askedLopez if this was true. Yes, sothat the family can be together,he said.If they can get throughwith a visa,theyll use that.If theycant, theyll go use the coyotes.

Because he has a tourist visa,Lopez is able to travel to and fromMexico relatively freely, and hevisits his mother about twice amonth in Mexico. Santana said

Lopez is lucky to be able to goback and forth with relative ease.Several years ago,one his parish-ioners told him he was going back

to Mexico to attend his sonsbaptism. And I tried to dis-courage him. I told him it wasdangerous, Santana said. Andhe said, Well, I dont want myson to grow up to know that his

father was not there at such animportant moment of his life.That would be hard for me.While trying to cross the border,

the man was killed by banditsHe had just crossed the bo

der into Mexico and the mugers approached him and hresisted,and in the struggle bohe and the mugger fell down

cliff.He died of head injuries,anthe mugger became a paraplegfrom the fall, Lopez said.

It was a horrible tragedy.

Aiding and reuniting familymain concern of immigrantsOne unauthorized Mexican worker explains why he entered the U.S.

PROFILE

More and more, undocumented workers stay in theUnited States longer to avoid the perilous and costly

journey back to Mexico. SHUTTERSTOCK PHOTO

Documenting theundocumented journey

University of Notre Dame theologyprofessor and immigrant advocateFather Daniel Groody has produced acompelling documentary film on theimmigration debate. Dying to Live A Migrants Journey is an unsettlinglook at the social, economic, politicaland religious implications of the mass

migration of Mexican citizens to theUnited States.

The films raw footage of the immi-grant journey, which begins deep inMexico and then treks to the northernborder and beyond, has received anenthusiastic response at local andregional film festivals from Delawareto California.

For information, visit www.nd.edu/~latino/units/clsc.htm.

Here is a compilation of still photographs from the documentary Dying to Live,

produced by the Center for Latino Spirituality and Culture at the University ofNotre Dame. PHOTOS COURTESY OF UNIVERSITY OF NOTRE DAME

Risky operation

According to theGovernment AccountabilityOffice, the number of bor-der crossing deaths hasdoubled since 1995. Lastyear, 472 people died try-ing to enter the UnitedStates.


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In Focus: Crossing the Border

OCTOBER 15, 2006 l OUR SUNDAY VISITOR

12

ADAPTATION

Father Charles Goraieb,knownas Father Charlie to his parish-ioners, has been working withimmigrants and in parishes withsignificant immigrant popula-tions for 15 years.

His current parish is Queenof Peace Catholic Church inMesa, Ariz., where he ministersto about 3,500 families.About 55percent ofthe parish is Hispanicimmigrants and the rest are a mixof white,other races and second-or third-generation HispanicAmericans.

Goraieb said there is alwaysfriction within his flock. Ivealways been in a bilingual parish,so wherever I go its always thesame thing, there is tension and

its why both cultures need tounderstand each other, he said.Last spring,just before he was

transferred to his current parish,Goraieb planned to hold a sym-posium at his former parish, St.Henrys in Buckeye,Ariz., whichhad roughly the same ethnicmakeup and issues of his newparish.The purpose of the meet-ing was to encourage dialogue and

understanding between the dom-inant Anglo, and the immigrantHispanic communities withinthe parish. But for several rea-sons, the symposium was can-celled.

One of those reasons was thepoisonous political atmospherein Arizona. What happened isthat here in Arizona were kindof a lightning rod because ourborder is really the main entry-way.The political situation heatedup so intensely here that the peo-ple were in a state of fury, and itwould have just been too politi-cally charged to be able to try andreason with the community, hesaid.They would have seen it asa political issue rather than the

spiritual issue we believe it is.Just months into his service athis new parish and seeing thesame problems, Father Goraiebis considering trying again.Thedominant [Anglo and Hispanic-American] culture doesnt reallyhave a broad understanding andcertainly in most cases not aChristian understanding of theimmigration concerns and the

immigration issue.

MisunderstandingsFather Goraieb attributes

much of the misunderstandingto inaccurate or exaggerated tele-vision and newspaper reportsthat disproportionately amplifythe security and economic impactaspects of immigration.

The media doesnt reallyunderstand the problem theyre reacting. People hear thislong enough and theyre goingto start reacting too,but the issueis very complex, he said. TheUnited States certainly has a rightto secure its borders, but at thesame time,as Catholics,we believethat people have a right to immi-

grate wherever it is they feel theyhave to go in order to provide alivelihood for their families. Wewant to help the dominant cul-ture understand what the immi-grants are doing here.

On the other hand, FatherGoraieb believes that immigrantsneed to understand and, to acertain extent,meet the legit-imate expectations that the dom-

inant culture has of them.Whenthey come here, they have todemonstrate a desire to integrateand assimilate to some degree,he said. They have to learn thelanguage. They have to appreci-ate that we are a nation that livesunder the rule of law, and theyhave to resist the temptation of

absorbing the very worst ofAmerican culture,which is mate-rialism and hedonism.

Cultural influencesSome immigrants will instinc-

tively reject the worst aspects ofAmerican culture. They comeand they see what it does to thefamily,Father Goraieb explained.They see that kids have no respect

for their parents,live in a that is completely separtheir parents, and theywhat happens to the famits not attractive to them

Other migrants will ethe illusory freedomAmerican way of l ifwomen will have one or t

dren and then have thetied, he said.Because now both get jobs, thework,and their kids areattended.They spend theend at the flea market orMart,and they're basicalsame treadmill that Aon. Even though its lowits still the same treadmiis acquisition.

Priest tries to ease tensionsHe wants parishioners to have an understanding of immigration issues

On July 9, 2005, Daniel Strauss andShanti Sellz,both 23, were arrestedby U.S.Border Patrol agents while trans-porting three undocumented immi-grants suffering from severe dehydrationfrom an aid camp near Arivaca,Ariz., toa hospital in Tucson. The two werecharged with conspiracy to transport anillegal alien and transporting an illegalalien, and faced a maximum penalty of10 years in prison, a $250,000 fine orboth, on each charge.

Both college students were doing vol-unteer work for No More Deaths, aninterfaith humanitarian-aid organizationthat tracks migrant border crossingdeaths and provides water,food and med-ical assistance to immigrants making theoften fatal trek across the border throughthe Arizona desert.

Strauss and Sellz were represented probono by two attorneys one of whomwas a former chief justice ofthe ArizonaSupreme Court and on Sept.1, 2006,the charges against the pair were dis-missed. In essence, U.S. District CourtJudge Raner Collins ruled that since thegovernment for years had allowed NoMore Deaths volunteers to provide assis-tance to immigrants in distress,it couldnot reverse that policy and now declarethe same aide a criminal act. The casewas watched closely by other immigrant

assistance organizations, including theArizona Catholic Conference.

Father Daniel Groody, a professor oftheology at the University of NotreDame who is also active with immigra-tion-assistance organizations, said that

some assistance groups try to workwithin the law,while others push the enve-lope into gray areas.

Either way,there are multiple dimen-sions of the law at issue:Sovereign rights,civil right and human rights, or inter-national law including especially theDeclaration on Human Rights and the

Geneva Convention domestic lawnatural law,he told Our Sunday V

The day before the court dismthe charges against Strauss and SelGreen Valley Samaritans, another igrant-assistance group, held a mrial service for a migrant they foundin the desert.

Further resourcesn Justice for Immigrants

The Catholic Campaign forImmigration Reform: www.justice-forimmigrants.orgnMexican Migration Project

from the Office of PopulationResearch at Princeton University:mmp.opr.princeton.edun No More Deaths, an inter-

faith humanitarian aide organization:www.nomoredeaths.orgn Green Valley Samaritans,

an interfaith humanitarian aide orga-nization: samaritanpatrol.orgn Humane Borders, an inter-

faith humanitarian aide organizationthat provides water stations in thedesert: www.humaneborders.orgn Economic Impact of the

Mexico-Arizona Relationship Thunderbird business school:www.ime.gob.mx/investigaciones/aportaciones/arizona.pdf

Members of Humane Borders, an interfaith humanitarian aidegroup, fill water stations in the Arizona desert. PHOTO COURTESY OF HUMANE B

Organizations that help immigrants at risk

When [immigrants] come here,

they have to demonstrate a

desire to integrate and assimilate

to some degree. FATHER CHARLES GORAIEB

from mexico to the 'promised land' cover story package for our sunday visitor, national catholic...

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