It is wonderful to see you! I have missed you and I have missed being with you here in worship. However, I am grateful beyond words for the opportunity to have the months of sabbatical for research, study and writing and also to have some time for relaxation. As was announced last week, I have completed the first draft of my dissertation on the subject of congregation mission involvement along the Mexico/U.S. border. Over the next few months, I will be working with my advisor, Dr. Philip Wickeri at San Francisco Theological Seminary, to edit the material in preparation for submission to the Doctor of Ministry review committee in November. The committee will make its decision by January or February and I hope to participate in graduation in late May.

During my research time, I met fascinating people and heard some incredible stories about life in the border area which has been so transformed in the past thirty years. It is a culture all its own with a mixture of people from all parts of Mexico and Central America, people who been forced to the border with hopes and dreams of a chance to make enough money to survive and support their families back home. The 2000-mile stretch is deeply influenced by its proximity to the United States and has become economically dependant on the 3500 maquiladoras, the foreign-owned factories that are encouraged to be there by the low wages, about $6 per day, and the limited regulations and taxes placed on the companies. The newest industrial parks are beautiful and as technologically up-to-date as similar parks here in California. The dichotomy is that workers leave the spotless Samsung, Mattell, or Chrysler plants to go home to the makeshift colonia neighborhoods and gather with their children in a one-room dirt-floor house built with garage doors or shipping palettes without water, electricity, heat, or plumbing. Because families can’t afford the necessary building materials, they are dependent upon volunteer groups as our youth who spoke last Sunday to offer their time with your financial support to provide a two-room house with a cement floor and a roof that does not leak.

During January, I was in Agua Prieta and Nogales, Mexico with a Presbyterian supported educational organization called BorderLinks. The ten days were spent learning about life at the border in face-to-face, hands-on ways. We toured the Border Patrol site at Nogales, Arizona, the Otis Elevator factory in Nogales, Mexico, and the Gigante Supermarket comparing prices to those in our Safeway in the U.S.. We shared meals in homes of human rights workers and factory workers, middle class homes and also two-room homes with cardboard ceilings and outside kitchens. We reflected on Bible passages with local Presbyterian and Roman Catholic parish members. In Agua Prieta, Lety Mendoza, a member of the Holy Family (Sagrada Familia) Catholic church welcomed me into her home with her family for three nights. It is her story, one beacon of light, that I would like to share with you this morning.

About ten years ago, Lety and her husband Ignacio moved to Agua Prieta from southern Mexico in search of work and a better life for their young daughter, Carmen. Today, Ignacio delivers milk seven days each week from a pasteurizing plant to super markets. They live in a modest two-bedroom home with indoor plumbing and kitchen — upper middle class by most standards.

In the early ‘70s, many large clothing manufacturers moved to the border area to take advantage of low wages — about $3.50 - $5.50 per day — slightly less than salaries today for similar work. Companies including Levi-Strauss and Kayser-Roth established their own manufacturing sites. At the same time, many small contract sewing houses were started that provided services for larger companies. In the mid-‘90s, Lety worked for one such sewing maquila in Agua Prieta. At its peak, there were about one hundred-fifty employees. The owner lived in San Diego and, unknown to his workers, he planned to move the plant to Tijuana closer to his home. Slowly, he secretly moved equipment a little at a time to his new site. Lety and others would come to work on a Monday morning and notice that one or two of the newest machines were gone! When asked, he told them that business was down and he had sold the machines. It didn’t take them long to sense trouble. They suspected that he was planning to close their plant and avoid telling them or compensating them, which was against Mexican law. When twenty-five employees were laid off, Lety went to Hermosillo to discuss representation with officials of the national labor union. She told union workers of the employee cutbacks at the maquila. The union put a blockage on removal of any more equipment. However, machinery kept disappearing. Finally, on September 17, 1998, the employees called a strike. The workers blocked all the plant doors. There, Lety met Paula and Eliza who became critically important in the organization of the strike. Workers remained present night and day for three months, which was the time period required by law before a legal case could be pursued. The union allowed them to seek other jobs after the three-month period. Most employees needed to move on and find other work as soon as possible to support their families. However, five men continued to guard the plant at night and four women did so in the daytime. The team of people took turns sitting in front of the building entrance twenty-four hours each day for over one year! A tented area provided protection for the striking workers from hot sun or rainy weather. Support teams brought food and coffee and other supplies. Fifty workers participated in the protest with Lety. With the help of donations salary was paid to the strike guards. The manager never returned. He fled the area and a warrant was out for his arrest in Mexico. It was learned that he had committed the same crime before at another maquila he had owned. Though the legal case against him was fought for two years, in the end the employees received no compensation. They were only awarded the right to own the remaining sewing machinery to sell or use. They tried to sell the units but could find no buyers so they divided the machines among themselves. With a small business loan from the Presbyterian church, Lety and her friends Paula and Eliza started their own company, a small sewing cooperative called SEW GOOD with eight women working in Lety’s home. They had no other choice since they had been blacklisted and would find it impossible to get employment at other maquilas. Inquiries were made to the North Atlantic Free Trade Association (NAFTA) asking them to require new companies to be bonded. With bonding, employees would be assured of the government-required compensation if a maquila suddenly closed. However, NAFTA’s response was negative. Lety and her friends were told, "Requiring bonding would deter investment in Mexico."

Now, the story is not over. As a result of this experience, Lety and Eliza began organizing women in their church and neighborhood. Approximately 13,000 people work in the 35-40 maquilas located in Agua Prieta. Most of them are young Mexican women between the ages of 16 and 26. They are paid about $25-35/wk for 48 hours of work. Lety’s new endeavor, which she has been involved in now for about two years, is the Maquila Organizing Project. In an unusual partnership between Protestants and Catholics in Mexico, the Lily of the Valley Presbyterian Church in Agua Prieta and the Presbyterian Border Ministry have provided some funding in support of this project. Along with other women in her Catholic parish, Lety meets with workers in small home meetings to educate them to know their rights by Mexican law, improve working conditions and living standards, and build solidarity networks of support.

"Is a lamp brought in to be put under a bushel basket or under the bed? Surely, it is to be put on the lamp-stand. For there is nothing hidden, except to be disclosed; nothing kept secret except to be brought to light." Lety is a quiet woman but she is confident and strong. Though her year-long strike might have appeared to be a losing battle, her life is a light to those struggling to work and support their families and an inspiration to her congregation, including the priests who serve the parish. In Jesus’ ministry, particularly as told in the Gospel according to Mark, he came to be with the outcast, the marginalized, the oppressed. Those on the outside of society were on the inside of his ministry. "Who are my mother and my brothers?" Jesus asked. Then answering his own question, he said, "Anyone who does the will of God, that person is my brother and sister and mother."¹

As the spring months unfolded following my time with Lety and the business scandals began to rock our nation, we learned of Sherron Watkins at Enron and Coleen Rowley in the F.B.I. On a completely different scale in an entirely different place, Watkins and Rowley took great professional and personal risks to confront systems that supported misplaced power. Anita Hill, professor at Brandeis University, wrote in the New York Times recently, "As whistle-blowers the two women expressed certain values and had the conviction to act on values that were apparently in conflict with those of the leaders in their institutions."² Then in a statement that likely has personal meaning to Hill given her own battles, she said, "Like those who have had to challenge workplace bias, Ms. Rowley and Ms. Watkins differed from their superiors in their notions of appropriate institutional conduct. The women ultimately found that their chances for bringing change to their workplaces existed only outside those workplaces."² Soul sisters with Lety Mendoza in Agua Prieta, Mexico, but from such different worlds. Factory workers in Mexico toil for half a day to earn enough money to buy a dozen eggs while Army Secretary Thomas White testified this week about selling his Enron stock for somewhere between $10-20 million. The gap between the rich and the poor in our world continues to grow. Who will challenge the system so that the lilies of the field will truly know that God’s heart is set on saving justice for all people?³

As Christians, the lamp of Jesus Christ illumines us. We worship him and are sons and daughters of the new human being yet there are times when we avoid risks and hide that light inside ourselves. Would Jesus recognize us as his sisters and brothers? The light needs to shine out from our lives unmasking illusions, exposing lies, and demonstrating God’s love for all people. Some of us are in positions similar to Watkins and Rowley. We do have the authority and power to be aware of situations in our professional lives that take advantage of the less powerful and need to be changed. Do we have the strength and the commitment to confront those issues? God promises to be with us when we do. Others of us are more like Lety. We might suddenly find ourselves in the right place at the right time to stand up against negative powers in society and let God’s light shine through us as we respond. It is critical to our life as a faith community. It is also an important way for us to model our faith for our children who meet unkind and unfair situations on the schoolyard, the soccer field and in their social groups. In their Sunday School lesson this morning they are learning about the lamp of Jesus Christ and the strength of their own shining light. I invite you to remember back to your Sunday School and church camp days and join with me in singing the song our children are also singing this morning.

Let us pray…

God, we open our lives to your lamp of justice-seeking love in Jesus Christ. May we be strengthened and empowered to share your light wherever we walk in your world. Amen.

1. Mark 3:35

2. Hill, Anita, New York Times Editorial/Op-Ed, "Insider Women With Outsider Values", June 6, 2002.

3. Matthew 6:28-34