Hello! You've received this e-letter because either you or a team at your church expressed an interest in Frontera de Cristo and Café Justo. Please add mark@fronteradecristo.org to your address book so we'll be sure to land in your inbox each time! You may unsubscribe using the link at the bottom of this page if you no longer wish to receive our emails. View This Email as Webpage | | | |  | | |
Dear friends,
Father Bob Carney, founder of the "Healing Our Borders" prayer vigil and a good friend of Frontera de Cristo, often shared the wisdom he had learned from a Nicaraguan priest during a very difficult time: "En medio de la lucha, hay que festejar. / In the midst of the struggle, one must celebrate."
On August 15, we celebrated. It was a balmy 66 degrees at 5:45 am as folks on both sides of the border gathered for 5k run along the border wall, to kick off Friends Across Borders. The runners ran, separated by a concertina-draped, 18-foot steel barrier that has signs plastered on both sides that read "Danger Do Not Enter/Peligro No Entre." Defying the signs, runners from Douglas crossed into Mexico and finished the run side-by-side with the runners from Agua Prieta.
The day continued with yoga, an urban mesquite harvesting walk, a panel discussion of the Theology of Migration, oral histories, and finally a wonderful sunset celebration filled with music, dance, art, games, tamales, and aguas frescas. Everyone there experienced the distinctive vibe often felt during activities here in the borderlands: "One community, united in friendship."
There are lots of ways that you, too, can experience this sense of community. We welcome delegations of any size for a day or two—or longer—to visit our ministries and witness first-hand "one community." Or you can order Café Justo for your morning cup of very freshly roasted coffee. Or perhaps you've been longing to travel with us on our annual border-to-border excursion to Chiapas to witness coffee growing at its finest and meet the coffee farming families. We look forward to welcoming you!
| | |
Creation's Beauty, Government's Destruction
by Mark Adams, FDC Co-Coordinator
| |
EARLIER THIS SUMMER, a friend and I got lost in the beautiful and remote San Rafael Valley on our way to a happening in Lochiel, Arizona. We took a wrong turn off a dirt road and went on a road that washed out about a quarter mile from the border. We heard the driving of machinery and walked down a wash and over a hill to where our government is spending millions of dollars to wall off a 24-mile section of one of the last migratory corridors for animals along the Arizona/Sonoran border—not with just one wall, but two. Continue reading Mark's reflections and see more photos.
Read it on our Substack blog in English or en español and sign up to receive our blog.
| | |
One view of our government's destruction of the Sonoran Desert
(the cactus in the foreground is a "cane cholla" or, for the botanists among us,
cylindropuntia imbricata)
| | |
Countering the Negative Border Narrative:
A Photo Essay on the Friends Across Borders Event
in Agua Prieta and Douglas
by Todd Miller
| | Todd Miller went looking for a border gathering and found Border Patrol trucks kicking up dust on a road he’d been warned off before. He’d misread the flyer. The real event was across the line, in Agua Prieta, runners crossing at dawn, yoga by the wall, tamales, dancing, a 14-year-old’s drawing asking that peace prevail on earth. This is a photo essay on what the borderlands actually look like when the cameras aren’t looking for a war zone. | | Unfurling the UNIDOS/UNITED banner on both sides of the border. Photo by EPIX Films. | | |
Expanding the Children's Enrichment Ministry
by Mark Adams, FDC Co-Coordinator
| | |
THROUGHOUT THE FIRST HALF OF THIS YEAR, our Children's Enrichment Ministry has provided a safe and welcoming space for 138 children by providing opportunities for them to cultivate their academic, spiritual, social, and artistic lives and capabilities.
This summer, local artists provided the children with intensive painting classes and invited them to create a painting to submit in this year's International Peace Pals annual art exhibition whose theme is “Together in Peace.” Ninety-one of the children chose to submit their art work, which was featured in the Friends Across Borders celebration (watch the video).
Frontera de Cristo works in partnership with four local groups—New Hope Community Center, DouglaPrieta Trabaja, Iglesia Presbiteriana Lirio de los Valles (Lily of the Valley Presbyterian Church), and the city children's home—to make this ministry to children possible.
And we are now working with Iglesia El Salvador in Agua Prieta to open a fifth site in the coming months. The remaining capital needed for the startup is just under $15,000. Will you prayerfully consider making a donation to help make this children's ministry expansion possible? Just click the Donate Now button at the bottom of this newsletter.
| | The children's "Together in Peace" paintings were displayed on the border wall during the Friends Across Borders event on August 15. | | Join the 2026 Border-to-Border Delegation to Chiapas | | | | HAVE YOU HAD YOUR CUPPA CAFÉ JUSTO TODAY? At just $15 per pound, you can have the freshest, most recently roasted coffee around! Shipping is included in the price, and we appreciate a minimum of 2 pounds per order, so that we may keep the cost of shipping down. Orders placed by 8:00am on Tuesdays will be shipped on Thursday of the same week. Click here to order. | | Help Us Welcome Them With Coffee | | "THE LOVE MERCY, DO JUSTICE" initiative was created by Frontera de Cristo and Café Justo to provide coffee for migrant shelters along the southern border. Thousands of women and men each week are greeted with a cup of coffee, a meal, and vital medical attention when they are repatriated into Mexico. You can help support this effort with a donation to Love Mercy, Do Justice. | | | Follow us on Social Media! | | To access the QR codes in this newsletter, first download, to your cell phone, the "QR Code and Barcode Scanner" from Google Play. (You can use the same phone app to scan special sale barcodes at the grocery store!) | | Borders: Places of Encounter, Opportunity, and Hope | | |
to Support the Ministries of Frontera de Cristo
FRONTERA DE CRISTO
PO BOX 1112
DOUGLAS, AZ 85608
| | | | |
