by Michael Seifert
I have lived in the Rio Grande Valley’s colonias for the past 15 years and have come to love the resilience and the energy that these communities contain and nurture.
The homes in the colonia neighborhoods are nearly all works in progress, visible testimonials to the Valley residents’ tenacious hold on hope. Outsiders see poverty and misery. Those of us who live here see the fruits of people working far harder than most others to build something for their children and their children’s children.
Works in progress, however, are often risky ventures. A working family doesn’t always have the material resources to build the strongest homes and can’t always locate their homestead in the best geographic space. Many of our neighborhoods are in flood plains, exposed to the whimsical wrath of storms.
House blessings are particularly touching. Some of my neighbors’ homes are indeed dependent upon some divine protection. Hurricanes are particular threats. All of us are all too aware that another storm like Gilbert would leave us but memories of what our neighborhoods once were.
We look over our shoulders now and then, hoping fate isn’t creeping up on us unseen.
As Hurricane Ike made its way east and north, I spoke with my neighbors. They all vividly remember that day in May when Rio Grande Guardian reporter Joey Gómez discovered Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) checking for citizenship documents during a practice evacuation. The word spread quickly—during a hurricane evacuation, the Border Patrol will separate people according to their documentation.
I asked my neighbors, in light of Border Patrol’s recent claims they wouldn’t “necessarily” be checking for documents, that if an evacuation was ordered, would they leave?
Those families composed of legal permanent residents or U.S. citizens ail told me, “Yes indeed! We aren’t crazy people.”
Those families composed of people with mixed immigration status—a grandfather whose application for residency is in “process,” or a niece who had submitted a request for a visa under the Violence Against Women Act, or a family with children who are U.S. citizens, but whose parents are Mexican nationals – they all told me, every last one of them, “No way are we leaving.”
When I asked those neighbors why wouldn’t they leave, they said, again, every last one of them, “We don’t trust the Border Patrol.
We would rather take our chances with Ike. While I admire the bravado, it is clear that the bluster borders on foolishness.
Families with small children are the ones whose eyes opened wide as they considered their options—the tragedy of a catastrophic storm or the icy efficiency of our government’s security apparatus.
This sort of worry would have seemed inconceivable 15 years ago. We lived in a different time, a time when someone’s identity had to do with their character more than with thei r documentation. It seems to me we have given in to a terror so deep that we are willing to take actions which would place our poorest, most vulnerable families at risk.
The memorial of September 11th offered another opportunity to reflect on what sort of national community we have created… Have we become shrill in our fear? This hurricane might well lift up the veil that covers some of the shameful realities of our national character—we have become a fearful people.
The hurricane is indeed a tragedy… Purses will open, helping communities rebuild. I pray that we are blessed with courage and wisdom and much less fear. I put my own hope in that tenaciously.
(Father Michael Seifert is pastor at San Felipe de Jesus Church in Cameron Park, nearBrownsville, the largest U.S. colonia.)
