Arks in the desert 

Medical aid camps assisting border crossers 24/7

by Evan Silverstein

       The earthly blessing was part of a ceremony May 31, dedicating a new 24-hour migrant aid camp here on what is now considered sacred land.

       The “Ark of the Covenant” desert camp near the Mexican border is providing undocumented immigrants food, water and medical attention as they cross through the desolate, blistering southwestern desert. 

       As one of three aid stations planned for the Arizona border this summer, the outpost is staffed around-the-clock, seven days a week, by a rotating group of volunteers, including Presbyterian church members.

       With a credo of “ni una muerte más” — “not even one more death” — volunteers are working to prevent a rising number of illegal border crossers who die each summer in Arizona’s desert borderlands while traveling on foot from Mexico.

       “What we are doing here is a direct response to this crisis situation,” said Lisa Lieber of Tucson, AZ, a volunteer with “No More Deaths,” the group organizing the camps. “We’re mobilizing to go out and put aid stations in the desert to save lives in the most urgent sense.”

       Mexican nationals and others crossing illegally into Arizona, often to find work, are dying at nearly three times the rate of last year, the deadliest year on record, according to the Tucson Sector of the U.S. Border Patrol.

       The desert camp initiative is also inline with an overture addressing the increasing number of migrant worker deaths in the borderlands approved last year by the 215^th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA).

       The measure, submitted by the Presbytery of de Cristo, which represents 30 Presbyterian churches in southern Arizona and western New Mexico, calls on Presbyterian Disaster Assistance (PDA) to be in relationship with congregations and middle governing bodies in the borderlands to determine appropriate ministries and assistance for migrants facing life-threatening situations. 

       Experts believe that more than 2,000 men, women, and children have lost their lives attempting to cross the border between the U.S. and Mexico since 1998, many of them because of dehydration.

       Between 1,000 to 3,000 people are believed to cross the U.S. border from Mexico every day. The Border Patrol reported in April that more than 200,000 illegal entrants had been apprehended so far this fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30.

       The agency listed 84 migrant deaths in the Tucson Sector since Oct. 1. At this rate, last year’s record-setting toll of 139 deaths is expected to soon be eclipsed.

      Organizers said the hundreds of desert deaths and thousands of apprehensions of undocumented crossers point to a failure in U.S. border policy. They said a blockade strategy by the federal government along the border that has intensified since 1995 is failing miserably and has only increased the risks of border crossings.       

     “Since 1995, the number of deaths each summer here in the Tucson Sector has increased and set a new record every year,” said the Rev. John Fife, pastor of Southside Presbyterian Church in Tucson, and a longtime border ministry leader. “We felt we needed to make a clear statement that any more deaths out here is a moral tragedy and a sin.”

     Fife said U.S. Border Patrol officials agreed in meetings not to target the camps in its operations to apprehend illegal migrants. He said agents have kept their word in the past by not deliberately staking out other humanitarian projects aimed at providing assistance to undocumented border crossers in distress. 

       Border Patrol officials reminded the volunteers that it is a federal crime to aid any migrant “in furtherance of their illegal activity,” but said that humanitarian aid is an acceptable activity.

      “I want to emphasis that this is not against the law,” Fife said of the desert camps. “It is never illegal to provide food and water and medical aid to the migrants who are in danger of dying and are in medical distress.”

       At the desert camp, two white flags were hoisted skyward, one with a green cross indicating that first aid is available and another with blue spots shaped like water drops.

       The three Arks of the Covenant camps, which will operate until at least Labor Day, are named after a wooden box that in the Old Testament symbolized the presence of God traveling with the people of Israel when they were wandering through the desert.

       In this case, the ark is a mobile home parked on property in Arivaca — owned by noted Southwestern author Byrd Baylor — about 20 miles from the U.S. border with Mexico and about 60 miles southwest of Tucson.

       The other Arks of the Covenant camps, which are expected to open this month, will be situated near the Arizona border communities of Douglas and Why.

       With prayer and a Spanish version of “Amazing Grace,” the religious leaders asked for God’s blessing to help them do their work in the desert as a few dozen supporters looked on.

       “We take our church to the desert,” said Rick Ufford-Chase, a Presbyterian elder, missionary and co-director of BorderLinks, a cross-border (U.S.-Mexico) organization supported by the PC(USA)’s Worldwide Ministries Division. “To the travelers who will continue traveling and traveling and traveling, we dedicate this spot as a holy spot. We are now on holy ground.”

       Those present at the ceremony took a few moments to recall the life of the late Matthew Michael Foster Moore, a Presbyterian activist and humanitarian from Tucson in whose honor the camp in Arivaca is named.

       Moore, 23, died last year from causes related to a genetic heart defect, said Ufford-Chase, who was friends with Moore. Chase said the former youth director at St. Mark’s Presbyterian Church  in Tucson was a strong advocate for migrant rights and helping stranded border crossers in the desert.

         Presbyterian Brandon Wert, who was also a friend of Moore, recalled when Moore suggested the need for stronger measures to help undocumented entrants.

         “When Matt and I sat down to a lunch he said, ‘You know, we shouldn’t just be sitting around Tucson waiting for folks to show up beaten and dehydrated and half dead,’” said Wert, the youth director at Southside Presbyterian Church. ‘“We need to be out there walking the trail with our brothers and sisters.’”

     Wert was stationed at the camp during its first week in operation. While no official numbers have yet been compiled, those connected with the camp say the ark has already assisted a number of border crossers.

     The Rev. Sue Westfall, a co-pastor at St. Mark’s church, which is active in the campaign against border deaths, said it’s important for Presbyterians to be aware of the federal government’s suspect policy along the border so they can help fix the problem. 

      “The issues of border policies that really create the fact that people are dying is very much at

    Standing behind a small shrine featuring Roman Catholic saints, Fife urged those staffing the camp to make the outpost a place of refuge and to always show compassion.

       “You are charged to keep this place in the tradition of Abraham and Sarah,” he said. “In the tradition of all the saints, a place of hospitality and safety.” 

       Volunteers poured water into a large bowl and then adorned the colorful shrine with full bottles of water.

       The medical aid stations are just one focus of the No More Deaths coalition, which refers to itself as a movement. It formed to push for changes in U.S. border policy that will eliminate the “militarization” of the border, which has made it more dangerous for immigrants to cross, volunteers say.

       The No More Deaths coalition is comprised of individuals, faith groups, human rights advocates and grassroots organizations from around the country. It receives strong leadership and support from individual Presbyterians and congregations such as Fife’s Southside Presbyterian Church.

       The coalition brings together the resources of organizations and efforts —- like Southside’s Samaritans program — that are fighting the increasing number of deaths on and near the border.

       “This is a movement, not a new organization,” said Fife, a former PC(USA) General Assembly moderator . “It is designed to bring together all the separate efforts that have developed in the borderlands since this disastrous, failed, deadly (border) policy began.”

       Other organizations involved include BorderLinks, which was co-founded by Ufford-Chase, and Humane Borders, a Tucson-based effort that maintains fixed water tanks in the southern Arizona desert for thirsty migrants.

       As with the Samaritans, search and rescue patrols from the Arks of the Covenant will seek out immigrants in distress. Volunteers will roam desert trails in four-wheel drive vehicles packed with medical supplies to provide assistance to anyone who needs help, Fife said. 

       He said some of the volunteers camping out and waiting for immigrants in need of assistance will be medically trained. Volunteer pilots have agreed to provide air surveillance to help track undocumented immigrants wandering the desert in need.

       Volunteers from the international Christian Peacemaker organization will operate the Douglas camp, while the camp near Why will be manned by students from Colorado College in Colorado Springs, CO. A third team of rotating volunteers, including Presbyterians, will be stationed at the Arivaca camp.

      The protocol, Fife said, is to provide food, water and medical attention. Volunteers will only call the Border Patrol after immigrants ask them to do so and will call for emergency responders if necessary.

       The camps have already drawn criticism from some groups and individuals who say they will only worsen a problem of illegal entry into the United States. But volunteers say they have a moral obligation to help anyone in danger of dying.

       “We’re on biblical ground,” said the Rev. Gene Lefebvre, a Presbyterian pastor and No More Deaths volunteer from Phoenix. “It’s a biblical mandate for us, Old and New Testament. In fact, it says it very clearly about strangers and offering hospitality (more) then it does even about loving your neighbor.”

        Following the dedication of the first camp, about 30 people participated in a 75-mile march from the Mexican side of the border at Sasabe to Tucson to highlight the migrants’ plight and call for border policy reforms to stop the deaths.

    “This is a cry of desperation, a cry of anguish,” said Patricia Jesus Torres de Hernandez, a Catholic nun from Nogales, Mexico, as activists were preparing to march. “There have already been more than 2,500 deaths in the desert. How many more do there have to be before we start addressing the issue?”

     The long-distance walk from the border began May 31, and ended at the Border Patrol’s Tucson Sector Headquarters on June 6.

       Another march through part of downtown Tucson was staged May 28 to draw attention to the problem of immigrants dying along the borderlands.

       “I’m just outraged that people here in southern Arizona are accepting this as something natural that’s going on in our backyard,” said Lieber, the No More Deaths volunteer from Tucson. “Some people see this as just the way things are. I know that’s not true. We can make a difference and we need to be out there using our resources to save lives in the desert.”