America's Most Wanted #10

One of the things that you see, as you walk the migrant trails out in the desert,  is "the casting off of things" that no longer support and serve the journey.  The jettisoned artifacts attest to the fact that there is a universality evident in what people pack to 'go on a trip'.  And then there comes that point, when you realize that you actually need fewer things then you thought.  You don't want to 'lug' that much 'stuff' along with you...you might not 'make it'...it will surely slow you down...it is NOT LIFE GIVING. 

People With No Names - The Undocumented #75

This is a detail of a large oil on unstretched canvas (2' x 3') with a small indistinct crucified Christ in the upper left hand corner (yes I have continued to look at Gauguin!). I just read that "to do theology means, in part, to face reality". Gioacchino Campese in his chapter titled 'Cuantos Mas? states,

"the planners of the current border policy knew very well that they were pushing immigrants toward a terrain in which they would find themselves in 'mortal danger', and they were aware that those natural obstacles were most probably not going to deter the migrants from crossing the border.   In other words, the deaths of thousands of immigrants at the U.S.-Mexico border is NOT an "unintended" consequence of U.S. border strategy, but part and parcel of an immigration policy that is often indifferent to the HUMANITY of immigrants, and does not really care if "SOME" of them die in the process of joining the cheap immigrant labor force that the U.S. economy needs.  After all they are criminals...not really human...illegal aliens. While employers of immigrants, and consumers of cheap goods continue to reap the benefits of this situation---without acknowledging it---the immigrants pay the real price of this policy with their very lives. Once again in the history of humankind it is the most vulnerable and defenseless people who must pay the price." pp. 281 and 282 "A Promised Land, A Perilous Journey"

People With No Names - The Undocumented #67

Okay, you may think that you have seen this painting before...you have seen a smaller, different version. This oil on stretched canvas is 24" x 12". It is of a boy who is part of a multi-family co-op that organically grows raspberries and strawberries. It is a wonderful story (all the more so because of it's rarity) of immigrants from Mexico and Central America finding/creating safe, dignified work to support their families. They had help from kind community members securing a lease on the land, learning effective organic methodology, and selecting desirable crops to grow.

This immigrant story is highly unusual. As Father Daniel Groody (Notre Dame professor and scholar on world-wide migration) writes, the immigrant story most often follows the "four 'action verbs' of the Last Supper narrative---taking, blessing, breaking, giving. People 'take up'the decision to leave their homeland, 'bless God' for the gift of their lives and families (even in the midst of tremendous suffering), 'break themselves open' so that they can feed those that they love, and 'give themselves away' for the nourishment of others, even at the cost of their own lives." ---A PROMISED LAND, A PERILOUS JOURNEY p. 304-305.