Neto wrote:temporal1 wrote:… i'd read of Catholics helping with immigrants in the U.S. - these from Mexico. ….
This is the sort of activism / civil disobedience that I was also involved with while I was an activist-pacifist, assisting in hiding illegals from immigration officials. Back then, however, many had fled their own countries for political reasons – to escape oppressive regimes, or from (home-grown) terrorist groups (like Shining Light in Peru).
Regarding other’s comments that touched somewhat on cooperation with left-wing organizations, during our time living with the Amazonian tribe in Brazil, I sometimes found myself working toward the same goals as the Marxist “mission” CIMI in Brazil. We both advocated against illegal timber & fishing operations, for instance, or sales of liquor to the Indians. We also both supported demarcation of Indian territories.
I just saw the news article about this man's death. He was killed by an arrow while attempting to help protect an threatened tribal group from encroaching outsiders.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-54109584
I read an article (in Portugese) after I saw this one, because I think that I met him once. The CIMI (a Left-leaning, basically Marxist, 'missionary' organization somewhat affiliated with the Catholic church in Brazil) article I read mentioned that he had worked for many years in the Arawan area, and Banawa is a member of that very small language family. I'm pretty sure it was him, who came to our village once while FUNAI (the Brazilian Indian Agency) was maintaining a military station up river from us (actually, up the Piranha River, into which the Banawa River empties) to prevent outsider from going into the area where the uncontacted tribe Himerima had been sighted. He was not pleased to find us there in the village, and I would not have met him if I had not gone over to meet him on my own. He once told another Arawan tribal man who sometimes came to our village that he shouldn't wear shorts, that he should live like his ancestors. But the biggest thing of that organization was to 'protect' isolated peoples from missionaries, and to encourage others to return to their traditional religions. So he was an enemy of what we were trying to accomplish there, and several killings of back water Brazilians were accredited to him and his team. But he was still a person who had dedicated his life to a lot of the same goals we had - to protect the tribal areas from invasions by gold miners, wood cutters, and other illegal activities like destructive fishing practices. In that sense, we were 'on the same side'.
If it was indeed him that I met, from what I can recall as to when this meeting took place, it would have been toward the beginning of his 30 some years of work in the Arawan area.
Congregation: Gospel Haven Mennonite Fellowship, Benton, Ohio (Holmes Co.) a split from Beachy-Amish Mennonite.
Personal heritage & general theological viewpoint: conservative Mennonite Brethren.