Today, for the first time, I came face-to-face with the U.S. – Mexico Border: the peaceful, green, flowing Rio Grande that divides Eagle Pass, Texas, from Piedras Negras, Mexico. That the international boundary appears arbitrary must certainly have occurred to those who set it in 1848 as much as it does to me now. Even the new, 2-mile, $10 million border fence looks as out-of-place as the international bridge and waving flags of the United States and Mexico.

Paul Bailie, pastor of San Lucas Lutheran Church in Eagle Pass, reminded us of the realities of the border. While he travels into Mexico each Sunday afternoon to conduct worship services, easily moving in and out of the U.S., people a few feet away risk their lives by crossing the Rio Grande at night, in the dark.

No matter how much one may hear about it, the reality of privilege is sobering. It is as palpable as the third-generation Mexican-American Border Patrol agent who protected America’s shores as we gazed across them at Mexico.

I have never lived with the physical reality of a man-made boundary, and I cannot imagine wrestling with such a juxtaposition every day of my life. Food for thought this week…

Mark Horner