We Share the Same Sky

 SATURDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2023

Last full day in Tucson. Our first order of business is to visit Casa Alitas in Tucson. This huge facility is processing center for Temporary Asylum seekers, for the purpose of checking them in and getting them into the computer system, meeting any immediate needs and releasing them to their sponsors- ideally within 72 hours. 

Founded in 2014, it was started entirely by volunteers.  For the first 6 years, they saw a slow increase i the daily number of asylum-seekers. By 2021, they were seeing 100-150 per day. In 2022, it rose to 300-800 per day and this year, they have seen as many as 1200 per day! They have quickly ramped up and now have staff and around 800 volunteers. While the majority still tend to be from South and Central America, Cuba, and Mexico, of late there are increasing numbers of folks from India, Africa (Senegal and Mauritania, especially); Eastern Europe, Russia, Afghanistan, Nepal, and Bangladesh. 

Caleb, one of the Operation Managers, walked us through the process.  

Offloaded from a bus, single men are separated from single women and families. Everyone is given food while they wait to be entered into the computer system. They are then tested for COVID and given any minor medical attention. Signs dot the walls with instructions in every language imaginable. Handmade posters of encouragement are found along the way.  

They then must reach their sponsor- the person responsible for them while they await their asylum trial that will take years for a date to be assigned.  Women and children wait at a hotel. 
Once they make contact with their sponsor, travel arrangements are made and they are taken to the the airport or bus station to make their way there.  They are given three weeks to get to their sponsor  and provide a court date to Casa Alitas. 

The facility was packed with people of all ages as we made our way through. We were wearing masks, so could only smile at people with our eyes.  Little faces looked up at us and my heart broke as I imagined what they had already been through just getting here. They come from all over representing unknowable stories of oppression, danger and fear.  But wherever they come from they are alike in one way. They are under the cover of the same sky. 

Despite hundreds of people being "processed", the atmosphere was calm. Dozens of volunteers were giving out food and clothing,  administering COVID tests, arranging plane flights- calmly, pleasantly.  It had to have been a relief after God-knows-what chaos they had seen up to this point.  They had made it! Who knows what awaits in their legal process (less than 1% of all asylum-seekers are granted asylum- at which time, if rejected, they will be deported home).     

As our group was discussing it all later, our reactions were a mixture of anger, hope and happiness at what we had seen there. But one thing was clear. Caleb and his cadre of staff and volunteers are saints in the Arizona desert. 

Our last two official stops were at Southside Presbyterian Church in Tucson- on Saturday afternoon for a briefing by Leslie Carlson and again on Sunday for worship.

On March 24, 1982, two years to the day after the assassination of Archbishop Romero in El Salvadore, the Rev. John Fife and his small congregation of indigenous Tohono O'Odom, Mexican and Anglo people, "stood up to the most powerful government in the world", as current pastor Alison Harrington said in worship on Sunday. He involved the press and declared his church to be a "sanctuary" and resisting arrest for protecting migrants seeking asylum. It was the start of the "sanctuary movement" in the '80's. It was a great way to end our trip- worshiping with this vibrant community which still lives up to this legacy.