Mission Yearbook: Presbytery’s partnership helps offer literary classes in Guatemala

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A second literacy class has been added in Las Barrancas, Guatemala.

Last fall, while visiting our partners in Guatemala, we traveled about two hours from the Association of Mam Christian Women for Development office to a very remote village called Las Barrancas, which means “the ravines.” Tucked away in lush mountains, this gorgeous place feels somewhat forgotten, like the end of the Earth.

Traveling there is quite an adventure, requiring a trusty 4x4 to navigate the pothole-filled, muddy surfaces that are sometimes impassable in the rainy season. For residents of this community to attend school, especially after the elementary grades, they have to travel quite far, which is not always possible.

This means that literacy rates and education levels in the community are low. Most of the people living here work on one of the eight surrounding coffee fincas (plantations), the majority of them women since many of the men have migrated to the United States to find work.

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A student is given materials on the first day of class (photo courtesy of New Castle Presbytery's Guatemala Partnership).

Our main reason for venturing to Las Barrancas was to learn more about a new literacy project that had just been launched by a Guatemalan government agency. While the initial class was a success, the government did not have the funding to continue the program after the first year. In response, the Association committed to keeping the first class going, while also adding a second class in 2025. Concord Presbyterian Church in Wilmington, Delaware, donated the funds needed for the teachers' salaries and materials while an anonymous individual offered to cover the cost of new folding tables and chairs. We are thrilled to report that both classes are now underway!

There are 20 students in total this year. Twelve students are in the “first grade” class, and eight in the “second grade” class. Sessions are held on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 2 to 5:20 p.m. for a total of 10 hours a week. This afternoon schedule allows students to come to class after they return from working on the fincas.

Students learn how to write their name, do basic math, and master the alphabet, and will receive an official government “diploma” as long as they pass the final test at the end of the year. Last year's class had a 100% pass rate! Watch this video they made to show you their hard work, as well as the new tables, chairs and materials.

This program also is providing a source of income for two teachers who both live in the community, Lidia and Abdiel, pictured below. Abdiel (right) is just 17 years old and is using his salary to pay for his tuition and travel expenses to finish high school.

This wonderful new program is building confidence and transforming lives. The students share, “we thank God for the opportunity to learn and gain knowledge.” We are especially grateful to Concord Presbyterian Church and the anonymous donor for their financial support and hope to continue and expand these classes for years to come.

Carrie Saathoff, Guatemala Partnership of New Castle Presbytery (Click here to read original PNS Story)

Let us join in prayer for:

Zenia Baker, Administrative I, Operations, Presbyterian Foundation            
Adriana Ballard, AVP, Director of Investment Management, Investments, Presbyterian Foundation

Let us pray:

Loving God, we pray that all congregations will open their arms to those who live in their communities, embrace the gifts that new people bring and allow the Holy Spirit to enable them to thrive as new creations in Christ. Amen.

Today in the Mission Yearbook - New Castle Presbytery sponsors life-changing field trip for young adults in Guatemala

The presbytery’s longstanding Guatemala Partnership funds a trip where bread is baked, broken and shared

March 27, 2024

Last November, seven Guatemalan young adults embarked on an 

adventure that will have a lasting impact on their lives. (All photos by 

Carrie Saathoff)

In November, seven Guatemalan young adults embarked on a four-day adventure that will have a lasting impact on their lives. I had the privilege of accompanying the group, alongside Pastors Emerson Morales and Mardoqueo Perez of Jesus es El Camino church in Guatemala City. The Guatemala Partnership of New Castle Presbytery funded this trip.

These young people are founding members of the Utz Pan bakery, a project recently initiated by Jesus es El Camino (Jesus is the Way) church and funded with a grant from Presbyterian Committee on the Self-Development of People, part of the PC(USA)’s Compassion, Peace & Justice ministries.

A year ago, travelers from eight churches in New Castle Presbytery visited the newly created Utz Pan bakery. We had just returned from seeing a well-established bakery located five hours away and the idea of an “exchange trip” was born.

The young bakers are pictured outside a bakery they visited.

These young bakers live in an area of Guatemala City known as a “red zone” due to its high levels of poverty and drug-related crime. Gangs and violence are a way of life. There is little opportunity for these youth, and many have never traveled very far from home. Utz Pan, meaning Good Bread, offers these young people a way to learn new skills and earn money to pay for their education and help support their families. This field trip was designed to give them a behind-the-scenes look at other bakeries, learn more about the business, showcase the incredible beauty and history of their country, and strengthen friendships — both old and new.

We piled into two cars and headed five hours west to Quetzaltenango (aka Xela), stopping at Iximche, a well-known Mayan archaeological site, along the way. Early the next day, we arrived at our first bakery, owned by Justa and her family. Several years ago, Justa received revolving funds from the Association of Mam Christian Women for Development to start her own bakery. With an incredible amount of perseverance and hard work she has grown it into a very impressive operation.

A sacred lagoon is nestled in Chicabal Volcano.

After several hours standing in a hot and crowded kitchen learning how to make more than a dozen kinds of breads, we ate a wonderful lunch at a nearby restaurant owned by Julia and later watched a chocolate-making demonstration by a second woman, also named Justa. Both of these strong and determined women received revolving funds to launch their small businesses. Many in New Castle Presbytery have supported this project over the years.

The third day provided us a chance to relax, have some fun, and experience the natural beauty of Guatemala. We climbed up Chicabal Volcano and had time for reflection on the shores of the sacred lagoon nestled in the crater at the top. After such an intense hike, we decided to swing over to the natural hot springs of Fuentes Georginas to soak our weary legs, and then headed into downtown Xela for a nice dinner out. We even caught a pre-game parade of a beloved national soccer team in the main square!

Day four started out with a visit to a second bakery, owned by my Spanish teacher Astrid and her family. It was very different from the first one, from the atmosphere to even the look and taste of the bread, which was quite interesting. We were able to ask a lot of questions, see how they tracked their sales, and sample delicious pastries.

Alas, it was time to head back to Guatemala City. Clearly, this experience was life-changing and formative for the participants as they discern their future in the bakery business. It also afforded them a rare opportunity to explore their home country and meet people who live far away yet have similar dreams and struggles. We already have plans to offer this trip again next fall to different youth. Thank you for your ongoing support!

Watch a video the young adults made documenting their trip.

Carrie Saathoff is co-chair of New Castle Presbytery’s Guatemala Partnership.

Today’s Focus: New Castle Presbytery sponsors trip to Guatemala

Let us join in prayer for:

PC(USA) Agencies’ Staff
Jim Deweese, Graphic Designer II, Communications, Presbyterian Mission Agency 
Bryan Dickerson, Financial & Investment Planning Associate, Presbyterian Foundation

Let us pray

O Lord, open our hearts to those who come into our midst in need. May all be treated as children of God who reveal the in-breaking of your kingdom on earth, as it is in heaven. Amen.

Today in the Mission Yearbook - ‘The world is on fire’

Webinar put on by Guatemala-based PC(USA) partner offers participants actions of hope to help douse the flames

August 15, 2022

The Rev. Dr. Karla Koll

A recent virtual journey to Guatemala carried this title: “Confronting Climate Change with Actions of Hope.” The webinar, attended by more than 100 people, featured Bible study by The Rev. Dr. Karla Koll, a mission co-worker and professor of history, mission and religion at the Latin American Biblical University, an ecumenical institution in San Jose, Costa Rica.

CEDEPCA, a Guatemala City-based partner of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), put on the 75-minute webinar. “We live in a beautiful complex planet God created, and it’s changing every day,” said Esvin Sirin, a member of CEDEPCA’s Intercultural Encounters team. “Central America has become one of the most vulnerable places in the world.”

“The world is on fire” but “we are not the first to feel the world was on fire,” Koll said to introduce the Bible study for the evening. “The first Christian communities were in fragile ecosystems along the Mediterranean Sea. Heat and fire were a constant danger.” Those early Christians “used symbols of fire and destruction to describe the social forces tearing apart their society.”

We may think of “apocalyptic” as being related to destruction, but in fact it means “revelation,” Koll said. “An apocalyptic vision is seeing beyond what is happening to the future God has for God’s Creation. The symbols were not meant to provoke fear; they were already living in fear. They nurtured the hope that God would act soon. God would reclaim God’s Creation.”

Koll asked webinar participants to look at one such apocalyptic piece of Scripture: 2 Peter 3:8–13, which includes these words: “But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a loud noise, and the elements will be dissolved with fire, and the earth and everything that is done on it will be disclosed.”

“I think the text communicates a longing for profound radical change — change that goes down to the elemental level,” Koll said. “The coming fire will be revelatory. All will see what the eyes of faith already see. Destruction is not the last word or the central point of this text. The forces of destruction will not triumph. A new heaven and new Earth are on their way,” which in this epistle reading “is a place where righteousness is at home.”

A photograph depicting the Volcan de Agua near Santa María de Jesús in Guatemala. (Photo by José Barrios via Unsplash)

“I think of righteousness as right relations — between people, between communities, between human beings and the rest of Creation,” Koll said. “They are relationships of interdependence and reciprocity.”

“Imagine what it would be to live that way,” Koll said. “It’s hard when we are surrounded by the forces of death — forces with which we find ourselves collaborating beyond our own will.”

In Central America, many Christians use the term “holiness” to mean “being set apart from the world,” Koll noted. But “to lead lives of holiness, we need to identify with those with whom God identifies.” Who did Jesus spend time with? Those people on the margins, Koll said. “Jesus said the coming reign of God would be good news for the poor. ‘Just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it for me.’ … Holy lives are active lives, not passive lives. We are not called to wait with arms crossed while God’s ecosystems are destroyed.”

“The world is on fire, but this is not the end of our story … Our task then as we actively wait is to build righteousness a home, to right our relations,” Koll said. “For all of us, this means resistance to the predatory system that is destroying the ability to sustain life. With the help of Christ, we can live holy lives — even in the midst of climate change. May God bless us all.”

Sirin then introduced a video depicting people in Guatemala hit hard by climate change — and what’s being done to help people help themselves and their families. Programs include help with family gardens and a how-to on planting tree seedlings raised in greenhouses before they’re transplanted.

The Rev. Betsey Moe, a mission co-worker serving with CEDEPCA, summed up the webinar with this observation: “God is using each of us as participants in the new Creation.”

Mike Ferguson, Editor, Presbyterian News Service

Let us join in prayer for:

PC(USA) Agencies’ Staff
Betsie Chilton, Administrator, Researcher & Analyst, Presbyterian Foundation
Moongil Cho, Associate, Korean Intercultural Congregational Support, Presbyterian Mission Agency

Let us pray

Thank you, Lord, for opportunities to share our gifts and learn from one another. Please give us the strength and courage to remain faithful to you while working hard to care for the rest of your children. We pray all this in your precious Son’s name. Amen.

Today in the Mission Yearbook - Hundreds of Guatemalan families receive emergency food assistance

New Castle Presbytery and Guatemalan partners collaborate to supply enough kits to feed more than 400 families for a month

March 4, 2021

Emergency food kits are delivered to families in rural Guatemala. (Photo by CEDEPCA)

As in the U.S., COVID-19 has caused a huge disruption in the lives of families in Guatemala, resulting in lives lost, jobs vanished and plans put on hold. The Western Highlands, where the Association of Mam Christian Women for Development is headquartered, has been hit especially hard because of widespread poverty and nearly nonexistent health systems. As a result, high levels of chronic malnutrition and food insecurity in rural Guatemala persist.

When the first impacts of COVID-19 were felt, Presbyterian Disaster Assistance (PDA) sent an immediate grant to the Protestant Center for Pastoral Studies in Central America (CEDEPCA), a longtime partner of Presbyterian World Mission. This allowed CEDEPCA’s Disaster Ministry Team to begin distributing emergency food kits to families in need. The association was one of the first groups to receive these kits, with 25 women benefiting.

“When we heard this news, we were delighted!” said Carrie Saathoff, co-chair of the Guatemala Partnership of New Castle Presbytery and board member of CEDEPCA USA. “But then it quickly dawned on us that with more than 300 women in the association, New Castle Presbytery needed to take action and come alongside PDA to support our partner.”

In response, the Guatemala Partnership of New Castle Presbytery, CEDEPCA and the association developed an end-to-end system to safely deliver food kits to association families.

“New Castle Presbytery has been working in partnership with CEDEPCA and the association for many years,” said Luis Sarpec, facilitator for risk management on CEDEPCA’s Disaster Ministry Team. “Community leadership was coordinated and activated; the logistical parts were already in place, so implementing a new initiative quickly, efficiently and safely was natural.”

New Castle Presbytery immediately began promotion and fundraising efforts. CEDEPCA engaged its well-established contacts with local distributors, and the association organized and prioritized the deliveries to the most vulnerable communities.

To date, funds raised have provided more than 400 food kits with 200 kits delivered.

“When we first launched this initiative, our goal was 100 food kits, which at the time we thought was ambitious. But the response has been overwhelming and the funds are still arriving,” said Dale Smith, steering committee member for New Castle Presbytery’s Guatemala Partnership and co-chair of the Mission Committee at Ocean View Presbyterian Church in Ocean View, Delaware.

Each kit contains basic provisions — rice, beans, oil, sugar, flour, salt, oatmeal, powdered milk, eggs, disinfectant, toilet paper and detergent — to feed a family of five for one month. The kits provide assistance for individuals left jobless and without schools for their children to attend due to the pandemic. An association member expressed her gratitude: “I am a widow with two little girls who cannot attend school now, where they used to receive a meal. I have to go to work to get money and feed them every day. … For me, this is a blessing!” Watch a video of food kits being delivered.

Without a doubt, the fallout from COVID-19 will continue to exacerbate the current situation. Last month, the United Nations published a policy brief stating COVID-19 is causing Latin America’s “worst health, economic, social and humanitarian crisis in a century.”

“This experience reaffirms that — even in darkness— God’s light shines,” said Kim Loman, a member of the partnership steering committee and West Nottingham Presbyterian Church in Colora, Maryland. “We remain committed to addressing our partners’ critical needs, as it’s the bedrock of our mission.”

Partners agree that deliveries of food kits will be ongoing because we are all God’s children and must take care of each other in this time of great need.

The Guatemala Partnership of New Castle Presbytery is led by a designated steering committee to encourage, guide, support and coordinate efforts of the presbytery, its congregations and individual members to actively engage with our partners in Guatemala, namely the Protestant Center for Pastoral Studies in Central America (CEDEPCA) and the Association of Mam Christian Women for Development. For more information about the Guatemala Partnership of New Castle Presbytery or how to get involved, visit ncpguatemala.com.

 Chris Hickey, Guatemala Partnership of New Castle Presbytery

Let us join in prayer for: 

Anna Edlin, Presbyterian Foundation
Laura Edwards, Presbyterian Foundation

Let us pray:

God of grace and peace, there is so much happening around us. We long for your guidance. Please break through the chaos with your reassurance and understanding. Help our lives be a channel of your blessings and power for many others. Amen.

Today in the Mission Yearbook - Guatemala mission partners focus on relief rather than reunion

During COVID-19, need for food and clean water take priority as mission trips are canceled, postponed or moved online

December 19, 2020

Families in Guatemala’s Estoreño Presbytery, in partnership with Crescent Hill Presbyterian Church in Louisville, Ky., received emergency food assistance through funds allocated for a mission trip canceled due to COVID-19. (Photo contributed by Estoreño Presbytery)

The ministry of presence is important in God’s mission. Yet even when a global pandemic causes cancellation of short-term mission trips, congregations and presbyteries in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) are showing care and compassion in creative and urgently needed ways from afar.

In Mid-Kentucky Presbytery, after more than a decade of mutual mission, Crescent Hill Presbyterian Church canceled its scheduled July mission trip to the Q’eqchi’ Estoreño Izabal Presbytery in rural eastern Guatemala  due to COVID-19 travel restrictions.

It’s the first time a trip has had to be canceled since the partnership officially began in 2009, said Perry Chang, a deacon at CHPC, Guatemalan Connection participant and research associate in Research Services with the Presbyterian Mission Agency.

With news of growing food insecurity, CHPC decided to send its partner presbytery some of the money that would have been spent on airfare, housing, meals and other expenses for the seven-member team, along with some money from the church budget, to provide food for Guatemalan families experiencing extra challenges during the pandemic.

“People are not working at home at Guatemala,” Chang said. “They don’t have big savings accounts or access to paycheck protection program loans. They aren’t receiving economic stimulus checks. A family who grows corn depends on their neighbors to grind the corn.”

Through CHPC’s reallocation of a portion of its mission trip funds for COVID-19 relief, some 240 families in 12 congregations within the Estoreño Presbytery received emergency food assistance.

There are many factors that cause division among people in Guatemala — financially, culturally, geographically, as well as through the more than 20 Indigenous Mayan languages spoken, Chang said. Yet the Guatemalan people are resilient in the midst of some pretty tough circumstances. Guatemalan and U.S. partners faithfully pray for one another. They share joys and concerns through phone calls, Facebook messages, emails and mutual visits.

“Our visits to be with our Guatemalan partners do not include typical mission projects. Our time together is focused instead on building personal relationships, self-education activities and learning from each other how to serve God more effectively,” said Soni Castleberry, an elder at CHPC. “This year, however, our partners had asked us to help them to do some very basic maintenance and improvement projects on the grounds or inside their church buildings. We were eager to help with those because we saw firsthand on our last visit some of the problem areas that congregations had identified to the presbytery as priorities.” On previous trips, the team has led workshops for women, children, men, youth and young adults, and visited new congregations within the presbytery.

Other presbyteries across the country, such as the Presbytery of South Alabama and the Presbytery of Denver, have seen their Guatemala partnerships continue even during the pandemic. Some of the relationships are decades long.

“Albany Presbytery is in the process of providing emergency food for our partners in the Mam Presbytery, working with CEDEPCA to do so,” said the Rev. Kathy Gorman-Coombs, co-pastor of Trinity Presbyterian Church in Scotia, New York, and co-chair of the Guatemala Mission Network.

The Albany-Mam partnership is more than 30 years old and Gorman-Coombs has been involved since 2007.

“Those involved in the partnership now, both in Guatemala and in Albany, are not the same people who started it all those years ago,” Gorman-Coombs said. “We try to visit our partners at least once a year and have, on a few occasions, attempted to bring folks here to visit us, but they have not been able to obtain visas. The most recent time we attempted this was in 2016.”

Presbyterian Disaster Assistance has granted $55,000 to partners in Guatemala for emergency humanitarian response. This has included hygiene kits, food security projects, psychosocial support and the launch of an awareness campaign to share ways to prevent coronavirus. PDA also hosted a resiliency webinar in Spanish for CEDEPCA.

World Mission has added a discernment tool to its online Short-Term Mission Trips Toolkit. This new resource, “To go or not to go,” includes questions for reflection during the pandemic, along with alternatives to consider and additional service opportunities to explore.

 Tammy Warren, Communications Associate, Presbyterian Mission Agency

Let us join in prayer for: 

PC(USA) Agencies’ Staff
Angela Wyatt, Presbyterian Mission Agency
Yun Kyoung Yang, Presbyterian Publishing Corporation

Let us pray:

Loving God, thank you for the faithful who lead us to Christ through their love, ministry, proclamation and service. Amen.

Today in the Mission Yearbook - Guatemalan mother and son seek to help less fortunate during pandemic

 As immigration status hangs in the balance, family makes masks for those on the street

September 14, 2020

Hilda has been making masks for people living on the streets in Austin, Texas, to help protect them from the COVID-19 virus. (Photo by Hilda’s son, Ivan)

More than 1,500 days. That’s how long Hilda and her 14-year-old son, Ivan, have been living in sanctuary in Austin, Texas.

The family arrived at the U.S. border from Guatemala in 2014 hoping to start a new life, but it didn’t work out that way.

The two spent 11 months living in a detention facility. For the past four years, mother and son have been living in sanctuary at St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church in Austin in fear of deportation. The congregation of 350 has made the care of this small family its mission.

“The people of our church see Hilda and Ivan as part of their family. They love them and it pains us to see them in pain. We want to do whatever we can to help them to be free and be happy and to have all of the human rights they deserve,” said Lynn Cervini, church member. “The care team is in charge of getting them food and the things they need.

“They’re among a group of families that don’t have any relatives in the U.S. They were welcomed in the community, so they stayed in Austin,” said Mohammad Abdollahi, a family advocate. “Unfortunately, for this family, Ivan has had to live nearly half of his life in this setting.”

The COVID-19 pandemic has complicated matters even more. Ivan can no longer attend school and in-person worship is postponed. Now the two remain in the church with little person-to-person contact.

“I’m afraid someone from the church might have the virus and we could come in contact with it and might not be able to go to a doctor,” said Hilda.

Cervini says the pandemic has made it more difficult for the church to connect with the two.

“Ivan used to go to soccer games and now is stuck in church and doesn’t have friends to spend time with. I think there’s a bit of depression that sets in when you have no contact with human beings and a kid who is used to being in school and playing with friends.”

Hilda and Ivan say they are trying to make the best of the situation by giving back.

“I had an idea to do something during the virus to help people that are on the streets that don’t have homes,” she said. “I came up with the idea to create masks to protect them. It reminds me when I was homeless and didn’t have a place to go. It reminds me when I had a baby and had to live in the streets.”

While Hilda and Ivan make the best of their situation, their church is working with a group called Austin Sanctuary Network to secure their freedom.

Since the COVID-19 virus can easily be spread through detention facilities, Abdollahi says legal efforts are being made to grant a stay for Hilda and Ivan to prevent them from being taken into custody when the pandemic is over. They are also seeking assistance from the Texas congressional delegation.

Despite spending half of his life in some form of sanctuary, Ivan still has hopes for his future.

“At first, I wanted to be a doctor, but I don’t know now. I also want to be a soccer player, but I need another career in case something happens,” he said. “I kind of find it hard to believe I’m going to have a house or go to my house instead of going into a church to live.”

Meantime, Cervini says donations are needed to purchase supplies to make the masks. Click here for more information.

“She needs people to believe in her and we believe her case is one that fell through the cracks and there are so many broken parts of the system,” said Abdollahi. “These families are a priority, yet it’s hard to have hope right now.”

Ivan says they simply want their freedom to live as everyone else. “If people want to help us, they have to trust and believe in us.”

Click here for more information from OGA’s Sanctuary page. COVID-19 Immigration resources are available here.

 Rick Jones, Director of Communications, Office of General Assembly

Let us join in prayer for:

PC(USA) Agencies’ Staff
Martha Miller, Office of the General Assembly
Eliza Minasyan, Presbyterian Mission Agency

Let us pray:

Dear God, blessed are those who add to the harmony of your world and encourage others to do the same. Thank you for drawing us into the circle of your love. Amen.

Today in the Mission Yearbook - Presbyterian group explores the experiences of migration in Central American journey

Peacemaking Program travel study seminar spends 10 days in El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala

May 27, 2020

A memorial on Guatemala City’s Constitutional Plaza honors the 41 girls who were burned to death on March 8, 2017 in a “safe home” outside of Guatemala City. Photo by Carl Horton.

The journey from Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador to the Mexico-United States border is a brutal, dangerous undertaking even once.

The Rev. Terri Thomas of Indianapolis was surprised to learn that many people in the trio of countries known as the Northern Triangle endure that journey over and over in what is regarded as a “cycle of migration,” trying to make new lives for themselves in the United States.

“If you undertake that journey and get sent back, to go try it again says something,” she said. “And we found that almost everyone knows someone who has tried multiple times to migrate to the United States.”

Thomas was part of a group of 24 Presbyterians and guests who traveled to Central America in the past two weeks with the Presbyterian Peacemaking Program to learn more about the conditions in Latin American countries that make people choose to travel, usually on foot, to the United States border for the faint hope of a better life in the U.S. They also heard from migrants who had been returned to their home countries and the perils they faced after they returned.

Ten group members continued on to Los Angeles and joined others for a weekend-long travel study seminar to see what life is like for refugees just below the U.S. southern border in Tijuana, Mexico, and how the Presbytery of the Pacific is working to help people who have crossed into the United States.

For Larry Hjalmarson, a member of the United Methodist Church from Salt Lake City, the journey was a chance to see his daughter Dori Hjalmarson, a mission co-worker in Honduras for Presbyterian World Mission. But, even having worked before in Central America, he was surprised by many of the things he heard, particularly about the journey many people take.

“I will remember how these very vulnerable people are preyed on every step of the way,” Larry Hjalmarson said. “The extortion by the gangs, the government working against them, and then if they make it to the border, they suffer even more abuse.”

The trip’s participants also noted that they saw barriers to economic advancement, from government and business forces. Larry Hjalmarson said that in coffee production, farmers do the bulk of the work but see the smallest slice of the profits after distributors and governments take their shares.

Several trip participants said they were sad to learn some of the ways in which the U.S. government and businesses have contributed to the citizens’ plight, from propping up oppressive regimes to companies coming in to take advantage of cheap resources.

While the group did find that dire economic conditions led most people to immigrate, violence and gangs were also a major factor for a lot of people.

Thomas said they learned there were two ways to get out of a gang: die or go to church.

“A gang will let you go if you go to church and you are an active Christian,” she said. “Somewhere in there seems to be the message that there are answers in faith.”

A consistent message they heard, Thomas said, “is that God and faith keep them going.”

For her part, Dori Hjalmarson said that she appreciates Presbyterians taking the time and effort to travel to see the situation where she works.

“It can be frustrating telling people that this is a problem here and seeing people shut down, that they’re not listening,” Dori Hjalmarson said.

Larry Hjalmarson said he would go home ready to call out myths about immigration when he hears them.

And even with the rough days, participants said the travel study seminar was well worthwhile.

Thomas said, “I would absolutely recommend it. I don’t think there’s anything like hearing a person’s story face to face and crying with them.

“It opens your mind and your heart.”

 Rich Copley, Communications Strategist, Presbyterian Mission Agency

Let us join in prayer for: 

PC(USA) Agencies’ Staff
David Dobson, Presbyterian Publishing Corporation
Simon Doong, Presbyterian Mission Agency

Let us pray:

For those who open to us the words of Scripture, we give you thanks, great God. As Scripture is opened, as hearts are transformed, may the church of Jesus Christ thrive and bloom for this and all generations. Amen.