Back in June, we had filed the appropriate paperwork to be able to finalize Isabel’s adoption, hoping to get a date at Los Angeles County’s Edmund Edelman Children’s Court, right across the freeway from Cal. State Los Angeles.

When everything was discovered about her health in July, we had to put all that on hold in order to qualify for the Adoption Assistance Program (AAP), which can only happen before an adoption is finalized. We’ve sent in all of the appropriate forms and reports - thanks in great part to the help of our adoption agency Bethany Christian Services - and are just waiting to be contacted by public health nurse.

In the meantime, (more…)

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“I have heard members of the House of Representatives say, ‘Choking off the jobs of illegals will cause them to starve and force them to leave our country,’ I stand with hundreds of thousands of ministerial colleagues who will go to jail if necessary rather than to starve 12 million people and their 3 million American citizen children.”

This from Rev. Luis Cortés, Jr., president of Esperanza USA, at one of the Senate Judiciary Field Hearing on immigration in Philadelphia July 5, 2006, regarding the House Bill H.R. 4437 and the Senate Bill 2611. I’d love to know which members of the House he heard saying that.

*Post title reference

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…when you send your only daughter to college. The LA Times tells a heart-felt - if not melodramatic - story about a Latina from Highland Park named Betty Perez who decides to go to college on the East Coast. I think it is a telling tale of the Latino/a college experience on (at least) two fronts.

One, it highlights many of the family dynamics & paradigms - the blessings & the challenges - that Latino students bring with them when they are in college. (more…)

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I posted about this last year. They are accepting submissions now for the film festival in November. Check it out.

CINE SIN FIN: 12th ANNUAL EAST LOS ANGELES CHICANA/O FILM FESTIVAL ~ Nov.6 -11-06′

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE <> CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS

The Annual East Los Angeles Chicana/o Film Festival will be held the week of November 6 -11, 2006 at various locations throughout the Greater Los Angeles area. In addition, Cine Sin Fin continues its monthly screenings at Casa De Sousa Café located in the Historical Placita Olvera, Los Angeles; and at select national venues such as the Cheech Marin “Chicano Art Exhibit” in Fort Lauderdale, Florida; also, Albuquerque, NM; Coachella; San Jose; Visalia; Pico Rivera and many more to come.

Deadline: September 16, 2006

Requirements: send any length (format VHS or DVD) film with synopsis and press kit (if available), to:

Cine Sin Fin c/o A La Brava P.R., Inc. 673 South Fickett Street Los Angeles, California 90023

All films submitted and selected will become part of our library and may be shown at all our venues; we will respect all requests to do otherwise. For further information regarding Cine Sin Fin submission guidelines, internship and volunteer opportunities, or to be a sponsor call (323) 265-2344 or for further information go to www.alabrava. com or contact at cinesinfin@hotmail.com

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I think he is hilarious. Check this out if you’ve never heard him. As “part of” my sabatical, I’m going to try to get some guy friends together to see him perform at the Universal Ampitheatre on October 8th. Let me know if you want to come.

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“…it is difficult to understand how any American can consider law-and-order “supreme” when one of this nation’s most celebrated moments was the hooliganism we call the Boston Tea Party, and when this nation itself was founded on overthrowing not just a law but an entire government. Our Declaration of Independence is nothing but an explanation to the world for this law-defying act.”

This quote was from a great follow-up article in Christianity Today about the “law-and-order” response of many Christians in today’s immigration debate. As I stated earlier, I’m not a believer in random lawlessness. I don’t believe, however, that the law of government - on its own - is the supreme dictation of God’s moral law.

Also interesting from the article was a brief list of biblical lawbreakers-as-heroes. The one that stood out to me was Rahab, who hid the spy’s in Jericho during their survey of the land. Now I’m strongly against the atrocity & injustice experienced in much of human trafficking industry, but reading the Rahab story through the lens of immigration, would that make Rahab an early-form coyote?

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My dad - ever diligent in internet research & in his networking - sent me an article from the NY Times Opinions about the historical roots of the current immigration dialogue. Here was one quote that caught me:

“The Hispanic world did not come to the United States,” Carlos Fuentes observes. “The United States came to the Hispanic world. It is perhaps an act of poetic justice that now the Hispanic world should return.“

The whole article is worth the read. While I don’t think you need to go back 500 years to establish a good immigration policy for today, I do think the article provides an interesting perspective on understanding the cycle of history, particularly as it relates to the immigration rhetoric of today.

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Vero and I went to the Hollywood Bowl for the Mariachi USA festival on Saturday night. We had a great time, just relaxing and listening to at least 5-6 different mariachi groups play. The concert started at 6pm, but the Bowl really didn’t fill-up until 7pm. CPT? LST? Go figure.

It reminded me of when I started listening to and loving mariachi music. When I started learning Spanish 10 years ago, I was working full-time as a Work Comp claims adjuster, plus doing a volunteer gig with InterVarsity. There wasn’t a lot of free time in my schedule to learn a language. So… (more…)

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Here it is. Or at least here is the beginning of my new blog-in-progress: SpanglishGringo.com! Thank you for all of you who voted on my old blog to help me settle this out.

While I won’t reveal the final vote tally - and it was close - over half of the votes included something “gringo” in the URL. “SpanglishGringo.com” was one of my top 2 choices. Let me explain why.

I like “Spanglish Gringo” because it captures the bilingual-ish & cross-cultural nature of my world. Despite my wife’s constant encouragement, I’m more accurately fluent in spanglish than I am in Spanish, though I still hold out my dream & goal of being able to preach in Spanish, as well as our hope & plan to raise our daughter (& and future kids that Jesus gives us) to be - at the very least - bilingual in both Spanish & English. For the past 10 years or so, my world has become increasinlgy Spanglish - at home with my wife, our family, our friends, with our neighbors and church. And while several books have been written - Living in Spanglish, The Future is Mestizo, Hispanic Nation, Latino Inc., - about the Spanglish experience for Latinos, espeically in the U.S., this blog will express the Spanglish experience of a Gringo living in an increasingly multi-ethnic (and particularly Latino) world.

And though in some contexts “gringo” can be understood as a derogatory reference for White Americans, it is not inherently so. It itself is a spanglish-esque word that says many things - outsider, foreigner or white guy, but also can be used con carino to communicate about someone who is entering into Latino culture, who recognizes themselves as an outsider - and the good & the bad they bring - but who also sees enters in authentically, sincerely, genuinely looking to both learn from & invest in this new culture. That, too, will be the perspective that comes on this blog.

I’m proud to be a spanglish gringo and I’m not pretending to be anything more or less. Hope you enjoy the new blog!

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I’ve been meaning to post this link for a couple weeks. The LA Times had an article in their Sunday magazine (link is to the author’s site) in April on a club at UCLA for undocumented immigrant students. It’s important to put a human face on the immigration debate. Here’s an excerpt:

If archers and anime fans could have student clubs at UCLA, why not undocumented immigrants? They called themselves IDEAS (Improving Dreams, Equality, Access and Success) and gathered weekly, talking about all manner of frustrations: how mortifying it is to get carded at an 18-and-older show and have no ID . . . How frustrating it is when people make fun of you because you can’t drive, when you can’t get a license in California. How you hate lying about stupid things. How sometimes, even though you would never tell them, you blame your parents for coming here the way they did and making your life so difficult.

But the conversations usually turned pragmatic. Some administrative staff in the finance and registration offices were unaware of AB 540 and openly hostile to students whose files lacked a Social Security number, telling them that their admission must have been a mistake or that they didn’t belong in college.

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Even though Congress is on vacation (for Easter?), the demand for immigration reform rolls on. I just found out that tomorrow is being called the “National Day of Action for Immigrant Rights.” There is going to be a candelight vigil & procession at 5pm at La Placita [Olvera] Church. This is co-sponsored by: CARECEN, CHIRLA, CLUE, Dolores Mission, Korean Resource Center, NAKASEC, SEIU 1877, SEIU 434B, Southern California District Council of Laborers.Though I’ve posted a lot on immigration in the past year, I’ve yet to really dive into the recent activity surrounding HR-4437, the House-sponsored bill that has been the source of all of the rallies. Even though I’m generally pro-amnesty, and warming up to Bush’s guest-worker ideas, I’m actually glad that the Senate bill died on Friday. It would have only reinforced the underground counterfeit document economy. Which is sad, since there seems to be so much focus on legality, without really talking about morality & values.Sad.Anyway, I realize that it is easy to be another voice of rhetoric & ideology, so I’m trying to think more about policy & tangible steps for reform. Other than workplace enforcement & making it a felony to hire or exploit undocumented workers, I’m still figuring out the balance of issues as it relates to reforming the system of immigration. When the light bulb goes on, I’ll post more.

MORE: I just read this WSJ article by none other than Arnold Schwarzenegger. He writes:

“A compassionate immigration policy will acknowledge that immigrants are just like us: They’re moms and dads looking for work, wanting to provide for their kids. Any measure that punishes charities and individuals who comfort and help immigrants is not only unnecessary, but un-American.”

Way to throw down the “un-American” gauntlet, Arnold!!

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READ: Barrio Prophets intro + (a), (b), (c) and (d).
As with the recounting of any event, there are the stats and there are the stories. On Friday, at the Cumbre de Alabanza - The Heart of a Barrio Prophet, the stats were exciting:

• over 130 people attended, including:
• students & staff from at least 13 campuses,
• plus youth leaders & pastors from 5 or 6 churches,
• and a dozen or so Latino alumni from IV,
• even a few parents & families,
• and 35 to 45 people that stood up, saying “I want to be a Barrio Prophet” in their barrio or campus or in their family.

And then there are the stories. In his message, Abner held up a stuffed bear from Starbucks that was wearing a frog suit. [Read “Osito, que paso“] He said, “When I think of a bear, I think ‘majestic, big, beautiful, ferocious’. Bears rule the forest: they eat berries, they punk bees for their honey, they even punk happy campers out of their food, bears eat trout and salmon.”

“But you see, someone at Starbucks corporate headquarters in Seattle Washington thought it would be a cute idea to put a frog suit on this guy. Frog! Frogs are at the bottom of the food chain, they spend their lives hopping away from every predator in the forest, and they eat worms and mosquito. A frog suit!“

“You see, someone put a frog suit on this bear, and in doing so they robbed him of his dignity, of his potential, of his rightful place in the grand scheme of the forest. Every time you and I settle for less than what we are—when we don’t live up to our god-given potential, when we go out and protest the system without having solutions to the problems, when we let others define who we are—we put on a frog suit.”

At the end of the night, student after student came down the center isle to pronounce their verbal commitment - “I want to be a barrio prophet,” - making the stand to tear off the frog suit and uncover the potential God has put in them - not just for themselves privately, but publicly for the campus, their families and the barrios, neighborhoods and place where they live.

And all of the students’ stories. The story of Natalie, our only student in attendance from CSULA, said, “We really need to have something like this on campus.” Or the story of Carlos, a youth our church that came, said, “I never realized how much I was like Jeremiah, or how much I had to learn from him.”

Or the story of Stacey, a student leader from Redlands who I got to pray for, who shared, “I know that the Lord is leading me to be a Barrio Prophet and to come on staff with InterVarsity.” Or of Cindy, another student from Redlands, who brought up her friend Hedi, to pray for healing for her brother who is in the hospital, praying “Give her your peace and show her your love as you heal her brother.”

There is the story of Francisco, a student leader from the UCLA La Fe Bible study that provided all of the snacks for the event, who told me, “We all felt challenged with joy to give this as our offering - free of charge - so that the money raised could go to help out future La Fe events.” Or the story of Lupita, currently a 4th grader, saying “Yes, I will” when I asked her if she would be part of the next generation of Lation college students.

These are stories of God raising up a generation of barrio prophets - called from the barrio, called to the barrio, or to their campus, or their families - to be God’s messengers of hope.

La Fe logo - InterVarsity

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