“The border is everywhere”: Peace Pairs pilgrimage of hope at the border 

By Michelle Sherman
Pax Christi USA staff

In mid-December, an intergenerational group of Pax Christi USA members participated in an encuentro border delegation as part of the Jubilee Year of Hope. The 12 participants from across the United States are involved in local immigrant support and advocacy networks; several of the participants are immigrants themselves. The majority of the group were young adults (under 40) and almost all were part of the Pax Christi USA Peace Pairs program.

The goal of the pilgrimage was to facilitate encounters, to debunk myths and false news headlines, to gain factual information and personal anecdotes that allow participants to respond locally, to witness the Catholic presence and response in the borderlands, and to affirm that we are on Indigenous land. Participants met with Pax Christi El Paso, the Diocese of El Paso (including Auxiliary Bishop Anthony Celino); Annunciation House; Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center; Hope Border Institute; Maryknoll and Franciscan missioners; La Mujer Obrera; the Religious of the Assumption; Jesuits; historian David Romo, and more. Some members of the group were able to cross the border to Ciudad Juarez and meet with the migrants and community at the Juarez Cathedral with the Columban Border Ministry team. The group also joined an interfaith prayer vigil outside the federal courthouse in El Paso.

Annunciation House, Las Americas, and Hope Border Institute were all recognized at the Pax Christi International Peace Award ceremony in Florence, Italy, when Bishop Mark Seitz of El Paso was named the recipient of the 2025 prize.

Over the next few weeks, we will be releasing a series of reflections from some of the participants of the pilgrimage. The first of the reflections, written by Jeanelle Wheeler, is below.

• Reflection #2, Encounter and accompaniment, by Markayla Love
• Reflection #3, Building a culture of encounter, by Ryan Di Corpo
• Reflection #4, Pilgrimage to a different border, by Kim Redigan
• Reflection #5, Peacebuilding and migration justice, by Hugh Truempi

We are grateful to our generous donor who made this immersion trip possible.

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Dare to be holy

Jeanelle Wheeler
Pax Christi Young Adult Caucus
Pax Christi Rhode Island and Agape Community

“No tengo pelos en la lengua.” [I don’t have hairs on my tongue.]

We all sat together, entranced by the historian’s words. He explained, “It’s how we say in Spanish, ‘Don’t hold back.’” David Romo knew about truth-telling.

I sat on the edge of my folding chair at the El Paso church where David spoke. As I scribbled his words in my notebook, I caught a glimpse of the maroon sticker between its pages. It said, “Dare to be holy.” That was the message of the Assumption Sisters of Chaparral who had greeted us with delight earlier that day.

Don’t hold back. Dare to be holy. These messages were a prophetic call.

Our intergenerational delegation wanted to answer that call. So we came to the border to encounter many storytellers. One was David, a historian and son of Mexican immigrants. He joked that he was surprised that the Catholic schools hadn’t banned his latest book yet.

He began, “First, you’ve got to diagnose the poison.” 

We were there to witness the poison.

The sheen of freshly-added barbed wire atop the towering border wall.

The eerie silence of El Paso’s Annunciation House that once welcomed over 70 migrants daily. Now nearly none.

But according to David Romo, this poison isn’t new.

In 1916 there was a racial eugenics-inspired disinfection plant at the border, targeted at Mexicans crossing into the US. David told us of kerosene baths, toxic pesticides, and Zyklon B. He told us what is absent from our history books.

David asked, “Who has poisoned who?”

Meanwhile, today we see politicians let words like “pest” and “poison” drip from their lips as they point fingers at the migrant community.

They point at the border. They point at El Paso and Ciudad Juarez, which are like twin sisters who have been forcibly separated. The land known as El Paso was Mexican land. It is indigenous land. 

David said, “We didn’t cross the border. The border crossed us.”

On this trip, I got to cross the border. We walked across the Paso del Norte bridge. I peered down below the bridge to see the sharpness of the wall’s barbed wire, imagining blood pooling from the Earth’s wound. Meanwhile, the flow of the Rio Grande seemed reduced to a trickle. The birds didn’t notice. A cluster of black-necked stilts wandered freely in the river, dipping their mouths into the water. As the river dries, the wall grows.

When we officially reached Juarez, I was surprised by how obvious it was that we weren’t in the US any more. Vibrant fuschias and indigos lined the handmade goods and tamales of the market. Crowds of people lined the central square. The city was full of life.

When we visited migrants by the Catedral de Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe, I spoke in Spanish with a Honduran man who had been there for over a year. He told me that his four children, who have lived in the US for decades, are now terrified to leave their homes. 

I didn’t ask him if he wanted to cross the border. But I imagined he wanted to. I imagined that like the others here, he may have had an appointment scheduled at the border in January. There are many like him who went through official channels and completed paperwork, just to have the door slammed in their faces.

I walked back over the bridge. With my passport out, I was asked several questions. But it only took minutes. I was quickly let back inside. With every step, I was keenly aware of my privilege as a white American citizen. I was keenly aware of all those who cannot cross. 

David Romo told us to find the poison. But he also told us that once we identify that poison, we are called to find an antidote. 

How can we work to prescribe policies that are anti-venom? That are antidotes to the violence?

How can we address the immediate needs of the wounded?

As I write this reflection, I am flying home to Providence, far from the black-necked stilts and the great-tailed grackles. Back to a community I love. Back to a community that is grieving in the wake of a recent mass shooting at Brown University. The shooting happened just a few blocks from my apartment, the night before I flew to Texas. 

Throughout my time in El Paso, my heart was mourning my own community’s trauma as well as the border’s. I felt deeply. I felt God in my grief.

Living in a culture defined by a numb, throbbing fear, we need to actively resist this nation’s extensive apparatus of violence by deeply feeling. And deeply loving.

Jesus said, “Love your neighbor as you love yourself.” And as David Romo reminded us, this Mayan saying will help: “In lak’ech. You are the other me.” Remembering this is the first step. 

It’s time to heal.