![]() ![]() The church wouldn’t send anyone to a war zone, but it does have missionaries in places such as Pakistan and Afghanistan, near Taliban-controlled areas. Brent Whitefield, pastor for missions and outreach. Up to 60 volunteers with Corona’s Northpoint Evangelical Free Church will travel to the Mexicali area in April, said the Rev. Volunteers from Magnolia Avenue Baptist Church had concerns about an upcoming mission to León, Mexico, but felt more comfortable after the Riverside church investigated the crime level there and found the central Mexican city to be relatively safe, said Pastor Ron Harvey. ![]() Some individual Inland churches continue to go to Mexico. “So many people have canceled that there’s a greater need, because they used to get a lot more help,” he said. LeDuc said the Mexico missions are especially vital now. Much of the work is on the Texas side of the border - where the poverty and need are also high - and that’s where participants slept on most nights, partly for safety reasons, he said. Participants never travel after dark in Mexico, plan routes in advance to avoid risky stretches of road and don’t go to the most dangerous places, such as Ciudad Juárez, LeDuc said. “We evaluate what we should and shouldn’t do and take precautions.” “We’ve never once not felt safe,” he said. ![]() Power Ministry’s roots stretch to the 1970s, with a mission at Victoria Community Church, which later became The Grove.Ībout 130 people - most from the Inland area - went on two Power Ministry trips over the past two weeks, said Mark LeDuc, a coordinator of the missions. Crossroads views the Power Ministry trip as a safer option because the ministry has years of experience in Mexico and long-term relationships with communities there, Butler said. The University of California Education Abroad Program will not give credit to undergraduate students who conduct research in most of northern Mexico, said Toby Miller, a UC Riverside professor and academic director for the program in Mexico.Ĭorona’s Crossroads Christian Church canceled its Mexico trips about two years ago after warnings from its contacts there, said Kasey Butler, spokeswoman for the church.īut six Crossroads staff and volunteers were in the Mexico-Texas border region until Wednesday on a mission with Riverside-based Power Ministry. The Cal State system suspended its study-abroad program in Mexico after a 2010 State Department travel warning about parts of the country. Religious organizations are not the only ones worried about violence in Mexico. But an increasing number of victims are innocent people, many “in the wrong place at the wrong time,” she said. Even in dangerous areas, most victims are linked to the drug trade. Starr said organizations that cancel all trips to Mexico are overreacting, because much of the country remains safe. The security situation is constantly shifting, with violence waning in one area and spiking elsewhere, said Pamela Starr, director of the U.S.-Mexico Network at USC. The Grove has 12 missions this summer to other countries and may still travel to other parts of Mexico later this year if they are considered safe, Barnes said. We have deep relationships with people there.” “It was a very painful decision,” Barnes said. The economy may have been a small factor, but the violence appears to be by far the primary reason, he said.Ĭulbertson, a professor of missions and world evangelism at Southern Nazarene University in Oklahoma, coordinated a trip of about 120 people to northern Mexico last month, but he and his associates were ready to cancel the mission at the last minute if the area became unsafe. Precise figures on trip cancellations are unavailable, but Howard Culbertson, an expert on religious missions, estimates that the number of missions to Mexico has fallen by more than half in the past few years. ![]() More than 50,000 people have died in drug-related violence in the past five years, according to Mexican media reports. Highland’s Immanuel Baptist Church and the Seventh-day Adventist La Sierra University in Riverside are among other Inland institutions that have stopped going to Mexico. consulate there warned of a spike in drug battles. Riverside’s Grove Community Church, which has been going to Mexico for 35 years, recently canceled a planned trip for this month to the Guadalajara area after pastors, missionaries and the U.S. As drug-related violence continues to ravage parts of Mexico, a mounting number of churches in the Inland area and nationwide are canceling missions for fear that volunteers might get caught up in the maelstrom. ![]()
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