Day Four by Bernadette

The moon tonight was one of the most beautiful I’ve ever seen. Just outside the window of the Tohono O’odam reservation’s cultural center, I can see it rising, swollen and orange, framed by giant saguaro cacti. Stars are spreading brightly across the clear night sky, lighting up faint, far away wisps of clouds. To the east are the sacred Baboquivori Mountains where the creator resides. Beyond the home of the gods is Mexico.

It seems that this issue grows more complex every day.

Today we spoke to a county coroner. He explained statistics to us. As border control tightened over safer, urban crossing areas, people began crossing the deadly Sonoran desert in search of a better life. The desert killed many during the summer months, and some during cooler months. Neatly colored bars and graphs related the time of year, age of victim, and cause of death.

He showed us disturbing photographs of swollen, sun-dried bodies that were bleeding, mummified, or skeletal, depending on the stage in which they were found. He showed us how dentures and tattoos can help people identify family members. If this fails, clothing brands, or little holy cards with penciled in addresses, or love letters tucked into bras, or phone numbers written in wallets can help forensic specialists track down the families. After several days of drying in the sun, bodies are “unidentificado,” defined only by imperfect teeth, body ink, or small messages hidden in clothes. Everything they ever were or hoped to become is reduced to whatever ruins survived the desert sun. The number of unidentificados in recent years have surpassed the storage capacity of the county coroner’s office, so they have a refrigerator truck parked outside, holding the people who did not keep enough information on their wasted bodies.

Several days ago, we participated in Las Cruces. We joined a procession of people walking to the border wall, each of us holding a cross with the name of a victim of the desert. When it was my turn to read the name on my cross and cry the name of a victim, I shouted, “Unidentificado!” to the crowd, who yelled, “Presente!” I knew then that my victim was unidentified, but it was not until this morning that I understood why that person was unidentified. I did not quite grasp what it meant to be killed by the sun—killed by your own dreams.

Yesterday in the detention center, I saw girls my own age in a small glass room. They stared at me across the room of police and agents. I waved at them sheepishly, ashamed at my own good fortune of being born in the right country.

I also met border agents, who were young and frustrated. They said they were expected to hold back the Mississippi with a two-by-four. They patrolled the urban areas with the resources they had available to them, and left the desert as a natural barrier to illegal immigrants. However, the desert is no match for dreaming and people still come.

There is a church in Douglas where ranchers, undocumented people, border agents, and immigration activists worship together. They teach each others’ children how to love each other and know their god. They cook together and organize social events. Outside, they are enemies. Inside the walls of the church, they are one before God.

However, Christian activists in the community struggle for justice. Christ was a revolutionary and as a church, they must stand for the rights of the alien. A pastor told the story of the Good Samaritan, but with a new twist. What if the Good Samaritan kept finding bleeding people on the side of the road each week? Should he keep healing the people, or might it be time to fix the road? He calls for justice, but knows that he will alienate half his congregation, destroying the last refuge of cooperation, if the church takes a political stance.

Meanwhile, a woman is preventing domestic abuse through home visits and education. An Aztec man is teaching multiplication through dance, and wisdom through the wind blowing through the thin stretch of trees between his tiny schoolhouse and the highway. Young students are lugging Gatorade and pretzels through the desert trails, to leave survival packages for people who may not survive the journey. A small team of lawyers is teaching detainees their rights. Sierra Club scholars are documenting the pain the wall is inflicting on the natural world. A community of native people is struggling to balance humanity and survival, as their ancestral lands are cut in two and violence spills over onto sacred sites. Above a small mountain of flowers, balloons, and teddy bears, a Congresswoman is overcoming her wounds of crazy hatred and ignorance.

I don’t know what the answer is. I’ve seen reflections of tragedy that make me feel like the world is crazy. But I’ve also met quite a few people this week who are nothing less than heroes. The world is crazy and the solution is not simple. But people are dying. Let’s start there, and then deal with the politics of it all.