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“We fear for our lives, and we fear for our families”
Stories from migrants in El Paso
By Veronika Jaster
Migrants traveling through El Paso, Texas receive uncompromising love from many shelters, such as the one at the St. Francis Xavier Parish just 2,000 feet from the border, where Assumptionist priests have dedicated their lives to serving immigrants. Warm meals, clothing, support, and prayers from the priests, parishioners, and volunteers go a long way after the nightmares the migrants experience in their home countries.
Jairo, a middle-aged schoolteacher from Nicaragua, shared, “I feel at home here; I do. As some friends and I were just saying, for me, you are angels that God has placed on our journey, because God does not abandon anyone.”
He chose to come here because in Nicaragua, “the current government doesn’t respect human rights. If you’re not in favor of this government and don’t share its ideals, they mistreat you.”
This oppression causes citizens themselves to resort to evil measures. Hipolito, also from Nicaragua, told his story of how another’s desperation not only puts a life at risk but fuels the bigger problem.
“When I was 32 years old, a man tried to rob me. He hit and assaulted me, and left me with life-long injuries. He gave me thirteen machete wounds, and the man is already going to be set free from jail. My life is at risk over there, since the government is Sandinista… and since he’s sided with the government, he’ll be freed from prison soon, in order to serve the government in oppressing people.”
For every criminal walking free, a just man faces a punishment even worse than what the latter would have deserved.
“If you were to speak out against the government, you’d go to jail for 12-13 years,” Hipolito explained. “And then, after doing that time, they’d take you to a prison called El Chipote, where they’d torture you, and afterward, they’d kill you. And if not, they’d let you go and after that, they'd send their own country’s military to execute you.”
Columbia’s economy also endangers the well-being of its people, which is what brought José, a young Columbian man, to the States.
“I’m here undergoing this cursed experience, to which you come prepared to suffer because it’s a story already told by family and friends. But it’s not just a story because every day, my country is getting worse and worse economically. Even if you manage to get a job, the pay is very low; with what you earn, it’s basically impossible to put food on the table.”
But the nightmare didn’t end as soon as they stepped out of their home countries.
“It’s very risky and difficult to get here,” Jairo said. “You have to pass through many countries, and when you get inspected by the immigration law enforcement and the cartels, some are lucky, and some are not. It’s very tiring; you travel by day and by night, and you pass through very dangerous places. So we fear for our lives, and we fear for our families.”
Compared to some colleagues who were kidnapped, robbed, and delayed by months, Jairo’s journey was relatively quick and not as perilous, but still traumatic.
“In my case, the most dangerous thing was traveling in a trailer. We were closed up, there wasn’t enough oxygen, it was very straining, and we had to spend twelve hours on the road,” he said. “One person suffocated and was also dehydrated.”
The officers and cartels in some countries also threaten safe passage. Jairo said that “they approach you, check you, and blackmail you, saying that the document you’ve brought isn’t valid. Then in order for you to keep going, you have to collaborate [with them].”
And the nightmare persists, even on this side of the border. Once migrants arrive, they must wait in a detention center for an indefinite amount of time. These centers, according to Hipolito, are more like prisons.
“It took me two months to get to the States, plus the 14 days that I spent in the prisons here; well, I don't know what you called them, but we were prisoners there,” he said.
José would agree, as he described the uncertainty to be confining.
“One terrible thing is that the future is so uncertain. You don’t know where they’re taking you,” the Columbian migrant said. “Let’s say a person is received in one place, and once he’s taken to another place, he doesn’t even know if food will arrive nor where they’ll take him. They come and wake you up at any hour of the night and we have to leave right away. So it’s literally like a dream.”
And this terrible nightmare lingers, even once they leave the detention center and arrive at their final destination.
“You’re free,” Jairo began, “but when you come here, there’s not really any more freedom or possibility of exit.”
Despite the horrors, these men trust that God does not abandon them and that their decisions were worth the risk.
“If ten times I was told to come here from Nicaragua and I had to do it, I would do it my entire life,” Hipolito said. “And through God, everything will work out well here for me in this country because this is the country of opportunities for all of us immigrants.”
José likewise does not regret the journey, especially thanks to the St. Francis Xavier parish. “I really don’t even have enough words to express how grateful I am because out of all the bad and ugly experiences, out of all the bad places I’ve passed through, to get to a place like this, you feel as if you have come to a family where they make you feel truly at home.”
Jairo expressed his blessings for all those involved with the Assumptionist mission in El Paso: “I ask that God blesses you, may He provide for you more and more each day, and may the organizations or institutions or people support this mission because what you do is part of God's commandment; to love your neighbor.”
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