KBI officially opens Migrant Outreach Center in Sonora

By MICHAEL BROWN
Managing Editor
 
There have been many “ups and downs … through which God has led us to this day,” said Jesuit Father Sean Carroll, head of Kino Border Initiative, at the official blessing on a new 18,000 square-foot facility at the international border in Nogales, Sonora, Mexico, Feb. 12.

More than 400 volunteers, supporters and migrants crowded into the facility to hear from religious and civic leaders, before Bishop José Leopoldo González González, of the Diocese of Nogales, Sonora, Mexico, blessed and cut a ribbon on the new Migrant Outreach Center.

Tucson Bishop Edward J. Weisenburger and Bishop-emeritus Gerald F. Kicanas were at the Vatican in Rome on their ad limina visit and were unable to attend.
The $1.5 million facility replaces the humble comedor – dining hall – across the street established in 2009. Since then, the comedor has given two meals a day for the poor and hungry blocked from entering the US or who have been returned from the US while their asylum cases are pending.

The recent survival needs of migrants have increased dramatically. According to the KBI website, in 2016, the comedor served an estimated 46,000 meals; in 2018, the number was 55,633.

Nazareth House, a shelter for women and children trying to escape violence, showed an even more dramatic increase. In 2016, 380 women and children found refuge there. In 2018, that number more than doubled, to 839.
Katie Sharar,  KBI spokeswoman, said  the new center will have 170 beds for “several thousand” immigrants in Nogales. Since the Trump administration imposed the “Remain in Mexico” policy last November, the flow of asylum seekers into the US has been largely reduced with their detention by Border Patrol, relocation to El Paso/Ciudad Juarez, or the time it takes to eventually work their way back to Nogales for their court dates.

That contrasts with the seemingly endless flow last spring when beds for asylum seekers were needed for detainees in the US. That demand led agencies like Catholic Community Services’ Casa Alitas in Tucson to open a new and expanded shelter in a former juvenile detention center, from which asylum seekers would relocate to other parts of the country where family members were living and where their hearings would occur.

Sharar said that previous flow of immigrants has virtually stopped.
Meanwhile, Mexican border cities like Nogales deal with the crises of growing numbers of refugees.

For the leaders inside the Migrant Outreach Center, the day was more about celebrating the opening of the facility than about the scope of the demands it will have to address.

Bishop Gonzalez noted in his remarks  that when he was named as the first Bishop of Nogales, he stopped at the comedor on the day he was appointed. He also thanked the media who were present and who have reported on KBI over the years. “It is because of the media that this work can be known in all of Mexico and all of the United States.”

“Thank you for all who have shown an interest in this work,” he said.
Msgr. Raul Trevizo, Vicar for Hispanics in the Diocese of Tucson and pastor of St. John the Evangelist, started his comments by pointing out the flowers around the face and the heart of a nearby image of Our Lady of Guadalupe.
“The face and the heart together combine to reveal who the person is,” he said.

“Policies on both sides of the border want to hide the faces and the hearts (of migrants). People are afraid that if we see them, it will change our hearts.”
He recounted the story of a good friend who was a supporter of US border policy. Msgr. Trevizo challenged his friend to visit Casa Alitas with him and to see the faces of the people affected by that policy.

“We were there for five minutes and he saw the children’s faces and the women there nursing their children,” the monsignor recalled.

“My friend is a very big man, and he started to scream. He said, ‘Why doesn’t someone bring President Trump here so he can see the faces of the people so he can change his mind?’”

Msgr. Trevizo thanked the supporters in the room: “You make us see their faces and their hearts.”

Pointing out a series of panels on the wall behind him, depicting a native symbol in the middle, with the arms stretching from the center, he added, “The heart of Jesus is at the center of the work of KBI.”

“I see the tragedies that are unfolding all over the world,” said another speaker, Jane Rosenhauer, executive director of Jesuit Refugee Service USA. “What keeps me up at night is the children.”

She said she was buoyed to be in “a room full of people who have not ignored the crisis at the border.”

“KBI and this facility are a model on how migrants should be treated as a people,” Rosenhauer said, adding a challenge: “It’s really important that all of you bring this message to others.”

Father Prisciliano Peraza, from Altar, Sonora, Mexico and a supporter of KBI from the beginning, recalled the meeting he had with Father Carroll and Bishop Kicanas, to float the idea of the cross-border effort.

“People thought it was crazy,” Father Peraza said. “Bishop Kicanas listened and he accepted it and that’s how we were able to begin this work 15 years ago.”
“This is such a large building,” he started, adding quickly, “yet, today this space is inadequate for the need.”

He also reached out to thank those who are being served there. “Thank you to our brother and sister migrants. You have helped us to become better people.”

Jesuit Father Michael Bayard, provincial assistant for Social Ministry and Planning, noted the art on the front of the building, showing two hands joined together vertically, like the one on top was lifting the other.

That sign of being united symbolizes “the promise of God to all humanity from the beginning. … Jesus reaching out his hand to clasp the hand of others.”

Missionaries of the Eucharist Sister Diana Lorena Rubio said the KBI mission was to “be similar to Jesus, who doesn’t judge us, who doesn’t have prejudice, but who welcomes people in need.”

The Missionaries of the Eucharist have staffed the comedor and other KBI relief efforts for years.