“Everyone should see this film.” “It’s an emotional story about migrant families and what they have gone through.” “It’s the most impactful documentary I have seen about immigration.” These are a few of the responses viewers gave after they saw the documentary, Exodus, which is now being presented in the Washington, DC, area by CPT volunteers and the director of the CAME migrant shelter in Agua Prieta, Sonora, Mexico.
The film-maker, Bijoyini Chaterjee, says that the documentary looks at what happened at CAME in 2019 as the shelter was “filling up with families from the Mexican state of Guerrero. Shelter director Adalberto Ramos (Betto) is appalled to see entire families with young children and babies coming to seek political asylum in the US. In his 20-plus years of sheltering and protecting migrants and refugees from all over the world, he has never seen families with children of all ages seeking protection at his shelter. Betto and other shelter workers hear stories of random killings, disappearances and forced displacement of entire villages, all without redress and all without a word from Mexican media.”
Exodus also examines questions of why people are leaving their homes, what historical, social, and economic forces drive people north to the US border, and what are the root causes of the violence from which migrating people are fleeing.
“For Betto, the shelter workers, and activists, protecting vulnerable migrants is an act of resistance”, says Biyojini. “For the migrant refugees, participating in this film is a meaningful act of resilience.”
Pray that the people who watch this documentary can better understand the motives and actions of migrating people. Pray that migrants find a safe place to live their lives. Pray that the US government implements more just immigration policies.
