From mid-June to early July, Mennonite Mission Network hosted three back-to-back-to-back Christ at the Borders Just Peace Pilgrimages. These week-long trips to South Texas and the U.S.-Mexico border help participants learn about the realities and implications of migration, as well as how churches and communities of faith are responding to it.

In the stifling southern heat of June and July, three separate groups made their way to South Texas to participate in Christ at the Borders pilgrimages. These pilgrimages, part of Mennonite Mission Network's Just Peace Pilgrimage program, introduce participants to the realities and implications of migration, including its causes and how some churches and communities of faith are responding.

The first of the three trips, June 18-24, included adult members of Maplewood Mennonite Church in Fort Wayne, Indiana. The next two pilgrimages, June 24-30 and June 30-July 5, included youth groups from Assembly Mennonite Church in Goshen, Indiana, and Belmont Mennonite Church in Elkhart, Indiana, respectively.

"[These pilgrimages are important] for the church, as a whole, because they bring to life the reality of what is happening at the border, versus what we see on television," said Ana Alicia Hinojosa, senior executive for ventures at Mission Network. "I've experienced the proverbial light bulb go on above [participants'] heads, as they're thinking, 'Oh my gosh, this is very different from what I thought I knew.'"

Hinojosa led all three trips and provided many of the organizational contacts in South Texas that made the pilgrimages possible.

Hinojosa has been working in immigration ministries since 1982, when guerilla warfare in El Salvador and Guatemala caused mass migration movements through Mexico into the United States. Her home church, Iglesia Menonita Del Cordero  in Brownsville, Texas, was a block from the only shelter in town that welcomed people on immigration journeys. The church opened its newly constructed gym to unsheltered people. As a junior in high school at the time, Hinojosa started helping people fill out their nearly 80-page, handwritten immigration applications.

"You get to see what God is calling people — and the church — to do," Hinojosa said of the Christ at the Borders pilgrimages.

Simon Dutkiewicz, a participant from Belmont Mennonite Church, found that the difference between a Just Peace Pilgrimage and a typical "service trip" make a lot of sense. Two years ago, the Belmont youth group participated in Discovering Opportunities for Outreach and Reflection (DOOR, now operating as We Collectively) in Chicago, Illinois. "I was expecting my experience in southern Texas to be very similar to DOOR, in so far as it being a 'service trip,' the difference was that, for the most part, our experience in Texas seemed to be much more focused on learning," Dutkiewicz said.

Dutkiewicz said that the learning he experienced hit home the most at the South Texas Human Rights Center (STHRC), an organization that places and maintains stations where migrating people can find water, as they cross South Texas desert and ranchland.

"We saw the impact of the Texan sun and the absolute necessity of water, [as we worked at one of the few long-term migrant shelters]," Dutkiewicz said. "Someone else in my youth group put it really well. She said something like, 'When we were at the point of dehydration, we were able to drink something. [Migrating] people get to that point where they can't go on, and they aren't able to get water, and yet they still had to keep going. It's the idea of being at your breaking point and then still having to go further. That's why water is such a necessity.'"

In addition to learning from and serving with STHRC, the pilgrims visited the U.S.-Mexico border fence, the historic La Lomita Chapel, several border patrol and government sites, and other ministries that assist people on their migration journey, such as La Posada Providencia, an emergency shelter that provides refuge, education and emotional support.

During experiences like these pilgrimages, Hinojosa said that she hears people expressing hopelessness when they see the struggles that migrating people face. Participants often ask, "What can I do?"

"There's a lot you can do," Hinojosa said. "Seeing [what is happening at the border] with your own eyes and listening to God speaking here can make a difference. You can make a difference. We think we're just one person in a vast country — in a vast world. But we're a church, and being a church is not sitting in a pew. It's going out and being the hands and feet of Christ."

Mission Network invites you to embark on one of the many Just Peace Pilgrimages offered in 2025. To learn more, visit MennoniteMission.net/JustPeace or contact StephanieW@MennoniteMission.net.